Millionaire Challenge

Listerbelle

Oh no! I am so sorry to learn of this LL. Please look after yourself x

lessonlearned

Thanks. I feel a lot better today but am just taking it easy for a few days.

Muhren

Hope you are fully recovered now LL?

On a much more minor note about cars, I smashed my wing mirror off reversing onto my drive tonight. Something I have done a thousand times before without issue, I'm going to blame the heat! That is probably going to cost a couple of hundred quid to sort out as I don't think it is covered by the leasing company!!!!

Kayalana99

Hope all is well LL.

Our finances were a bit up in the air but everything is coming together now and from August we are substantially better off, I did plan on getting rid of my eBay but after a few changes we will be saving £250 a month - which seems a fair amount but when I work out what we need for the holiday, xmas and car insurance/mot/tax (nothing that needs paying for straight away, but need to put money away) it basically means all our savings will end up getting put towards the above.

Also includes 50 a month into our house fund, as we want to make home improvements for when we come to rent it out but hoping we can up this figure somehow, perhaps once some other pots are filled or linked with below if I decide to carry on.

This was including me closing down my eBay and no longer adding the wage I withdraw to our income, I think normally what happens is I don't tend to touch the profits of my business so I take big chunks out to pay for things like the above - but without my eBay running we'd not have that luxury...so do I carry on and juggle my eBay with my photography, degree and kids? Or do I cut the ties and close the eBay so I can focus on my future...it's a hard decision as I believe the best one is to close the eBay down but then I think about the amount of ££ we would be better off if it was kept open.

- although just to be clear, we would manage now without the eBay but the extra money would mean we would be able to say, get that kitchen a bit faster or our next house deposit together.

The other option is to raise prices, and let it fizzle out in it's own time (but make more money on the orders I do make) either way, I still owe paypal 1.6k from the loan I took out - so I'm not taking a wage out the business anymore to get this paid of ASAP. The debt will not see the new year.

I do worry for Xmas as not only do I have a string of weddings late august/Sept, my degree starts in Oct and I'm looking at doing 6-7 essays before the end of December alongside doing my xmas rush for eBay....I'm just one person after all...

Broken_Biscuits

Hey, hope everyone is winning at both life and personal finance. I did a quick count up and can now say I'm worth more than an eight of a million and all before my 35th birthday. The markets have reacted well to brexit and both my pensions and shares isa have coped well with a falling pound.

In a post in this thread, from December 2015, I wrote that to have 125k by December 2016 would be the best stretching target i could hope to achieve, but I'm now a few thousand ahead of this early thanks to a few funds being up by 20% to 40%. it seems funds being calculated in foreign currency and then converted back into a week GBP only adds to the success of those funds... Oh and sticking with a 40% saving rate probably helps too.

I've got a couple of grand of expenses coming up for some home improvements and the markets could collapse any time, but as it stands I look on track for improving my net worth by more than my salary in 2016... the same thing happened in 2015 too, it would be a very nice tradition to keep that going for sure!

Dec 2013 NW 68k
Dec 2014 NW 82.5k
Dec 2015 NW 110k
Dec 2016 NW 135k (new target)

Currently about 13% on track.

PoorGuyNextDoor

Wow, a 67k gain in 3 years is some doing. Any advice??

Im miles behind (although seem quite young on these pages at 25?) so i may have a bit more time on my side. Im paying off £1400 a month which sees over £1,000 off the balances once interest is accounted for. Iv got £45k to pay off then i can crack on with the first(of many!!) millions!!! Off to bed now, need a good day at work tomorrow to set my week up nicely.

Will be back in the next few days once i suss out some short and long term financial goals.

lessonlearned

Good morning everyone........lovely to hear from you all.

BIscuits, that's cracking progress. Well done you.

Kaya....busy as always. Don't overdo it sweetheart, as you say you are only one person. You don't want to risk burn out. Whether or not to close down eBay. That's a tricky one, yes it's nice to have the extra money but you do have to factor in time costs, not just what is costing you now but also what they called "missed opportunity costs".

