Are we entitled to anything?

gibson123

Can you remortgage and get the payments down?

A lot of baby equipment and clothes are either little used or never used, so there are plenty of second hand bargains to be had.

Can you sew? You will save a fortune on baby furnishings and get a lovely designer look if you make your own. Instead of baby fitness is there an aquarobics exercise class close by, or just try swimming it is the perfect exercise for pregnancy. Enjoy your preganancy and good luck when the baby comes

daska

I don't think you'll qualify for anything prior to the birth.

However, I'd second using freegle etc so you don't overstretch the finances any further. Babies need very little that you can't get for free, I'd say just a new mattress and ideally a changing mat. Assuming you have a washing machine then I'd go for any free real nappies you can get your hands on and bolster with disposables which are invaluable for the first few weeks (when they seem to need changing 163 times a day) and overnight thereafter.

wajoda2002

I don't know if we can remortgage as the house doesn't have any equity and my husband is now in a job where he earns less than what he did when we bought it.
Although we can pay £1000.00, it's a case of having to.
We live in South Essex and have £150,000 mortgage with the halifax. We are currently on SVR. I have spoken to them and ask if we fix, will it reduce it, but it wont, so we'll plod on as we are until it increases (again).

Thank you everyone for your advice

xfive71

Congratulations! This is an exciting time for you.
I'm afraid you are not eligible for the £500 maternity grant & Healthy Start. Both are for very low incomes / benefits recepients. You will be able to claim Child Benefit and Working Tax credit (depending on your income).

At the moment, what I could advise is to put in extra hours OT (for DH) if it is possible, do lots of ebaying and build a little nest egg.

For baby equipment, like other posters say, get them from freegle/freecycle/gumtree if you could. Although of course it is highly tempting to go out and buy lovely stuff, babies don't need very much. You'll be wading in baby clothes given by many well-wishers.

Also baby exercise classes are not neccessary. Usually there will be free ante-natal, baby massages and post-natal exercise classes run by the hospital or community centres. For ante-natal, these are usually towards the 3rd trimester.

BigAunty

As per the previous posts, means tested benefits are based on household income so debts and household expenses are ignored, even if they leave you severely constrained with disposable income.

The debt free wanabee board is good, so too is the debt advice info on the Direct Gov website.

MSE also has a budget planner so download that and work through the site to identify where to slash expenses - the cheapest energy,insurance, telecom tariffs, cheap recipes (some of the Old Style members like to feed two people on a pound a day) and so on.

You don't have a benefits issue but a debt/budgeting one.

squeeks

Fire_Fox wrote: »

What on earth have the credit cards or baby got to do with the price of rice?? Matched Betting needs about £50 to get started, is risk free if you research it properly because matched betting is NOT gambling.
...
Many people open a separate bank account and only place a matched bet with the profit they have made from previous matched bets.

It is still a gamble. You can't place a bet on a bookies and an exchange at the same time as a single transaction - odds change quickly on both the bookies and the exchange. So you can loose money.... that and you spend ages looking for favourable odds.

I found the best way was to liberate the 'Free' bets from bookies so you are looking at making a small gains/minimal loses, rather than huge gains. But you do need cash flow. On one occasion I tried to liberate a £200 free bet from the bookie - I had to cycle over to £2k before I could cash out as all the bets kept wining on the bookies instead of the exchange. It was that one that actually put me off and decided I had had enough.

If you have nothing else to do and a reliable net connection, it's fine. But there are better ways of making money. If you do start matched betting, keep it small. You will make mistakes, especially to start with and will probably loose some money while learning, just try not to loose your shirt as well.

When you find you are betting a couple of hundred £ to make +/-5p, it is probably time to stop.

skintmumof2

Sure start nursery centres so all sorts of baby classes and are free although they ask for donations now and then to help with costs. Find your local one as they do a lot of ante natal things too and pregnancy clubs (well my local one does) good luck!

benefitbaby

Hi,
You can claim the sure start maternity grant of £500 if when you are awarded Child Tax Credit it is paid at a rate higher than the family element.

CTC is made up of different elements based on your individual circs eg family element, child element, disability element etc.

So if you are awarded CTC after the birth and your annual entitlement is more than £545 (the family element) then you will qualify for the SS maternity grant.

PS. CTC entitlement is calculated on your previous tax year income so even if you do not qualify this year, you may qualify next year as your earnings will have taken a 9 month reduction whilst on mat leave.