Pollyanna's Diary!

pollyanna24

Just thought I would join all you people on here who are trying to be mortgage free.

My situation is this:-

At the beginning of last year, my bf decided to leave me leaving me with two sproggies aged 2 and 2months. Not a good time in my life I can tell you!

My brother decided to buy my ex out of the house and seems to be as proactive as me getting the mortgage paid off. Ex never seemed bothered and think we would have been saddled with the mortgage forever seeing as it is a 35 year one!

While my kiddies are so young, I've decided that I will have no life and just spend pretty much every penny I have overpaying the mortgage. There will be time for a life once they are a bit older. It's not like I can go out anywhere at the moment anyway!

Plus I want to pay the mortgage off as quickly as possible as:-

1. I don't really want to live with my brother forever and figured that once it was paid off, then I could move further away (live on fringes of London) and buy a house outright by myself (or who knows... a new partner!) somewhere miles away.

2. My boss is getting on a bit and I have no intention of leaving my job until he retires, but going by his age, that may be in the region of 10 years or so, and I have no idea what kind of job I would be able to get with kids in tow, so want the mortgage gone so I don't have this extra worry.

At the moment, we are in a five year fixed rate of 5.63% and only allowed to overpay £500 a month, but when this is up next April, will go back to BMR (currently 2.5%) and plan to overpay as much as we can each month as there are no restrictions.

Lois_E

Hi pollyanna and welcome to MFW! :wave:

Boo hiss to the bf leaving you in that situation, but great that you have your brother ready to step in and share the mortgage with you, and that your boss is supportive.

I don't know if you think of yourself as a single parent - I guess if you've got your brother living with the family, then you're not alone in quite the same way that some of the others of us are, but all the same you're doing this without a partner, so you might like to read some diaries of some other single parents. You could try my diary (which is here) or downsizer's (which is here).

Anyway, you're off to a great start with £4k OP'd already, so well done, and enjoy the journey from here on in.

numptyknownothing

Well done you. There are loads of ways to enjoy life with your 2 little ones without it costing a fortune even in this usually water logged country. I have only recently taken to commenting on this forum having lerked for quite some time. Everyone is really supportive and will pitch in with advice and ideas if you need it. Good luck with your aim. I live just outside London, and enjoy a cheaper postcode with all the benefits of being close enough to things to still enjoy it.

linz

I think you're exactly right in what you are trying to achieve. Overpaying now whilst the interest rates are so low and you will reap the rewards in years to come with a much lower LTV allowing you access to more favourable mortagees when you come to want to remortgage.

Plus as others have said on this forum, your children are young, they won't mind you not spending a fortune on them at that age, there can be time for that in a few years time if you want that. Make hay while the sun shines with the rest of us on here, then look back when the rates rise and when your children get older and be glad that you did

Good luck.

pollyanna24

Lois_E – Thank you so much for your support, seems like I’m not the only single mummy out there trying to get a better life for her littleuns when they are older. I do consider myself a single mum as my brother has a completely different schedule to me as in he sleeps all day and works all night (no idea how he sleeps cos my two arerather loud!) and plus they are not his kids, so I don’t ask him to do anything for them. He didn’t move in to be a replacement father, but he is a male figure to have around the girls as they are growing up I guess. I’ll take a look at your diary when I get a minute.

Numptyknownothing – yep, it is handy where I live now (still in the London Underground zones, but way way out) for my job in London which pays well, but I don’t really want to be here forever. Waiting for the time when my kids are old enough to enjoy all the free museums in London, but no doubt they will want to do all the expensive stuff first!

Linz – interest rates may be low, but I am stuck on what I consider to be a highish interest rate (seeing as how the rate went down as soon as we fixed). We (me and ex) fixed for 5 years cos at the time I was pregnant and we wanted to make sure we knew what we were paying. Hoping rates will stay low by the time the fixed is up.

Have decided that we will stay on BMR as no fixed rate seems as cheap as that at the mo and apparently we will revert to this rather than the SVR as we took our current fixed rate out before 2009 or something (hoping the fact that my brother came on the mortgage and we kicked my ex off won't affect anything). But as soon as we fix again and come off it, it will go to SVR which at the moment is 3.99.

When my kids are a bit older and everything is a bit settled, I’ll spend more on them going out and stuff, but at the moment, they find leaves amusing, so…

I'm just glad (trying to see the bright side) that one of the upsides of my ex leaving me is that I will be in a better position financially and hopefully he will lose everything! Bitter?! Me?... Never!

LauraWxx

good luck on your journey!!
Will be subscribing to see how you are getting on!
xxx

pollyanna24

Posted the below on Lois_E diary, but then thought why not put it on my own?! Now that I see how this diary thing works, you guys are gona get damn bored of me!

Just thought I’d join all the subscribers to this thread(how do I subscribe exactly?) I can’tbelieve I’ve never noticed all these mortgage diaries before (Lois_E showed mewhere hers was when I started my own yesterday) and have read all 24 pages ofthis one this morning (yes, I really should be working!) and may join some moreas it seems it’s not just me who’s obsessed with saving money and paying offthe mortgage!

Talking of spending diaries, I have kept one for years,since about 2006. How sad! Lost a lot of it due to a virus on my laptop,but I never tend to go back to them once the month is over. Not sure why I keep them really. I could tell you how many pints of milk webought in say, October 2008, oh dear, I really should do more with my life!

Quite like the idea of a mortgage spreadsheet. I do have one, but it’s a very basic one andonly goes up to next April when my interest rate will change. I list every day and the daily interestcharge and then by comparing it the month before, take off so many pence ofinterest for the following month per day. So no complicated formulas as I wouldn’t know how to do that!

Mortgage_Reduction_Novice

You are in similar company on the MFW section of MSE if you like a bit of spreadsheet !!!!!!!

pollyanna24

Well, my budget isn't going too well at the moment. I don't have the kids at the moment, they are at their dads till next Friday.

Had to buy new clothes today for work and general. Tried to be practical and buy stuff that I could wear outside of work as well. Didn't feel like I spent too much, but after doing all my receipts, I have just under £50 to last me till the end of the month.

I have a budget until April next year, trying to save up a certain amount so I can stick a lump sum on the mortgage when the fixed rate is up.

I don't have to buy petrol this month as the car is just over half full and don't have to buy food and whatnot for the girls until their dad brings them back, but I am going to Brighton next Thursday for my mum's birthday, so think I may be going over my budget. Ho hum.

I'll have to try and do some overtime at work which will maybe leave me a little more leeway so I hit my target for next April.

pollyanna24

A NSD day today, so that £50 is intact. Only 11days left to go!

Off to see a friend in London for lunch tomorrow, but think she is making me lunch at her place, so aiming for another NSD then. Still half a tank of petrol in the car, keep going Polly!

Secret_Saving_Squirrel

Well done, stick with it! I know it is not particularly attractive but I also have been unkindly pleased to see my ex fritter away the money he got from our joint home when we split. Like you, I have built for the future whilst he has bought flash cars. Only problem is that now the contrast between our lives has become more noticeable (it has been ten years). He has started to make nasty comments to our children about me. Sad.