Diary of a Secret Saver

Harri-bear

Well today’s the day I’m going to start planning for thefuture!

About us

Well there’s me (justturned 40, grrrrr), Mr Bear and two liitle girlie bears (6 and 4 years). I wouldlove to say we live in a pretty cottage in the woods but the reality issomewhat different! We live in an ex council house in a not too salubrious areathat I am desperate to move from.

We both work full time and between us bring in a good wage.We pay a fortune in childcare but this is due to end in July as little bear startsReception in September, so swelling the coffers by another £400 a month.

I am an all or nothing kind of girl (whether it is food ormoney!) I can be extremely self disciplined at times and incredibly weak willedat others. Luckily I recognise this in myself and will be giving myself a stifftalking to should the need arise.

Hubby is just c**p with money. He knows it and I know it –he ain’t gonna change. This is why I need to be secret about my saving.

The debts(otherwise known as Millstone 1 and Millstone 2!)

11900 Homeowner loan. Started in 2004 and in 9 years we havepaid 3300 off the starting balance of 15200. Shocking! Especially as still has16 years to run.

9700 Personal loan. 2 years in, with 3 years to run.

Progress so far

Last year I paid off my last credit card. Last month mybiggest student loan finished so saving £134 a month and ... if I make it tillpayday on Monday, I will finally be out of my overdraft for the first time inmany, many years. I have 21p left in my account so fingers crossed.

The Plan

Now, the interest is higher on Millstone 2, but is a muchshorter term. Millstone 1 is the one I want gone first – don’t fancy payingnearly £100 a month for the next 16 years.

I am going to save as much as I possibly can over the next12 months so that we can pay the loan off in full. This is going to be toughgoing and I need to do it on my own, as Hubby is so laid back it will neverhappen with him involved. As I am in charge of the majority of our financesthis shouldn’t be too difficult to keep secret . I am going to save without himnoticing!

When this is paid Millstone 2 will be tackled as well asgetting a new kitchen before trying to sell. You might wonder why we’d need anew kitchen but if you saw what we’d got you’d understand. The kitchen is about30 years old, cupboard doors are broken, tiles are waterlogged and coming awayfrom the wall, under the sink the shelves are broken and slope backwards and Icould go on and on and on....

We will then hopefully be in a position to get a good mortgageand buy a house where we can enjoy raising our family. So let battlecommence...

Harri-bear

Just transferred ebay sales of £96 into separate account

Just realised have spent postage money on chocolate and will need to transfer some to main account

Harri-bear

Have just applied for an ISA. Figured it's going to take at least a year to raise enough money to pay off the loan so I might as well have an account that pays interest - however meagre.

I did have an ISA last year but it was with the same provider as my main account, so when I went on online banking it was all there on the same page. This made it far too easy to just transfer bits and bobs all the time. Note to self - this is a bad thing and must stop.

Helping eldest daughter (6) to write a story for a competition. Just reminded her of the need to use capital letters in sentences!:) She's sure she's going to win and I haven't the heart to tell her that she probably won't. It's just like when Britain's Got Talent is on and she keeps asking me when she can be on it! There's only so long you can say 'You have to be a bit bigger, darling.':D

Bad_Weather

Harri-bear wrote: »

Just realised have spent postage money on chocolate and will need to transfer some to main account

Ha - LOVE IT!

I am a bit of a secret saver aswell my OH didn't know about my savings, he thought I had £300 not £3000.

I stupidly told OH. Now nothing major has happened but he has

A) Taken his foot of the gas
Thinks we are now FINE!
C) Has a completely different attitude

We are about 10k from where we need to be in 9 month bit because of my revelation he thinks we are fine. :mad:

So my advice - even when you are feeling really good and really really want to tell him. Don't. Harsh, but if he is like my OH, necessary!

Xxx

Bad_Weather

Also my savings are in a completely different bank which I don't have online access to - made a HUGE difference! X

Harri-bear

Wow, I am very impressed with your saving so far, but agree that my OH would think we were fine if I told him we had any, so I think I will have to keep shtummm!

He has quite an odd way of looking at many things. For example I tell him how desperate I am to move. His response is, 'Why, we haven't got many years left to pay on the mortgage?'
THAT IS NOT THE POINT! I want to live in a nice house in a nice area not in a cr*ppy house in a cr*ppy area. I am sure he wouldn't mind living here forever but, actually, I do!
In all other respects I think he is fab - he is kind, caring and a wonderful dad but he has absolutely no aspirations.
He is also really bad at keeping hold of money...


