Enjoying the Sunshine whilst Saving for the Rainy Day

please-let-me-be-lucky

Sorry you've been having problems with nasty neighbours again. Hopefully they will be moved, and although I'm sure that will stick in your throat, I'm also sure it will be best all round Xx

Dolphin1

Sorry that you are having such a stressful time. Hope things start improving soon especially with your dad.

Take care!

Dolphin1

*Robin*

Hi DFw, :hello:

Sorry to read you've been going through Trying Times recently..
Sending positive vibes / prayers for your Dad - hope he's got someone able to spend the days with him while he waits for his body to recover from the surgery.

As for the neighbours; well! :eek:
Just fervently hope you are close to an acceptable resolution for that situation.. And it's a once-only life experience (sort-of inoculating you against nasty neighbours in the future?).

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

Oh forgot to add my laptop was dead and the entire hard drive needed replacing I lost all my pictures again! I lost all my spreadsheets and my documents too really not happy atm with anything!

Have you got the "dead" drive? It might still be possible to recover the contents - DS2 has managed it for me, twice (it is a bit of a specialist task, apparently - but plenty of people can do it).

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

Sorry to hear about the ................. tenant leaving! I am expecting to hear the same any day now as August is the 6 month point in the tenancy for us and the Polish tenants don't seem to stay very long (shame as they actually pay their rent on time and in full!)

Lifted the above from your post on SbO's diary.. Now is the time to closely supervise your agent - is he looking for another fee to re-issue a new contract, or maybe won't give the tenants the chance to stay because he'll make more £££ from a new lot?
Not all agents are charlatans; when the first AST is up, you'll discover whether yours has morals or not - being in direct contact with the tenants is a good idea, as many LLs haven't a clue what the agent is saying to the tenant.
Just a thought.

*Robin*

Hi again DFw, :hello:

Just in case you do lose your Polish tenants, this organisation may be worth considering:

http://www.homegroup.org.uk/careandsupport/Pages/landlordsneeded.aspx

The tenants sound very well supervised, and rent is paid direct. Plus you'd be helping vulnerable folk, it looks like it could become a long-term arrangement, and you wouldn't need an agent.
What do you reckon (am thinking about something like this, m'self)?

debtfreewannabe321

*Robin* wrote: »

Hi DFw, :hello:

Sorry to read you've been going through Trying Times recently..
Sending positive vibes / prayers for your Dad - hope he's got someone able to spend the days with him while he waits for his body to recover from the surgery.

As for the neighbours; well! :eek:
Just fervently hope you are close to an acceptable resolution for that situation.. And it's a once-only life experience (sort-of inoculating you against nasty neighbours in the future?).



Have you got the "dead" drive? It might still be possible to recover the contents - DS2 has managed it for me, twice (it is a bit of a specialist task, apparently - but plenty of people can do it).



Lifted the above from your post on SbO's diary.. Now is the time to closely supervise your agent - is he looking for another fee to re-issue a new contract, or maybe won't give the tenants the chance to stay because he'll make more £££ from a new lot?
Not all agents are charlatans; when the first AST is up, you'll discover whether yours has morals or not - being in direct contact with the tenants is a good idea, as many LLs haven't a clue what the agent is saying to the tenant.
Just a thought.

*Robin* wrote: »

Hi again DFw, :hello:

Just in case you do lose your Polish tenants, this organisation may be worth considering:

http://www.homegroup.org.uk/careandsupport/Pages/landlordsneeded.aspx

The tenants sound very well supervised, and rent is paid direct. Plus you'd be helping vulnerable folk, it looks like it could become a long-term arrangement, and you wouldn't need an agent.
What do you reckon (am thinking about something like this, m'self)?

Morning Robin thanks for popping in, i've got time at last this week to sit down and actually answer people properly!
I've had Polish tenants before and although they don't leave the place sparkling they leave the pipes, light fittings and usually their furniture too :rotfl: (unlike the Welsh & English tenants i've had so far!) I will look at that link in a moment, i've a funny feeling it's a company my dad uses with his BTLs I have already decided to get on to my LA on the 21st (that's the date the rent it due and the lease is due to expire...albeit 2 months further down the line! I will ask them to suss out what their plans are as I don't even know the name of the tenant without finding paperwork )

On to computer, we had a problem arise from no where and so we sent it back off to manufacturer as it's practically new and they sent it back fixed..........with a new hard drive!!!! A note was in there saying hard drive failure and new one had been put in and that was it Thankfully as it was relatively new we didn't have lots of things on there to lose but there was still things I wanted such as pictures spreadsheets and suchlike can be replaced...!

