Mortgage Free For A Happier Me

Happier_Me

I am spending quite a bit of time lurking in other peoples threads but then I forget to post in my own.

I am currently 'overdrawn' (as in owed to the savings, not actually overdrawn) by £1,200 mostly because if Christmas, but this is planned. DH gets an Xmas bonus this month and I have not been paid any 'extra' yet for this secondment - although it should be in my Jan pay packet. This extra income should bring us back into the black with a bit extra.

So, we have 5 school/work days to go now before we break up for Christmas. I really can't wait:j. Christmas day at ours this year, hopefully with my mum and dad. My dad is having a hip replacement next week and they are both desperately hoping he is well enough to have christmas dinner with us.

Children's presents all bought now and many are wrapped. Still a few more to go for other family members though, but mainly vouchers.

Off to see Frozen 3D on Sunday with friends and their children and we're eating out too.

Happier_Me

Happy New Year to everyone!

Well, we have had a lovely Christmas and I hope you all have too!

Back to work on Monday (boo!) but I have had a nice long break.

Worked out that we are £1,300 'overdrawn' still (owed to savings) although this will be paid back to savings by Feb 2014 payday, which I am hoping will be the latest I receive my back pay from work.

This overspend is only partly down to budgeting and then not receiving my extra pay rise when I expected to. The money will arrive eventually but I need to push this to a resolution next week.

We have also had an expensive Christmas. We usually go to my mums for Christmas dinner but this year they came to us because my dad had a major operation in December. We also did Boxing Day for DH's family. I spent ALOT more on food than I budgeted for -£330 on one Tesco shop and that didn't include the Turkey :eek:. I still feel a little faint when I think about it now.

I also spent an extra £250 on a new dinner service and cutlery set for Christmas day - I just couldn't bring myself to serve dinner on mismatched plates with '10 for £1.00' knives and forks from Poundland:rotfl:.

DH also ordered a new tablet for himself at a total of £300. Again not budgeted for. Oh dear...

So all in all an expensive few weeks. But enough's enough and we are climbing back on the MSE wagon from 1st Jan 2014. As long as we stick to the budget for the next two months we shall be able to pull this overspend back.

On a positive note, Jan mortgage payment went out yesterday and my signature has been updated. Getting close to breaking the £70k mark now:D. Yay!

Happier_Me

I've been busy this weekend, batch cooking for the week ahead. That's meals planned for the week with three meals cooked already:j.

Back to work tomorrow, not particularly looking forward to it but I'm sure I will get into the swing of things very quickly. The last two weeks will be a distant memory by lunchtime tomorrow no doubt.

We have some belt tightening to do if we are to pull back our overspends. This is more than manageable as long as we stick to the budget for the next couple of months, but for us it is still tight. We will need to watch every penny although I do have a DH that seems to have caught the 'I want...' bug.

I am going to try posting here a little more often in the hope this keeps us on track.

Happier_Me

DH's obsession with Rightmove has kicked off again and instead of looking for others (house hunting for his mum has been a great distraction for him) he has started looking for us. He has found a beautiful house in our Village that I believe was sold before Christmas but is now back on the market. We really don't need to move but I keep having a sneaky look at it myself. It is quite a bit bigger than our current house with a great garden and it has been decorated to a very high standard. There is space for five cars on the drive whereas we have room for two. I would say our house is more attractive from the front and the road we live on is more sought after. I reckon it would cost us around £45k to move including fees which would add another two years onto our MF date.

We can be very spontaneous when it comes to moving house so it is possible I will be posting that our house is on the market in a couple of days time.:eek:

slowlyfading

How exciting! Link to the maybe house?

Happier_Me

Hi slowfading and anyone else that reads my ramblings...

A move is now off the cards:j. All it took was for me to go back to work on the 13th Jan to put a stop to all this talk of moving. It must sound like I hate my job...I really don't! This new role is a personal challenge for me and it is rewarding but I can not see myself juggling this sort of work and my home life successfully long term. So we are not moving unless we have cash in the bank to remain mortgage free when we do and I would prefer this to be somewhere sunnier than the UK:D. Watched Winter Sun yesterday and we may have to give Florida a try for a holiday - the houses there are amazing for the price.

