Confessions of a mortgage-spreadsheet-a-holic

richj

Hi FF,
I wouldn't mind a copy too if it's not too much trouble. We are looking at starting to overpay as we would like to start on the path of mortgage freeness..

Rich

fishfins

Of course! I've cut out all my random notes and account numbers :eek: (I really shoudn't put them on!) and I've added some red notes to explain what I've done and what things show.

fishfins

AAARGH :mad:

Just got my quarterly bill from EDF. They're changing my direct debit from £31 per month to £71 per month . Looks like I'll be having a chilly winter.

Lois_E

fishfins wrote: »

AAARGH :mad:

Just got my quarterly bill from EDF. They're changing my direct debit from £31 per month to £71 per month . Looks like I'll be having a chilly winter.

:eek: Do just check if your usage really justifies the increase. I've had utility companies decide to put my DD up when my account was in credit before now, and when you ring up and say "but I am only using X kWh a month" they put it back down, or at least agree a smaller increase.

Have you got your utilities on your spreadsheet? I've just started including them on mine. I have an alarm on my phone that reminds me to read the meters at bedtime on Wednesdays, and I'm making little bar charts to see how we're doing. By next Wednesday I'll have two weeks of data to set a baseline, and then I'm going to start attacking our over-usage.

My plan is to offer my kids a small financial incentive to bring down the electric bar on the chart - they're the ones that keep leaving appliances switched on, so they're the ones who need to make an effort, and if it saves the family some money, why not let them share in the benefit of the savings? I'll take responsibility for the gas myself - there's not much to do about that now, but I'll have to be good about not using the heating too much when the autumn sets in. I'm tracking water as well, but that should go down when I get my shower fitted (soon I hope) and we can stop having so many baths.

fishfins

Hi Lois

I think what happened is I was way in credit so they dropped my dd quite a bit, then by this bill I'm £140 in debit. It really annoys me that I only get a bill to view once every quarter so I can't keep on top of it. They've justified changing it to £71 a month by adding the payments to get me back in credit. Funny they don't seem so bothered about it adding up when you're in credit!

I'm still going to ring them I think and try to drop it a bit more than that.

I love the idea of the spreadsheet for utilities (more spreadsheets ), I think it's great. I'm definitely going to try that so thanks! Luckily my water isn't metered and it's cheaper that way according to the calculators so I'm happy about that.

Hurdler

I like this idea of reading the meters at a set time. I might start that this on Sunday but mine are both outside, which is a pain. Altho' the useless munters of Lowry Beck always plead ignorance about that and just push a card through the door. They're such an unprofessional shower - they sent me an email saying a reading was due, could I do it and enter into a website a five-year old might have designed!!!

I refuse to engage with them at all now - I take readings and post them on NPower directly now!!!

fishfins

After the news about my electricity and gas prices yesterday I decided I need to save more energy! So this morning I sat down and wrote a list room by room of everything I have which uses gas or electricity and a list of things I can do to save money.

I've started on a couple of things already. I seem to spend a lot of time charging my phone, electric toothbrush and laptop so I've turned the brightness down on my phone and laptop to try to save battery life. I'm also going to set my phone alarm when I put things on to charge to remind me to unplug the charger after a certain time so it's not pumping charge into a fully charged thing!

I'm also trying to only have one light on in the house at a time, and to think if I really need that light on. I think I just need to get into the habit then it should be easy.

I'm going to try to make the house warmer for winter too. I think loft insulation is too big a job to do right now but I'm going to buy some cheap thick material and make secondary curtains for behind the thin ones I've got now. I'm also going to draught-proof the front and back door, and also make draught excluders for the doors of two bedrooms. These two get a bit damp if I don't open the windows a bit in winter, so I'm going to try to stop the cold air getting into the rest of the house.

And I'm going to ring EDF and ask them nicely (ish) to drop my payment!

fishfins

Just got back from B&Q, managed to get the picnic bench I've been after for a while for £39 (down from £59) and got TCB on it too. It does push my budget for "other" even further than way over, but I figured it was worth it to get the bench on offer! (also my Grandparents are coming up on Monday and my old picnic bench has collapsed :eek:)

Today is the last day of my month, and for the first time ever I've managed to keep a spending diary and budgets for a whole month . I'll do a monthly summary tomorrow I think, it's a bit shameful though how much overbudget I am on some areas!

I've managed to get EDF to drop my monthly payment to £61 from the £71 they'd put it up to, and thanks to Lois's suggestion I now have a colourful daily electricity and gas usage spreadsheet Thanks Lois!

I also joined the library this week. I don't know why I haven't done it sooner, it will save me reading my old books over and over because I'm too tight to buy new ones! I was quite ashamed at borrowing "Marley & Me" for my first library book, I hadn't seen the film but the book was actually really good! Didn't like to take it to work to read though for fear of getting laughed at- I work with mainly men!

fishfins

Summary for 21st July to 20th August

Budgets:
Groceries (£130): £124.83 -£5.17
Clothes (£30): £72.27 +42.27
Medical (26.33): £12.15 -£14.18
Eating out (£20): £45.14 +£25.14
Other (£40): £112.92 +72.92
Total (£246.33): £367.31 +£120.98

Mortgage overpayments: £100

Savings: +£113.24

fishfins

Had a bit of a bad day today but I did manage to get my weekly food shop in just under budget, I got a few things on offer too which should save me some money next week.

I'm having bad luck on surveys at the moment. I have tried maybe 9 on onepoll, every single one starts with "Do you have children" (or some variation), I answer no truthfully and get thrown off it .

On the positive side I did manage to list two things on ebay so hopefully I might get a bit back for them!