Mortgage Free in Three Yrs

Superfast_Gran

I forgot about the restaurant - I don't know if they do it here but they certainly used to in Ayr at the Poly there. Perhaps I should check :beer:

taka

Hi all!!

Good luck on monday for your interview Cupid! (fellow science bod here :wave: )

Well done SG for all your MSE stylie pampering!

Desperate_Housewife_2-2

setmefree2 wrote: »

Hi Desperate Housewife

Totally well done - £33,000 in a year :money:- that's amazing and inspiring :money:How did you do it?

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Hi smf,
It has been an effort but I did some preplanning before I decided to pay off the mortgage by paying off all existing debts first and ensuring I had a budget in place to cover everything including once yearly bills and things that crop up (like xmas, dentist and glasses etc).
Then I ensured the whole family was up for it and made sure we all wanted the same things (ie we all felt holidays were a top priority, no point suffering to pay off bills!), then I set out my plan of action, MSE has played a huge part of course, but here are a few tips.

-never waste anything, freeze any leftovers and reuse everything, be inventive with cooking.

- shop around for the best buys and keep a book of prices (like an a-z) when the price drops below the lowest, buy up as much as you can store/use, hence I tend to buy 10-20 of things when I go shopping rather than a weekly shop...this takes a bit of prebudgeting but as you get used to it, it evens itself out.

-I read Amy Dacyzyns book, 'Tightwad Gazette' and got loads of tips, the book has paid for itself tenfold, also I felt it gave me 'permission' to be a moneysaver! btw dont buy books use the library, you can reserve online now.

- an obvious one is work as many hours as poss (I do agency work so grab what I can while its busy) and curb spending, ring tax office to see if you are entitled to anything back, laundry costs, professional fees etc..

-Be determined! It won't just happen, make it a top priority, I have a chart on the wall and I cross off each time I have paid off a grand, the mortgage pig helps and I do this too.

-I do mystery shopping now and use pigsback, quidco, keep an eye on hotdealsuk for bargains and never buy anything full price as it can generally be found cheaper.

- use freecycle/realcycle, I've had some good stuff and got rid of stuff too.

- don't be embarrassed to go to jumble sales, wear 2nd hand clothing, use 2nd hand stuff, a lot of my stuff is pre owned and no one can tell the difference.

- make it a way of life and enjoy!

If I think of anything else, I'll post

firesidemaid

just wanted to share a small piece of good news with you guys......

......my mortgage has gone down below 100k:j

i've been waiting for this moment for a while now. i know there's still a long way to go, but i'm ahead of schedule and i hope overpaying will improve in the new year.

here's to sub 90k!

angelavdavis

You lucky devil Sazza! What a milestone! Well done you!!!

chickadee

Well done Sazza! A milestone indeed, and less of a millstone too. Way to go!

Kaz2904

Going back to the house prices thing- the way I view it is that I would have to pay the same as my minimum mortgage payment to rent somewhere.
The houses available are not in very good locations and I would always be answerable to someone else.
So even if I 'lost money' on the house, I won't have done because I would have been paying out that money anyway.
The fact that we are overpaying just means that we won't be 'renting' the house from the principality for 18 years. Hopefully we'll only have to 'rent' it for 7.5 years and then pay no more!
The equity is neither here nor there as far as we're concerned because we don't need anywhere bigger (yet?)!

We were lucky to get where we did when we did and if this had happened 6 years ago it may well have been a different story. We were in deep then and couldn't have afforded huge interest rate rises.
If the rates weren't low then we would never have been able to afford to buy so would have been stuck renting- probably forever.

Trying_to_be_good

Well done Sazza! I've managed to get my 'net' loan to under £100,000, but the real mortgage on its own won't be there for a while yet - progress has slowed as I wait to find out just how expensive a replacement boiler is going to be (why do these things happen just before Christmas?!).

Looking forward to joining you with a sub-£100,000 mortgage - it would help if the Bank of England cut rates today, as I'm on a tracker mortgage. Fingers and toes crossed!

Dithering_Dad

Well done Sazza, I can't see myself being sub 100k for a while, but when I do I'll be really chuffed!

Also well done to DH for dropping her mortgage by 33k in less than a year! You sound really dedicated in your post, so I reckon you'll be finished with the challenge before the end of next year!

taka

Gahhhhhhhh ... remind me again why I took out a 5 year fixed rate mortgage in July ..... sob..... grrrrrrrrrrrrrr interest rates. I sooooo never get it right!! Ho hum..........