£192,737 mortgage!

happydays_70

mortgage_girl wrote: »

Well done on your op's. :T Hope you got all of your birthday shopping done and had some time to enjoy the sun.

MGx

What are you up to MG?

mortgage_girl

happydays_70 wrote: »

What are you up to MG?

Had a busy weekend in the garden planting out lots of veggies and replanting various plants. Been trying to finish the polytunnel this morning and had a bit of a battle with the netting. Thankfully I won and now it's ready to house my kale and cabbage plants...only problem is that it's started to rain so I suppose I'll have to have a cuppa and catch up on some diaries. What a shame! :rotfl:

Hope you have a lovely day today...just 10 more get ups to go! :T

MGx

happydays_70

Really busy week at work. 5 more get ups, can't wait.
Got bits of food shopping to do and need petrol but can wait til tomorrow.
That means today has been NSD

happydays_70

I really let things slide. I am spending what is left over at the end of the month instead of making OPs. I have returned with renewed vigour and will be reading for tips to keep on track


My balance stands at £179000
Only 4 years left of CSA for one of my children so there will be a reduction in incoming money. With that in mind every little helps

happydays_70

Just made an OP of £50. Concerned though that these random payments don't have any impact and just get absorbed rather than help to make a difference. It's got to be regular doesn't it?

Floxxie

I'm completely with you there.

I've made no OPs and I know that child maintenance will dramatically reduce December 2019.

I blame the time of year

racing_blue

Even small payments make a difference. That single overpayment of £50 has reduced your monthly payment by about 12p per month, every month, at current interest rates.

Which is not a lot, but future overpayments will build on that, and over time all the "p"s become "£"s

If interest rates rise in future, so will the monthly benefit of having made that overpayment. You have made a gift to your future self!

Like many people, I think of money overpaid as money saved, whereas mortgage interest is money spent. So maximizing overpayments while minimizing interest rates is a prudent game to play!

One thing out of our control is inflation. We have have experienced a decade of low inflation. A few years of high inflation could be a game changer for those of us with jobs and mortgages, the get-out-of-jail card.

racing_blue

I prefer to look at my mortgage mountain in terms of the monthly interest payment "steps".

The repayment of the mortgage principal is simply saving - in the piggy bank of a house (clearly it's important that cashflow supports these too, but I prefer not to focus too much on the mountain).

Your mortgage was £185,340 last March, had 21 years and 5 months to run, and your mortgage rate is 2.84%. Without any overpayments since then, this month you would have paid £427.35 in interest.

That extra £50 brought the interest down to £427.24 this month and it will be less next month.

For comparison, using the figures from your very first post your interest payment was £640.85 that month.

Or put another way, your mortgage was 50% more expensive before you overpaid, reduced term and arranged a better rate.

Your next target might be £400 per month... you are probably on track to get there by November 2017, but you'll probably be able to bag an even better rate when your fixed rate period expires in March. I'm on a 1.99% 5 year fix with HSBC for example, so you might need to set an even more ambitious than that.

Good luck with it and I hope this doesn't feel like trying to teach anyone to suck eggs, this is simply the way I prefer to make sense of my own very big mortgage as I crunch it beneath my feet.

Die, mortgage!

http://bretwhissel.net/cgi-bin/amortize is the caculator I like to use btw

happydays_70

Thanks Floxxie and racing blue. I will still get half the maintenance til my youngest is 18 in 7.5 years. I sometimes feel like selling and buying a cheaper house but didn't have any luck selling mine a couple of years ago.
Plan is to keep chipping away and yes, racing blue I can see the light by making these payments, just get swayed at times to spend money rather than be sensible with it.

mortgage_girl

Keep going happydays, it all adds up. Instead of focusing on what you havent op'd, think about all of those wonderful op's that you have made. You're doing really well.

MGx