Kind relative wins modest amount on lottery....

Relative gives US cheque for £1000. Cheque is in hubby's name.

Hubby pays in cheque for £1000 ready to transfer to my account...

Short time later hubby gives me £750. The rest seems to have evaporated! :mad:


I actually said 'Well actually I'm quite surprised you've got that much left,' as this sort of thing usually happens at least once a year. Having said that hubby is paying the difference back a little each week and we are going on holiday for the first time in years to Devon! I am so excited as it's the first proper holiday since my last maternity four years ago!:j

Harri-bear

Plans for the month

Get paid tomorrow so here are the plans -

Save
Put £700 from wages into savings account and DO NOT TOUCH! Add this to ebay savings and should have £800.

Planned Spends
Need to buy some wedding shoes for DD1 from Monsoon as little ones are going to be bridesmaids. DD2 has got hers already. (Monsoon shoes for kids are really big - had to go down a size for each of them) £20

Buy some linen trousers for me, for said wedding. Hoped I'd have lost some weight by the time of the wedding and could buy a nice dress but hasn't happened. Will try to get on ebay.
Oh, and shoes for me too. Not really a 'shoe' person so will again search on ebay.

Hubby needs a new suit for the wedding too (forgot about that). He never wears a suit and when we checked the only one he has, the moths had obviously been at it.:D Supermarket for this probably.

Mum's birthday. There's a plant she really wants but quite hard to find. Can get it on the internet and have it delivered.

MIL. Difficult this. Might get some nice prints of the girls and frame them for her.

Hard to plan for spends

Hotel is paid for for the wedding, but there will be things like breakfast and travel to plan for. Have left enough leeway in budget for this.

Other plans

Finish staining the decking. Started yesterday but then looked like rain so stopped. If I do a bit each dry day should be finished by 2020!

Be more careful with online grocery shopping. Got the world smallest ham joint yesterday as was unsure what 500g looked like - lesson learnt. Previous mishaps include 5 bags of bananas instead of 5 bananas, and last time I ended up with 7 cartons of cottage cheese. Need to be more careful methinks.

Lose 1/2 a stone. Enough said.

Hiddenidenity

Looking good

*Subscribes*

Harri-bear

A NSD for me today - mainly because have been working all day, as back to the grind tomorrow after two weeks off.

Have got that Sunday evening feeling and still not prepared for tomorrow - reckon I've got another hour or so to go (I'm not really on here instead of working ).

Had to smile tonight as Hubby was bathing eldest who is six. He said 'I am an evil genius,' to which my DD said, 'Daddy you most definitely are not a genius.' Out of the mouth of babes eh?

jazzyjustlaw

I can relate to your circs, live in ex council flat, with OH bad with money early 40"s I'm 41 but no children! I will subscribe very interesting thread!

Harri-bear

Hi Jazzy, pleased to meet you.

I moan about my house A LOT. Now don't get me wrong I am very happy to be on the property ladder at all, I know many people aren't. We were very lucky we bought when we did (2001) but we were also very naïve. The people who owned the house before us left it in a bit of a shambles and we didn't have the know-how or money to do anything about it at the time.

As a result we had green and yellow stripy wallpaper in the front room, polystyrene ceiling tiles in the dining room (it looked like the kids had been throwing darts at it as it was full of holes!) and a shower that when we eventually got replaced we were told we were lucky it hadn't burst into flames (something to do with the wrong size cable I think).
The bathroom was a work-of-art, pine cladding on walls and ceiling - heaven help anyone who was claustrophobic!
It was literally like being in a sauna - but without the fluffy white towels.

This is the reason for Millstone (loan) 2. We just couldn't live with it anymore. Bathroom, hall, lounge, dining room all decorated (nice but nothing special). Decking over the boggiest bit of back garden as could literally sink up to your knees after a period of rain. Replaced fence which had blown down - said fence had been put up in front of a shared hedge by the lazy blighter who owned it before us, so losing us a good foot and a half of garden all the way round!


We had to pay for all the work, rather than have a go ourselves, as Hubby is ridiculously awful at DIY. We had a flat once and he decided to wallpaper the kitchen wall. Unfortunately he left a 1/2 inch gap between each sheet and I had to pull it all off again. For all this, he will not accept his limitations and is more than happy to drill, fill and generally demolish anything within reach. I once went away for a weekend and came back to find he'd painted the hideous blue cupboards a hideous green instead! I now use all these examples as reasons why he should never touch a drill, saw or hammer ever again.