Blinking in the brightness of the lightbulb moment

Cat2011

January Tally of savings.
Need £1,300. Saved £1.39

£1.39 - Quidco

Cat2011

Had a fairly good christmas with the family. Got some lovely presents, including a DAB radio for my kitchen

I've been pretty slack for the last week - so as of Monday (always start on a monday!) I'll be back to being super frugal (and super good with food).

I collected loads of possible eBay/car boot things from my room at my parents house and brought it all back to my home with me - the back fo the car was completely full! I've been taking photos for eBay things all day. My mannequin finally arrived and has been awesome to display the clothes on, things look so much better. I also have about 30 pairs of shoes to sell! I can't believe how I frittered all my money when I was younger! I would be seriously rich if I'd saved my money instead... oh well - can recoup some money from eBay. Also found a gorgeous never-used briefcase previously belonging to a grandparent I think. I'll never use it, so thought I'd put it on eBay so I can use the money to help secure my future. I checked out others online and they're going for £150-£250! Awesome .

Back to work next week. Also starting to get back into the mystery shopping - time to up the income again. Have started looking for a second job, and applied for a few - but in the current climate reckon it'll be a long process.

Still got essays to write as a bit behind with those :S . Hopefully get them done soon....

Back to typing up ebay adverts!

Cat2011

I've got a few big expenses coming up. Car insurance is due end of March - but I should have enough saved up to pay for that in full - for the first time ever, without relying on credit!! Super happy about that. Also hopefully my advanced driving certificate will help bring down the premium a little.

Unfortunately the tax on my rental income is also due at the end of January. I'm allowed to take off the mortgage interest from the income. But need to work out if that refers to the mortgage interest due - or that actually paid, as I started payments a bit late. I suspect it's on payments actually made, which means tax due will be about £1,180. *sigh*. That's going to make a huge dent in my savings.

I need to put money aside for future tax payments, and also maintenance of the house. I had a bit of a think, and tho i should be doing this monthly (and for the last year or so!) I'm going to wait til I'm debt free before I start putting money aside for the house/tax. Otherwise it's going to take me a fair bit longer to get debt free and that's going to seriously affect my enthusiasm. Should only be another 4 months before my DFD, and the next tax isn't due til Jan 2013, so reckon that'll give me enough time to save up.

Really wish the last uni would get back to me about studying medicine. Just reject me already! I really hate not knowing what the future holds, as I can't plan anything! A bit of spontanaity is fun, but a massive lifechanging event needs a bit of planning! I don't know whether I need to be saving up to be able to afford being a student, or whether I should be planning Plan B??

Cat2011

Yet another expense required. I have two hoovers in the house, and both are completely knackered. Tried to hoover the carpets, and one didn't suck anything up and the other just cut out because it over heated. Rather than risk having the cut-out fail and the hoover burst into flames - prob best to just buy a new one. Will be checking in the sales/Quidco for a bargain .

Got a letter from co-op about them stopping charges til April on my (unused) overdraft. Thought about moving the overdraft into my savings account for a bit of stooze-like behaviour - but it's only a £200 overdraft, so I'd only make just over £2. Not sure it's worth it...

On non-money news - bar a few weeks of good eating I failed with my previous "will get slimmer" challenge. So it's the new year, new start and all that. Weighed myself yesterday and for the first time in my life I'm officially overweight. Bit of a shocker. I've always been at the top end of the healthy weight, and wanted to get lower - but now I'm actually fat. Rubbish. So on with the exercise and healthy eating.... Went for a run for the first time in months last night and managed a solid 40mins, tho I hate to think how slow the pace was. Off to spin class tonight. So lets hope I can keep this up....

I have managed to make some progress on my "look better/make an effort" challenge tho. I'm too fat to fit into any of my jeans, so have been wearing pretty dresses for a few weeks now, which require putting together an outfit, rather than throwing on jeans and a jumper. Also been wearing make-up everyday too. Only a bit of foundation and mascara - I'm not slapping it on, but it's enough to make me look less crap! However, that means for the first time ever I've used up a bottle of foundation! So popped to Boots and bought some more. They had a 3 for 2 offer on, so took advantage and got a few things. They also had a £5 off voucher if you bought certain things. The sales assistant was extremely helpful and suggested I do two transactions, that way I can get 3 for 2, and get given a £5 voucher, then get another 3 for 2, and also use the voucher I was just given . So anyway - I spent over £60, but it only cost me about £30 . And I now have foundation, eyeshadow (for smokey eyes ), liner (I lost my previous one), some toner to help keep my skin in good nick with all this make-up wearing, lipstick (as used my previous to write on my friends wedding car!) and some blusher as I was running out of my current one. Phew!

Cat2011

January Tally of savings.
Need £1,300. Saved £54.82

£1.39 - Quidco
£53.43 - eBay

Cat2011

So been a while since I updated. I've been spending like a spendy thing! The hoovers died, so I bought a new one - a Dyson - all those adverts I saw finally got to me. It was £240, but it comes with a 5yr guarantee, so hopefully it'll last.

The fridge also broke. Again. Last time I defrosted it (it's a frost-free freezer!), that seemed to fix the problem, but 6 weeks later and the fridge is failing again. So I brought a Man in, and put the fridge under warranty for a year, for the princely sum of £140. The Man came this morning and "fixed" it, which seemed to basically invovle thoroughly defrosting it. He then told me to prevent it happening again I shouldn't leave the door open too often. Utterly ridiculous. I won't be buying a Hotpoint again - the frost-free mechansim just isn't up to scratch. Hopefully it'll run properly for a bit longer than 6 weeks this time...

Also finally submitted my tax return . £1,181.20 extra over what I've already paid through PAYE for my "property income" from renting some rooms out.

So all of that has seriously hit my savings. January payday is going to be a miserable month as barely earnt anything either.

Still not heard back from the last uni for Doctoring, looks like it'll be sometime in the next 2-11 weeks, which is a bit of a broad range. Just want to know so I can get some plans in place.

So not really much to report. Took lots of eBay photos, but not been able to get them listed yet. Spent lots of money, but haven't earnt any....All a bit dismal really.

Cat2011

January Tally of savings.
Need £1,300. Saved £62.36

£1.39 - Quidco
£53.43 - eBay
£7.54 - Amazon

With only a week til payday January has been a rubbish month - with all my spending on top of low earnings, probably will make a loss this month!! Friend has given me his old ski boots to sell on eBay, as he bought new ones and wants rid of the old one - so that's something else to put on eBay

Cat2011

Just applied for the HSBC 6% current account and got declined . That's another decline, probably due to all the credit cards, so think I'm going to just stick with my current situation for now - I have pretty good savings rates as it is. Get this debt paid off, and once the 0% interest periods start ending and the cards are paid off the credit score will improve...Annoying tho as I'd just set up 2 standing orders to qualify for the account! Lol, will have to cancel them now...

Cat2011

January Tally of savings.
Need £1,300. Saved £99.04

£1.39 - Quidco
£53.43 - eBay
£7.54 - Amazon
£36.68 - Mystery Shop

Cat2011

January Tally of savings.
Need £1,300. Saved £121.04

£1.39 - Quidco
£53.43 - eBay
£7.54 - Amazon
£36.68 - Mystery Shop
£10.00 - Mystery shop
£12.00 - Mystery Shop