Mortgage freedom..Shala_moo's attempt at a diary..

shala_moo

Evening :wave: busy day in the kitchen today making chilli jam and onion chutney :T I am sitting here listening to the lids "pop" as they cool down and seal themselves up.. love that sound.

Unfortunately far from a low spending week this week..

• OH had to get his heating fixed in his car £55
• Car has had to go back to the garage to get the timing chain replaced £200-300 :eek: (also MOT due January! :eek:)
• £15 on some iron supplements - been struggling with exhaustion/fatigue the last few months, saw this on Doctor in the House so thought i'd give it a go, it's like a fog has lifted off me and I feel like doing stuff again, whereas before all I wanted to do was sit/lie down :j:j so worth the money IMO
• had to buy a new actifry as I melted the cable on it got some of it with Tesco vouchers though so total spend £44
• hairdressers £95 :eek: why is it always more than they quote for!:mad: but at least i'm ready for Xmas :T
• finished off my Xmas shopping on Friday - haven't added it up yet but spent about £60 on Friday, that's for a b'day present too (still forgot to get a b'day card though :doh:)
• £20 on a team building day with work, had to get train fare there and buy our own lunch...
• £70 spent on the xmas food shop (just need to get the fresh bits next week)

Wow that's loads when it's all written down Looks like January is going to be a month for austerity!

Just heard OH break a dish in the kitchen, better go and see which one it was and how much it'll cost to replace :eek::rotfl:

Hope everyone is well xxxx

shala_moo

Even more spending has occurred this week I thought i'd finished but apparently not..

• OH car's had to go back to the garage :mad: this is the 3rd time in two weeks, last month it was at the body shop repairs as he'd had a crash in it, not his fault and it was a free fix, but still annoying
• had to buy a few more xmas presents, anyone else have that sudden feeling that what you've bought isn't enough/is rubbish so you have to buy something else:( I really don't like xmas sometimes!
• added more stuff to the xmas food shop (mainly cat food)so that's gone up
• bought a new set of bedding for the spare room £20 so not too bad - cat had ruined the other one, he's now banned from that room!
• bought the bedding from Dune1m, and well once you're in there - new light shade for living room, new soap dispenser for bathroom and matching tumbler bought:o

Hopefully that's it until after xmas, although I know my sister wants to go out on Tuesday! :eek: I will try and keep my purse in my bag!!

OH's car has been a bit of a discussion point this week obviously. He's decided that once it gets through it's MOT in January then he will start looking at selling it before the summer, it's cost £550 in the last few weeks and I can only see it getting worse as it's now over 10 years old.

He's looking to do a private lease and for the car he wants (a Corsa) it works out between £120-150 a month, which isn't unreasonable. We've weighed up the pro's and con's and this seems to be the best option as he doesn't have the cash to buy a car outright - and there will be no repair costs which he loves the idea of!

The sister is arriving on Monday so if I don't get on before next Friday, I hope everyone has a wonderful Xmas...

Merry Christmas xxx :xmastree::xmassign::xmassmile:rudolf::santa2:

beanielou

Wishing you and yours all the very best.

Goldiegirl

It all sounds very busy round your way!


Our old car was thirteen years old, and although it was reliable, it was getting to the point where it kept needing money spent on it.


Although we had the outlay of a new car in the summer, the running costs are now very low - including only £30 a year for the road tax. We're intending to keep the car for ever (well 10 - 15 years), so buying works for us now.


But at a different stage in our life, we did lease, which worked well for us, and we bought the car at the end of the lease.


But anything must be better than high repair bills, which I always begrudge. A huge amount of money being spent, and no pleasure from it!

shala_moo

Thanks beanie and Goldie for popping in x

These are my final figures for 2015:j:j

Dec Monthly figures
Outstanding Mortgage £136,931.85
Family Loan £0
Offset/Savings pot - £17,847.04
Approx. Monthly interest saved and OP'd £66.20
New end date - Aug 2028

Total Debt as present moment £119,084.81

Pretty pleased with that, last year I owed £136,024.78 to the world so this has decreased at a good rate.

