Paying the car tax via EBay, and other shenanigans.

mfmaybe

in_need_of_direction wrote: »

Is the flat in an air bnb desirable area?

It might be. I had two enquiries from people wanting to lease it to use with their own airbnb companies. But I fear that changes things from an insurance perspective, tax etc. I need to look in to it. Once we've got our house built, I might think about operating it myself. I probably need to replace the kitchen and the windows first though.

In money news I've managed to miscalculate by at least £200. I did wonder why things looked ok despite losing the rent this month. Sigh.

brizzlegirl

One step forward and one step back eh...sorry to hear that. Fingers and toes crossed it lets.

X

mfmaybe

brizzlegirl wrote: »

One step forward and one step back eh...sorry to hear that. Fingers and toes crossed it lets.

X

Thanks Brizzle. It's very quiet. I get enquiries then nothing comes of it. So I am going to give it one last price drop, meanwhile I think I need to go to an estate agent so that I can get it on to rightmove etc. Hopefully that might result in a higher rent. The enquiries at the moment seem to be all asking if the (already very low) rent includes bills and council tax :mad:

In money news, I think I've got just enough left in the bank to cover the monthly card. Though this is misleading as I raided an already negative pot to pay my lorry insurance etc. To the tune of nearly £400 :eek:, which essentially came out of house savings. But I'm trying to be positive. The Amex payment this month will be entirely paid for one day before payday. And current bill is about £600, but I'm guessing more like £850/£900 once another fuel and food shop is added plus the pending items. There's a chance I can therefore start setting money aside in the upcoming month for the card, or perhaps I should be reinstating those empty pots.

lucielle

Could you try for 1 month to go cash only and not use the card?

L

brizzlegirl

That’s an idea L...it does seem like you chase your tail on CCs and cash flow. I usually do the same but am seeking to use the current account more and then have lower CC totals to pay off at the end of the month.

How’s it going not doing paid work? Still glad you made the call?? Sorry you haven’t got tenants yet..a worry. Will you try Air BnB next?

mfmaybe

It wouldn't actually make a difference, I don't think. Whatever month we chose to start that would result in double costs: paying the card, and paying the cash out for the stuff we'd normally put on the card. It's all fuel, food shopping, dog food, road tax etc. Not splurgey stuff and not really stuff we can avoid. In essence I've already caught it up to the tune of one month due to DH's pay date being after the card payment date. And what I'm trying to do is get ahead of it, but that's not a one-month plan due to the sheer amount of stuff we seem to pay for . Oh plus we've travelled at the pointy end of the plane thanks to the points, so it's not all bad .

That said, I have all but stopped using my non-Amex card. So places like the hairdresser or horse feed store now get paid debit instead of credit. I could also maybe choose one item at a time off the Amex, eg pay the next dog food order in cash.

Non paid work is harder than paid work, I've decided. This is because toddler + puppy = bedlam. Yes I'm glad I made the call though, even before the health stuff, but work itself was a breeze in comparison. :rotfl: Logistics are simpler though and DS is amazing to spend time with.

The flat, ugh. I haven't actually dropped the rent again. I think I can't air Bnb until we've got our house built, so for now I have to accept lower rent is better than no rent. But the lower the rent goes the more I get asked to include bills etc.

PurpleFairy26

Caught up with the blog, thanks for updating. All seems to be progressing in the right direction.

mfmaybe

Thanks Purps. Need to give it another update. There might be a puppy pic on there too, once it's done

In money news, paid the Amex today and moved the little bit of money left into our utilities pot. Current rental house is all electric (heating, hot water, the lot) so our bill is going to be horrific over winter, I'd expect.

Have been musing on your comments about the card vs cash. As I'm now "caught up" with the bill on the Amex, have been deciding how to proceed. I think rather than setting aside everything I need for the Amex going forward, I'm going to start topping up the savings pots again. Reason being, the Amex is usually the same amount so long as my enormous road tax is on it. So I can almost predictably budget for that, whereas car tyres or whatever could take us by surprise.

That said, I've decided to try to set aside one spend type this month. I will start small with Pet food (the puppy's food is not cheap :eek:) and at the same time try to lower our food shopping bill too. Fuel is a bit of a less manageable cost, we live rurally and DH has to travel for work, only some of which is covered. And if I ever manage to sell anything, that can also go to the Amex slush fund. Plus if I rent my flat, it won't be quite so tight any more.

mfmaybe

Long overdue catch up. Going to try to keep it short though as I should be doing other stuff.

Have managed to top up savings for the last two months. Pleased about this, albeit it sometimes feels like a drop in the ocean, especially now I'm making the savings pots cover both of us. But I now have more than required for the house insurance this year (due in a couple of weeks) which is a nice feeling!

Also the flat is rented: I had to drop down to a considerably lower level than previous years, but better it is occupied and earning some money than none.

Amex is due to be paid in 3 days and it's massive. I had managed to set aside 1/3rd of it and DH got some expenses back which go towards it. But despite it being huge, I have enough to cover it, as well as putting the savings aside. It was huge mainly due to fuel costs (£670 in one month :eek:). Of course Christmas presents were part of it, and more than I realised when you see it all in one place. But we weren't frivolous and tried to buy things that were needed, eg new slippers.

I do also have a lot on my other card. Most of it is the building warrant for our house, which will come out of the house savings; but I am now including the broadband for the flat in the rent, and I paid the line rental upfront. Mustn't forget about that.

Have drafted my tax return and looks like I've a bit to pay on that too. Should be due a big rebate next year though, fingers crossed. I will be doing next year's return on the 6th April :rotfl:

Right, better go and do the things I am meant to be doing. Will try to post more frequently.

mfmaybe

A quick money update. Managed to get my professional subscription fee down to 1/5 of full fee as I'm not working just now. But still over £100, boo. In addition I've a small utilities charge to pay for the flat when it was empty, DH has to pay his fee in full and can't reclaim it, we had a emergency trip to the vet (fortunately not an expensive one and puppy is fine), and our electricity bill for current rental is due and is huge.

Oh and I need to transfer some money for a repair in the flat. And actually submit and pay my aforementioned tax return.

I've listed a few things for sale on FB but so far nothing doing.

On the plus side, money set aside for most of the household things we've had to pay in January and I've managed to put cash into savings again.