We haven't been very good from an MSE POV these last few weeks because I have been poorly. But I am on the mend and we need to get back on track so:

• I am batch cooking this weekend. Made 4 lasagnes and planning to make cottage pies and stew pot today. Chicken dinner for today and tomorrow planned also.
• I should receive back pay for my new role end of Feb although the deadline is tomorrow so management are leaving it to the last minute as usual. Also owed back pay for my last secondment that is likely to come through in March.
• Submitted £170 of car mileage to be paid in Feb:)
• DH did his first online shop last week on his new tablet but it appears he is genetically predisposed to overspend every time he uses his credit card. Looking in the freezer I am fairly certain he spent £120 on pizza (but at least he tried). So we are buying from Aldi now, DH and kids are banned from coming and I spent a massive £58 on our weekly shop yesterday.
• We have significantly cut back on wine and lager since the new year for health reasons and it really helps save the pennies too. I have had half a glass of wine and a bottle of lager since the 1st of Jan :A.
• Booking the ferry to France for our August hols today to take advantage of a kids go free offer. Cost (ferry and accommodation) for a 10 night stay in a farmhouse will be £500 (we share with friends). Plus we will need around 3 tanks of fuel and £300 for food (we eat and drink very well). We already have 300 euros from last year for spending money.
• Feb mortgage payment has been made and we are now close to breaking the £70k mark.:cool:
• We have decided to have a second holiday (4 nights in the UK), a surprise for my daughters birthday. So an unexpected expense but we should be able to do this without reducing over monthly over payments.

Apologies for the long post, ramblings over until next month;)

gallygirl

Crikey, never noticed your diary before .

You know you can get 'locks' installed on PC's to stop access to gambling sites? Maybe you should see if there is the equivalent for Right Move, Zoopla etc :rotfl:.

Probably best you've decided not to move. Your house sounds like it's in a good location - what would you do in the bigger house you don't/can't do now? Will be a good few years before you need parking for your children (and by your own admission you may have had the moving bug in between ). A bigger house costs more to run & furnish in addition to the extra cost of purchasing. You could be overpaying that amount to help move you towards being mortgage free, put in your pension, save for your future or have extra holidays. Or buy pizzas in the case of your hubby . We nearly moved a few years ago and would have added around 70k to our mortgage. We could easily have afforded it, but instead we've stayed where we are and I should be able to retire in 2 years time at 54-5. Adding to our mortgage would have made that 4 or 5 years. Yes, it was a lovely house, but I'd sooner be retired than having 12 hour days to pay for it.

Also, as you've said, juggling a demanding job and home life is v difficult and it's best to give yourself as many options as possible.

Happier_Me

Hi Gallygirl.

Thanks for dropping by, its nice to know there are like minded people out there. The thing that scares me most about a bigger house other than the bigger mortgage is the amount of cleaning I would need to do. I am not domesticated and although DH is perfectly capable of cleaning his car until every inch gleams, there could be dead bodies strewn all over the house and I swear he wouldn't notice.

These bigger high spec houses look great but I want to be mortgage free and have the flexibility to decide on the path we take sooner rather than later. You are retiring around the age I would like to and being mortgage free at 40ish makes that a real possibility.

Happier_Me

We've had a good week so far and we are on track to address the not so small matter of our overspend:

• The legal paperwork around my secondment has finally been sorted and back pay should be in my Feb pay, if not I will be getting an extra salary payment.
• It's DS's birthday in a couple of weeks. He is 6 and has never had a birthday party with friends. So this year we have decided to book a play centre for him and around 15 friends at a cost of £125ish. I'm keeping the party bags cheap and cheerful - I've bought some clear party bags, some ribbon and they will be filled with lots of sweets from Home Bargains.
• I am going to make his birthday cake the day before his party. This gives me enough time to rush out and buy a replacement when it goes horribly wrong (I am not a baker:o).
• DS is having a new tablet from a well known supermarket for his birthday. We don't normally go mad for birthdays and although this has only cost us £28 after voucher boost, DD will expect something similar for her birthday in May, no doubt.
• Hoping for a weekly shop of less than £40 in Aldi this weekend to help stay within budget.

I'm just about to hand in my solar meter readings for the worst quarter of the year, so we should be making an extra overpayment to the mortgage before the end of the month.:T

Happier_Me

My Aldi shop came in at £38 last week. Grandma is contributing to DS's birthday present too so this isn't going to cost us much more than £10 cash after using our T&sco vouchers.

It looks like I'm going to have to push for a second payment this month as the paperwork for my secondment has missed the deadline by a matter of a couple of hours. It's a little bit frustrating after being told it was sorted, but the money will get to eventually so I am not concerned. I prefer to receive a larger lump sum anyway as I am less likely to fritter it away.

We currently set a budget of £850 per month to cover food, fuel (£80), other travel (£35), clothes, entertainment etc. All other costs are budgeted for (insurances, day care fees, dinner money, etc etc). I don't think this is much (we could easily spend twice this if we stopped watching the pennies). My current secondment role (Jan to Sept) will earn me an extra £400ish per month after tax and this will not be used to overpay but to give us a little extra breathing space.