If you can manage well enough with the money you have coming in it might be better to focus on the businesses that offer better long term prospects. Can you make cost savings elsewhere to improve cash flow so you could give up eBay. Just an idea.

Poor Guy. Paying £1400 on your credit cards is fantastic. Especially as you are only 25. You will be minted before you know it.

Just one thing and I'm sure you have already thought about it, but your interest seems very high. Is there any way you could restructure your debts so that you pay less interest.

I am a great believer in cheap interest, interest free is even better.:rotfl:

Well I have been struggling a bit since the car crash. My injuries are worse than I thought. Very bad whiplash and nasty headaches.

I start an intensive course of Physio tomorrow, twice a week for ten weeks. Hopefully that should help. I did actually manage to do a few simple yoga stretches this morning. First time since the accident. Seems to help.

So needless to say I have not really done a lot, just pottering about. I have felt pretty wiped out. Belgium in two weeks so I am being careful not to make matters worse because I don't want to cancel the trip.

Speaking Of cost cutting. I have decided not to rush to replace the car. (Not had a settlement figure yet but it's definitely a write off).

I am going to try going car free for a while. TBH whilst I'm living with DS2 I think I will be ok without one. We can car share, I'm on his insurance anyway. We have a good bus service, I even have a gold card for free travel. I have a rail card. A taxi is just £4 to the city centre. And a bit of extra walking will be free exercise. .

You can buy most goods and services online and I can always hire a car now and again if I want to go somewhere that doesn't have good train links.

Tbh I don't really do a lot of mileage. I estimate car running costs (not counting depreciation) to be around £1500 a year and last year I only clocked up 3000 miles. Cost per mile is a bit extravagant.

£1500 could go towards my travelling adventures......I can always change my mind later when I do eventually move but for now, living where I do, I think I can manage perfectly well without one.

Did I tell you I have been invited to Aruba next year to meet the Venezuelan clan.......I shall have to brush up my tango.

lessonlearned

Just had a call from the loss adjusters. They offered me £1k more than I anticipated, so am happy enough.

That extra £1k can go towards the travel fund........:rotfl:

cc586

Hello. I've read through most of this thread and have to say, I wish I'd thought of something even half similar 20 years ago. I'm 45 so I think a million is a big ask from here, but the concept of becoming non reliant on work at an earlier age than state retirement age is certainly what I'm going to be aiming for. I think everyone wants to retire early, and I'm no different, but when I think of the money I've wasted over the years that could have been growing slowly away in the background I just wish I'd been more careful.
I've signed up to the various survey sites and other money things as an alternative to just browsing the web/watching tv in the evening and I'm going to start a blog on how I get on. My first step is to drive slower and put at least a quid a day into a jar (along with any bonus money from surveys etc).

Kayalana99

Gosh BB what an achievement!!

Really hope you get to go on your trip LL and things look up for you...rather have your health I'm sure, but sounds like you'll be getting a nice payout from the insurance which is a bit extra something to look forward to.

I really have been focused on cost saving, we don't even have a TV license (which alone from last year is 60-70 saved as we were paying sky as well)

The only thing I can try and cut back is food spending(65 a week doesn't seem to bad for a family of 4 as it is) and daily spending - I've put our daily spending up to 300 a month (so 150 each) as my partner wasn't managing on the 100, the plan is to get him a card - put 150 in a month and once it's gone it's gone, hoping he'll learn to budget better as he gets it weekly ATM. I won't spend all mine but I can put it back into our savings pots or treat myself once in a while. Got to stop helping him out so much I guess once he runs out - I guess if he's always got something to fall back on though, he won't learn to cope?

We will manage without the eBay, I'll most likey be closing it for a few weeks over Sept/Oct time, hoping as soon as I get my Uni books I can start planning the essays I have to do (worked out I have 5 to do, I forgot I'm doing 90 credits from Oct-March and 30 credits from April - Sept)

Just a matter of when to get rid of it but I'm 99% that's what I'm going to do, we'd manage for sure - but it would be 3 years of cutting corners whilst I finish my degree