The long road to being mortgage free!

ammonite

Yes indeed MRN, though I expect hubby would rather eat beans on toast for a year than get rid of darned Sky Sports! (and that's coming from a founding member of the Carnivore Wives club!).

A man from BT rang earlier trying to get my to switch back. He gave up when I said my line rental and calls were £3 a month with Sky! Usually I would listen and try and negotiate but he was doing the full on sales pitch and I ended up saying we were tied in for another 12 months (we aren't) - soon shifted him!

Really aching today - I seem to have a little foot stuck in my rib!

icklehelen

Hi Ammonite

Been thinking about DooYoo for a while but have seen many mixed comments on other threads - is it worth the time/effort?

Ouch I know how the foot in rib feels - my lo got her foot wedged behind my rib on one side so had awful pains for over 2 months - a major drawback of being ickle and not having enough room for a growing baby to move!!

Hope your lo turns soon

ickle

ammonite

icklehelen wrote: »

Hi Ammonite

Been thinking about DooYoo for a while but have seen many mixed comments on other threads - is it worth the time/effort?

Ouch I know how the foot in rib feels - my lo got her foot wedged behind my rib on one side so had awful pains for over 2 months - a major drawback of being ickle and not having enough room for a growing baby to move!!

Hope your lo turns soon

ickle

Hiya!

I wrote some advice for MFB50 in this post here about DY....

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=55959339&postcount=199

I kind of feel like at the start it didn't feel worth it but now it does. The more "seen" you are on the site, the more you tend to earn. If you can devote a bit of time to it in the early days (after newbie status has been taken away) then you might find it pays. Happy to offer some advice on your reviews. People can be quite mean at first and it takes a wee while to get the hang of the reviewing. I'm by no means brilliant but I do enough to get by and what I do like compared to surveys is you can't be screened out! :T


Drop me a PM if you need any more advice

The foot seems to have moved! Luckily there is a fair bit of room to move still!

ammonite

I've tried hard today.......

- Earned 30p on Onepoll
- Earned 40p on Ciao
- Earned about £1 on DY

- Put the three loads of washing on the maiden instead of the dryer

- Complained about a top I bought that fell to pieces (hoping for a refund or replacement so I don't have to buy another so soon)

- Used £10 Mr T's voucher off £50 spend, stocked up on essentials that we eat all the time and took advantage of their £4 Christmas Tinned Sweets at the same time so a few presents sorted (tins worked out at £3.20 with the discount!).

- Started work on the annual budget in a spreadsheet Need to get Mr A onboard too but he is busy at the moment so I'll have to wait for his spends.

- Played with the envelope budgeting app. See if that helps me keep an eye on spends.

Typically despite being shattered all day, I've now come to life as usual now it is bed time. Ho hum!

Speak to you tomorrow

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Hi Ammonite, you are a real inspiration

I haven't thought about building my budgets etc for next year, but I will have a look over the weekend - thanks for the suggestion.

Tilly x c

Mortgage_Reduction_Novice

ammonite wrote: »

Yes indeed MRN, though I expect hubby would rather eat beans on toast for a year than get rid of darned Sky Sports! (and that's coming from a founding member of the Carnivore Wives club!).

Wow that's a serious sports fanatic. We've never had Sky... and when we get comments on how many freeview channels we have, it reminds us we don't need it. I'm not sure whether MrMRN would choose meat over Lovefilm though (but then Lovefilm is paid out of his personal spends).

You two have put the fear in me about babies... I'm just over 5 foot! I'd been told that the giving birth would be hard because of my small hips but I hadn't heard that the incubation phase is also fraught for small mums!

icklehelen

Mortgage_Reduction_Novice wrote: »

You two have put the fear in me about babies... I'm just over 5 foot! I'd been told that the giving birth would be hard because of my small hips but I hadn't heard that the incubation phase is also fraught for small mums!

It wasn't really mentioned to me either - just that I was more likely to have a smaller baby! (I'm just UNDER 5 ft!!:o) My MIL is about the same height as me and hardly suffered with her 3 average sized boys but has a longer torso than me - I think it depends on lots of things!

Don't worry - it's not as bad as it sounds - just uncomfortable (but then later pregnancy isn't particularly comfortable for anyone!) and more to the point it is definitely worth it!!! :j

ickle

ammonite

MRN - I was (and am) the biggest wimp ever about child birth but once you know the baby has to come out some way and some how you begin to accept it and think positively. They come out one way or the other (even via the sunroof ) so don't worry about it

OK as for me....I..

- am £5 off the next DY payout, been working extra hard with that as I'm so close.



- have been paid £14.60 from Quidco, was expecting about 25pence but a payment must have cleared before payment deadline so that was a nice surprise! I will round this up to £20 and overpay as that change the amount we have in savings to 9.6%


I worked out for fun that if we overpayed all our savings (which we won't ever do as it is our emergency fund too) we would save 40 months on the mortgage. A nice thought/dream!

Mortgage_Reduction_Novice

Right... after that discussion I'm pressing on and will be opening my next pack of pills tomorrow morning!!!

Back to MFW... nice one on the Quidco last-minute scoop - better in your pocket for an extra month!

I also do the 'pretend' calculations. Like I could pay my student loan off with savings and have almost £2000 left (but realistically not a wise move!).

ammonite

Haha don't be scared MRN

As for the student loan - the interest is so low we decided it just isn't worth paying it off early, the money would be better thrown at the mortgage if we really had any spare (which of course we don't!). It does bug me a wee bit that we have a loan with an interest rate but as I say, the MASSIVE mortgage loan with the interest rate is far more worrying and would need attention before the student loan (hence why I'm here!).

£4 to go until DY payout.....I'm really slogging away at it while the bonus is on. Hopefully can make it by the end of the weekend if I pull my finger out.

Then.......I need to get back into the eBay way of life to make some extra pennies for Christmas. I will try and get this underway this weekend at some point. I have one Christmas present to buy this week whilst it is on offer and think I have enough Nectar points to cover it which is nice!

Might treat ourselves to a chinese tonight! It has been ages since we have had one and for once we aren't completely poor after payday!