Dad update- I'll put in my main post

debtfreewannabe321

Morning!

Well I'll start where I left off answering Robin's post!! My dad is now out of hospital! :j I think he badgered them to leave and I'm unsure if he's well enough to be home tbh but I also believe that if you are in familiar surroundings, with pets, loved ones etc you will recover much quicker. So I will continue to call him and see how he's progressing until I can get over next!

DH is on a 24 hr shift so I couldn't go this weekend

I also couldn't go this weekend because we're having more car problems :rotfl: *surprise surprise*! We've scrapped the blue car (new one) for the princely sum of £200. We made this decision because the night before last was like being up with a new born baby wailing. Every 20 mins our blue car would start crying and flashing for no good reason (the alarm was going off!) There was no reason for it! I googled the next morning, groggily over a cup of tea and found that it could be hiding more severe problems than just a broken alarm........I read all the problems and there were some new (and expensive) ones on top of what we already knew was wrong with it from our list :eek: I made a decision based on gut instinct alone (not one for thinking logically i'm afraid ) and told DH to get it scrapped. I'd rather be down £800 (after we got £200 back...) than the £1000+ £600 (we'd been quoted for second hand parts) + £400 labour (his mechanic friend quoted for fitting said parts) ....anything else could have gone wrong really after we had fixed these things and would set us back even more. My Renault Scenic (dashboard failure & computer failure) kept springing to mind very vividly and I took it as a sign! I was still paying that debt off up to last year :mad: So I said let's happily scrap this, lose the £800 and have gained a valuable (and expensive :rotfl:) lesson! SO we are now -£800 rather than -£2000 and waiting for more problems to arise! And the scrap bloke can deal with the new-born-baby-car-a-wailing!

Anyway our car problems don't stop there unfortunately The red car (our old one) which has seen us through the last few years has started to make sounds when turning the wheels into full lock. We've kind of ignored it as we wanted rid of anyway but typically as we get rid of the blue car, the red car gets worse *sigh* .....we are also losing the exhaust, slowly but surely! We've sort of tied it back up (I say sort of as it's still moving around!) and we're still driving it but I don't feel safe going to dad's house and back in it So we went to Ford yesterday to look at a Black car, we're in the middle of a credit check (which we think we might fail but wasn't sure what else to do :huh:) to buy a not so old black car with MOT and tax disc and working parts. If we don't get that, i'm out of cash (and ideas) unless I break into house funds which i'm so loathe to do I am willing to take on another loan :huh: Confused??? Me too........!

Oh and another thing that had us laughing hysterically on the way home from scrap guys..........we'd taken the tax disc thinking we'd get a refund on the couple of months remaining.....it turns out it was a disabled one which was free so no refund available :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: I'm not sure if i'm cracking up from car issues or just past caring and it really is funny

In neighbourly matters, i've been out doing things all week so haven't really been home- Monday was at dad's side in hospital, Tuesday I was travelling home, Wednesday I spent all day in a kitchen with homestart, Thursday I had my meditation group and was out in the afternoon and Friday I was with my homestart family and then out car shopping and car scrapping :rotfl: so anyway I hadn't realised that whilst DH has been home all week he's seen the other side to the neighbour too (the one she reserves for me usually) I think up to this point he'd thought I just had the hump and was picking her up and exaggerating her bad points. Well he has heard her screaming at the kids, slamming around, screaming at her husband several times (poor man) and locking the dog out all day (whom by the way is still wearing a cone of shame and has a limping leg months after it hurt itself ) and blaring her music out...He's been to welfare and we have a new Sgt Mjr in there who knows DH very well (:T) so he has been down, given his side as well as mine, to try and sort out once and for all and they think they can get her moved asap as she's breached the contract. But I won't be counting my chicks till the eggs have hatched :A

