Attempting to pay off our mortgage for a bigger house! :)

glitterjunkie

Thanks guys some fab ideas for meals. ..id never thought of adding grated carrot/courgette that's genius! Will try that for sure pavlovs-dog I am sort of trying to downshift with the whole Aldi shopping thing. .. I must say im really impressed so far, I've liked every Aldi item ive tried (well except their packet rice, id rather pay the extra lol) but everything else id definitely will buy again

Muser thanks for that, will defo look at Tillys diary for tips. Batch cooking is definitely the way forward I feel! We are looking to make a similar reduction in our grocery spend to what you have managed so it's good to know it can he done!

Greent haha silly me, I thought £300 was extremely low! Good luck with your January challenge looks like it's going well so far :I need to find these yellow stickers! Time for a late night shopping trip I think

Will update my spends/saves later, should be working really. .. ooops! Xx)

glitterjunkie

Hi MK55... Sorry missed yyour post with it being on a new page! Wiw well done you on that reduction! haha funny you should say that as I went to Aldi in December with a 5 off 40 spend vouchers l and I found it ridiculously difficult to spend 40 in there! After being used to a small basket costing 40 in asda I couldn't believe I could get a trolley full in Aldi for that price. .. its amazing! I love aldi and am definitely switching as much of my shopping as I can there from now on

glitterjunkie

Well I am very excited that we have had an unexpected refund of a bill which is going to he £116 cheaper than we had budgeted for, so that's going straight to OP tomorrow when hubby gets paid! so my first month's OP will be 516 not 400

This week's spends...a couple of NSD'S. £9 spend in aldi yesterday on fresh bits, we haven't actually done a 'big' shop at all yet this month as had loads in freezer and cupboards so just topping up with milk, veg etc. £23 on more Christmas/birthday pressies in the sales, got hubby 3 t-shirts at ASOS which were £60 originally. Just need to hide them from him when they arrive. Im going to have finished all 2014's birthday n Christmas shopping by January at this rate hehe oh and more baby wipes on offer at Amazon. .. 20 packs for £14 on huggies wipes. Definitely don't need to buy anymore for about 6 months now!

This week's extra money made/savings- £1.99 from Topcashback, an additional £18 made on local selling sites to add to the £12 made the other day ive also rediscovered my long forgotten Onepoll account which had £13.30 in it from years ago, started doing surveys again and its now £14

Also cancelled our Sun plus trial and Equifax so that's more bits ticked off the to do list hubby has been invited on a stag weekend in June which will be a dear do, so hes signed up for an overtime shift at work to help towards it DS also has a couple of birthday parties to attend this month so will need to look out for pressies. My mum used to always keep a 'present box' when we were kids whichwe wwould choose something out of to take to a party, I think I need to start keeping one too!

Oh and the £60 Next dress I ordered for a wedding didn't fit very well so ive returned it quite happy about that actually. .. this MFW thing is defo addictive and im now wondering if I should OP that £60? Haha... ive got til August though so il probably keep it to find something else.

Made lunches for work every day this week too

Muser1

You are doing an amazing job!

pixelwife

Hi Glitter, just read your thread from the start and it looks like you're going great guns.

I just wanted to say whilst we're all here to pay off our mortgages early, it's not about living like a pauper in the process. If you see a nice dress you want, get it! Is there any point living mortgage free and feeling miserable that you had no life for years doing so?

I felt like you got a bit guilt-tripped earlier in the thread and that for me is not in the spirit of this community.

So by all means be creative with every penny but don't deny yourself treats as they might be the ultimate source of motivation to smash that mortgage even more.

Best of luck!

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Hi Glitter, good luck with your mortgage reduction plans. I think the key to all this mortgage stuff is to increase your disposable income. Whether that's by savvy shopping, keeping to a budget for stuff, vouchers off etc, mystery dining - anything really which gives you more cash to do with as you please.

Everyone is different but I don't want to go to my grave knowing I'd missed out on something I really wanted or needed just to OP my mortgage. Equally, I don't go mad and the longer we travel this journey, the more we learn what we really do need vs want, which changes buying decisions anyway

Have fun and enjoy the journey.

Tilly

t-rexcellent

Hi Glitter,

I'm really enjoying your diary - keep up the great work! I'm a long-term MFW lurker trying to pluck up the courage to start my own diary so this weekend I think I'm going to take the plunge! We're trying to overpay as much as we can over the next 2 years so we can have a bit more breathing space!

I agree with Pixel and Tilly - you want to be sensible and see that you're making progress but don't punish or deprive yourself in the meantime - little treats are key to keeping us on track....especially if they're not full price

Best of luck with this - I'll be reading and following your journey!

Mallotum_X

Good luck. I started on a MFW journey 4 years ago, and have almost reach the end. We had an aim of mortgage free in 5 years which would have knocked 11 years off the mortgage. In the end we have managed it in just over 4. Its great to start to see the debt tumble, I had a spreadsheet that showed me how much interest i was saving. That helped a lot.

Good luck and enjoy the journey, its amazing how easy it is to make extra little Over Payments when you get small unexpected windfalls.

glitterjunkie

Thanks so much everyone Pixel and Tilly that's exactly the way I want to approach MFW so it's good to see others think that too! To be honest I don't buy much for myself these days anyway but I do like DS to have nice clothes and toys and days out, id hate him to miss out on anything to OP! And me and OH need a few to treats too so I think increasing income and cutting down on things like groceries by shopping and cooking more carefully is the way forward for us

T-recxellent (love the name!) Aww thankyou! - go for it, you should defo start a diary! Mines still really new but im finding it so useful to keep me motivated. I like to record spending so that If I think about buying something I think 'do I really need it' knowing I will have to confess all in my diary later on haha! Well done on starting OP already. .. go on, start a diary

Wow Mallotum-X well done, 4 years is fab! I bet its a wonderful feeling? Its great to see people that have reached their goal to motivate the rest of us! I think I need one of these interest spreadsheets!

Ive got a few bits to update later, OH got paid yesterday so need to check online banking and do a bit of organising first

Have lovely Saturdays everyone x

glitterjunkie

Well our new banking system of having a 'bills' account and a 'spending' account is in place and I feel so much more organised! Why didn't we do this years ago?! The first regular monthly mortgage OP standing order is due to leave the bills account tomorrow, im ridiculously excited to update my signature haha the 'spending' account is for all groceries, petrol, toiletries, socialising, new clothes etc, and the aim is to try and make the best use of this money as possible, so that anything that is left over in there at the end of the month can go to OP too, on top of the regular one we shall see whether this actually turns into reality ha.

Little Moneysaving things I've done this weekend. ..
* rediscovered my Valued Opinions account which has 90p in it.. spent some time updating my profile on there as not used it for ages. So hopefully start getting a few surveys through
* requested to close a couple of old unused accounts including my old student one from years ago, just to make things more simple! This was the one I got a couple of bank charges on as kept using the wrong card by accident when there was no money in it, so that won't happen again now
* got OH to register for telephone banking for First Direct so we can set him up one of the 6% regular savers. Ive already opened one in my name for our own savings, but I plan to pay DS's savings of nearly £1k into DH's, DS might as well earn the interest rather than the paltry 1% he gets with Natwest at the min!

I do have more to add but DH is off to work so will update more later off to Aldi today I think exciting times! hehe, have a lovely Sunday MSE'ers x