I added another £1000 to my S&S ISA in Dec so the total offset has come down a bit, therefore, interest saved has decreased.. however, I reviewed my annual bills account and found a spare £200 so OP'd that - swings and roundabouts :T

Recapping on my goals for 2015 -
2015 goals

• Save £12,000 in the offset account - not sure what my starting point was but there's a healthy sum in there at present
• increase mortgage payments to £1000 again - should be doable in March/April time - this didn't happen until June but we did OP other extra money we had - total OP fir the year £2865:j
• completely clear the family loan - done
• meet my MFIT target in December 15 - done
• save all overtime payments - done but didn't do as much overtime as previous years
• continue to go to Slimming World classes and reach target - ermm well I haven't gained any weight this year (however, I haven't lost any either! ) it's sooo difficult when there are so many sweets in the world!
• have a big holiday for OH's 40th - done, Canada trip was fab, sure we'll go back at some point

Other money saving achievements

• £500 earned from surveys plus one £100 competition win
• lots of products to trial through the 0rchard and BZZ - could do with some more Vanish though as i'm running out of my last stash :rotfl:
• vouchers used (mainly Amaz0n) as and where I could, although could do better
• increased pension contribution to 8%

Well wishing you all a Happy New Year whatever you may be doing tonight, may you have a joyous evening! xx

shala_moo

:wave: hi all..

Manic week at work this week as it's year end, worked 6 hours overtime last Saturday and more in the week so hopefully should get a bit extra in next month's pay packet :T

I've still managed to do a bit of money stuff though

• £6.52 TSB interest OP'd to mortgage
• £2.45 quidco pymt OP'd to mortgage (forgot to downgrade my membership so they've took a £5 off me)
• some of my shares have gone up by 50% :T:T some of my shares have gone down by 20% unfortunately I have more money tied up in the ones that have gone down it's a brilliant strategy
• OH gets his new leased car next week £137/month, fully maintained so a good deal.. his old one won't sell for much as he refuses to spend the money putting it through an MOT (it will fail) but we'll see how that works out in the next few weeks..
• bought a couple of LED bulbs as i'd heard good things about them, got them off eb*y so a lot cheaper than in the shops - still £10 for two bulbs though :eek: - hopefully they'll make their money back on the electricity savings (will replace the kitchen ones as they break - there's 8 halogen spots!!)
• been to the wholesale butcher today to stock the freezer back up - made some dump bags so we have 5-6 meals ready to go in the slow cooker, all prepped, using up some less than fresh veggies in the process too
• and lastly put some extra lines on the Lott0 for work syndicate - fingers crossed

There was a Bentley in the car park at the butchers, i avoided parking next to it with my driving skills :rotfl: I was quite intrigued seeing a car like that there, turns out it was the owners, there must be some margin in meat!! :eek:

Anyway off to make a cup of tea for when OH comes in, he's dashing straight back out again to a gig so quiet evening to myself later..

xx

beanielou

Money in meat indeed :eek:
Have a good weekend

Luckyinlife

some great overpayment there shal :]
My butcher seen me pull up in a 2 seater i had last year and said ohh like your cars do you wipped out this folder of cars he got at home (a big farm house may i add haha ) so ya defiantly money in meat haha

shares are a long term thing look 5-10 years down the line im sure it will be a rollercoster hehe

shala_moo

Think I married the wrong man then.. need to find me a butcher. Although I remember my friends dad when I was little was a butcher and he smelt of dead cow a lot _pale_:eek::rotfl:

Quiet day in today as it's raining cats and dogs(although the pub over the road looks inviting - must stay strong!). I have cleaned the house now the xmas trees have been put away and OH has gone to return an item of clothing in town, so cash back there. :T

I've been too efficient with my cleaning and tidied away a £10 voucher for free coffee pods, we had the coffee machine as a xmas present. Must try and find that today. Free coffee in a free coffee machine :j the only thing that would make it better was if I liked coffee :rotfl:

off to have a wander around the boards :wave:

shala_moo

Another day, another mortgage overpayment... £55 gone.

We've had two unexpected BGas engineers visit late last year (we have the boiler cover with them) and leave notes through the door to say we weren't in when they called - it's took OH until now to ring and find out what they wanted, after much nagging from me

Upshot is they have no clue why the engineers were coming out, and someone has accidently cancelled our account in September which makes it odder!! The only details they have on us are from our old house that we moved out of 4 years ago...

I give up with these big companies sometimes.

Anyway the good part - they haven't took the money out of the account for 3 months so I've demanded it off OH to OP on the mortgage. :T:T

He has to ring back up again on Monday to speak to the billing team and the man on the phone said hopefully they'll give us a better deal going forward as they've messed us around and left us with no cover for 3 months!

I'll have a look at what competition there is this afternoon so OH can go in with some knowledge of better offers out there.

Off to MIL's for dinner, money saving right there :rotfl: we have a bottle of wine that we had free for Xmas to take with us too..

xx