SO i've had a busy week and was hoping for a rest but I need food so will have to go out at some point this weekend. Luckily next week is looking a bit quieter! Oh and DS1 had his last physics exam on Thursday! He came out and said it was a breeze........so I said "shall we be expecting an A* then" and he changed his tune and went "hmm well at least a C i hope" and then shuffled off ! Boys! He didn't revise all that much and i've been so caught up with things that i've not really had a chance to badger him to do the revision! Perhaps it may be a lesson he needs to learn himself anyway This could be a good trial run for next year, if he doesn't do very well then he will know to revise more next year! However if he gets a good grade then I suppose I can't badger him to revise next year as he'll think he knows it all .

Anyone here interested in reincarnation? I'm reading a good book atm called Many Lives, Many Masters, it's an easy read (I read over half the book in 2 hours last night) and it's quite interesting Anyhow I think i've rambled enough, i'll leave you in peace xxx

debtfreewannabe321

Oh and just another quick one!

The YNAB is confusing me, i'm not used to working a spreadsheet in the negative all the time. We get our main bulk of wage on the last day of the working month but we also get other money during the month (tax credits, child benefit, tenancy money) so I'm working with a -£750 at the moment :huh: And i'm struggling to see if I have budgeted correctly for next month too as I can't put in any income yet?! I'm gutted I lost all my spreadsheets and I don't even know if I have put everything on them really as it's totally confused me (granted it doesn't take much does it!) I have worked out that I should have enough this month though to pay for one more trip to dads, £200 of food money left and also be able to put some money away for car insurance (which is due for the year next month...i'm going to use the £200 scrap money for this which then means I have £400 put away for it) and I should be able to put at least £150 into the house saving fund. So even though it's been a tough month i'm hoping I can kind of swallow the £800 hit and come out ok from it!~ xx

grannyx2

You are a busy little bee aren't you x

Sorry to hear about continued car problems, hope the black car works out

Glad to hear dad is home, hope he recovers well now he's home

Granny x

shinner

Wow you have had a busy week. Great news about neighbours moving I bet you can't wait to get the flags out. Hope their dog starts to get better soon. How disorder such a horrible owner ?
Hope your dad continues to recover.
Take care xx

debtfreewannabe321

Thanks Granny & shinner :A

Well I went to A1di yesterday, spent £10.99 on father's day gifts from the kids, £5 on gardening bits (some compost and a few small things) and around £90 on the weekly shopping. I've filled up 3 flower pots I found with compost and have watered them. One big one is for the tomatoes to go in once they get bigger (currently they are on my window sill still quite small!) and the other 2 are for my two smaller kids to put flowers in themselves. DS1 used to love doing this, he's got awful hayfever these days though and hates going in the garden now in summer, poor thing!

I finished my book, was a good read and now i'm looking for something else (preferably free and on kindle ) I've got half way through a book on Amma, an Indian guru, I'm going to a guru evening at the end of the month, my meditation teacher has taken Amma as her guru and lots of us have asked questions (quite skeptical ) so she is kindly putting on an evening of what they are about, and we can ask questions. I'm debating whether to meet her guru in the Autumn when she visits England...it doesn't cost much if anything and I get a free hug which are always welcomed

I have put 2 cheques in the bank this week so awaiting them to be available before adding to my YNAB. One was for £49 (a school trip ds1 can't go on anymore as we realised the school had booked 2 trips over the same day!) and one for £200 from the blue car. The £49 will go towards this month's expenses, £200 one will go straight to the car account to pay for next month's insurance for the year (i'll have £400 in there by then) Then after that I will resume putting away money each month for tax, insurance, MOT & servicing at around £100 for all of these categories. I've been reading some testimonials of YNAB and the fact you don't need separate accounts for all your savings, and some people actually only have the one account where bills, savings, every day spends come from! They must be very well organised not to over spend on each category to manage this :eek: I like the fact I can't touch my savings unless I physically move it from one account to the other! :rotfl: I'm not as obsessed as I once was with 13 accounts though, i've whittled it down to around 7/8 now :D!

DH was at work all night and all day yesterday so he's just got home this morning in time for the kids getting up and he's gone to bed now. SO I think a lazy day will be in order and i'm happy with that, i'm still recovering from last week