Small steps to reduce a big debt!! x

LittleMissGiggles123

I have FINALLY got around to calling Santander to check the overpayment rules on our mortgage & how I go about paying.


I'm glad I called because the person I spoke to was extremely helpful & actually made me realise I had thought wrong about our particular overpayment.


I initially thought that we could only make overpayments equal to 10% of our monthly payment (don't know where I got that from). However, the man I spoke to has advised it is 10% of the balance at the beginning of this year. So we are allowed to make an overpayment of £16,906.00 this year!! I can safely say we won't reach this but even a quarter of this would be a great start.


He also advised not to make the payments within 10 days before the monthly DD coming out as this would be treated as the monthly payment & would just reduce the DD on the 1st of the month. So I can safely make an overpayment anytime between the 1st & 17th of any month to stay well clear of the 10 day rule.


He's going to send out a form for me to complete to say that I automatically want any overpayment to come off the capital & reduce the term, but until I've sent that form back & confirmed they've received it I should ring them every time I make an overpayment. This has changed my method slightly because I was going to make small overpayments every week depending on affordability, but I don't want to be making weekly phone calls so I will save any money in a 'pot' & just make the payment once a month.


And last but not least, I now have the sort code, account number & reference to make these payments.


So even though I've not made an overpayment this month because of my disorganisation, I am well prepared now for next month. I have even written all the details in my desk diary that I update every day:)


Really looking forward to the weekend now after having a productive few days in & out of work.


x

LittleMissGiggles123

The start of a new week (well technically yesterday was, but it was a Bank Holiday so that doesn't count :rotfl:)


I had a lovely weekend. My daughters party was amazing, she absolutely loved it & even though it wasn't sunny, it didn't rain so we also managed to have a BBQ.


Payday on Friday & I have already started listing in my diary all the payments that will be going out on various dates. Most of our bills go out on the 1st of the month but there are a few (council tax for instance) that get taken around the middle of the month so I want to make sure I keep track of that so the money is in there ready rather than me having to transfer it in like I used to.


My surveys are going well but it seems so slow to get to the payout marks. InboxPounds is £20 before they'll pay out & Quidco Opinions is £25!! I might forget about Quidco Opinions though because they hardly ever have any surveys so I think it's just going to take forever to get to that £25. Valued Opinions is now on a massive 75p but I did a few more surveys today. Onepoll are on £8 & £11.


I'm ahead with the £1 per day pots. I had a load of change in my purse the other day so put in enough to get me to the end of May, have now put that money in a separate purse & have started the £1 per days for June.


To Do List for today


Little tidy up
Hoover downstairs
1 load of washing
Sort washing machine insurance
Sort a new tax disc holder for car


Not got many spendy days now until the weekend I hope. We have loads of food in the house & it's half term this week so no packed lunches or dinner money to sort.


x

LittleMissGiggles123

What a lovely day today. Daughters birthday & she has had a great day.

On to my to do list that I set

Little tidy up - DONE
Hoover downstairs - DONE
1 load of washing - DONE
Sort washing machine insurance - NOT DONE
Sort a new tax disc holder for car - NOT DONE

I've been busy keeping up with surveys, all going well so far.

Checked the bank accounts today & it looks like after payday & bills are done, I should be able to make quite a large overpayment next month. I was hoping for about £100 but will be able to better that a lot. However, I might take it easy because I don't want to leave us short if something unexpected comes along.

My old phone finally sold. I set a reserve but also a buy it now price. It was ending tonight but somebody bought it outright last night. The buyer paid straight away too so I transferred some of the money in to savings, some in to our joint account for a little bit extra safety cushion, paid my credit card bill & also paid some money in to our old joint account. It went overdrawn unexpectedly because a DD left the account before the switch happened between our old account & santander account, but I didn't realise it was still on the old account so didn't leave any money in there, very annoying! But I have sorted that now & left enough in there now for the charge we will get & a little buffer just in case. At some point the account will close though so I'll make sure I get that buffer back out as soon as I am 100% certain we have nothing else coming out of that account.

I've also left a little bit of the money in Paypal to pay for something that I ordered today & to pay the (extortionate) ebay fees. Thats the only problem with ebay, they are so expensive & you get double whammy because they also charge Paypal fees.

Was looking at some cheapish holiday ideas for next year. We already have this years holiday sorted but next year we want to make a massive effort with the mortgage overpayments so we're thinking of having a really low spend year (compared to our usual spends). I looked at Center Parcs but unless we go in term time, the prices are ridiculous! We used to just take a few days before Christmas & it was a lovely break for us all but our eldest daughter will be in Year 10 from September so the next 2 years are so important. Anyway, a week in term time is £349, but a half term week is £799 & thats in October, so not even a summer break! How can they justify that?? It's so out of proportion to the term time prices & I feel so sorry for the families who just want to take a nice family holiday. We've been extremely lucky & been able to afford some amazing holidays, but as I get older (and maybe wiser) I realise what a rip off some of these holiday companies are.

Anyway, rant over now! I don't know what we'll do next year. My husband keeps suggesting camping, but I'm not really convinced it is my sort of thing. I don't mind a caravan, but I'm talking a static caravan with hooked up electricity etc. Maybe we can come to a compromise.

I'm getting better with minimal or no spend days. If I do buy lunch, I literally just buy the main item (sandwich, sushi etc). I don't buy any drinks or snacks. I am actually planning on taking a packed lunch tomorrow too as I have to make a packed lunch for my daughter as she is off for a picnic with friends.

Well I think I've rambled on enough now! I'm just going to set my To Do list for tomorrow & then have a read of some other diaries.

To Do List

Buy a tax disc holder
Post phone
Put some stuff on ebay
Sync phone to regain some storage on it!

I think that's all I need to do, well apart from the usual routine.

Happy Wednesday everyone

x

LittleMissGiggles123

I've had a relatively quiet day today. Had a long but very productive meeting in work this morning. I love it when you have meetings & the discussions flow so ideas start to come together. Feels like things are going in the right direction


The to do list I came up with yesterday to do today isn't going so well at the moment, but the day isn't over yet & in my defence I can't sync my phone in work because I need the photos etc to go on my own laptop, not my work computer!


I won't be able to post the phone today though as I don't finish work until 5pm so will miss the post office. That's not a problem though as I want to make sure I get the IMEI number etc saved somewhere just in case the buyer tries to mess me around. I will post it tomorrow.


I am hoping to get a few items on ebay tonight on a 10 day listing, because if I put them on tonight they get 2 weekends of viewers & end on a Sunday night too which is apparently when you get more bids. Plus a lot of the items are my daughters old summer clothes, so I want somebody to buy them ready for the summer holidays. Maybe I'll set a target for myself.


I gave up on Toluna a few weeks ago because I read some bad reviews on it but I have started it up again because I thought to myself if I don't get anything all I've really wasted is a few minutes a day but if they've improved their services then I potentially get something for nothing. So I've started doing the surveys on that one now & already up to enough points for a £5 voucher for Photobox. I don't know whether to redeem this or keep saving the points for a different voucher. I think I'll have a really good nose through the rewards they offer & then decide.


Valued Opinions has gone a bit quiet recently. I've had 1 or 2 surveys sent to me but then been screened out. I'm only on £1.50 at the moment, but I suppose the good thing about VO is you can redeem at £10. InboxPounds seems to be busy lately but they don't payout until £20 & I'm currently on just over £8.50 so got a while to go on that one yet. Will check it again later.


I have requested my cashback payout from Quidco. It was only £5.52 & I have other stuff I'm waiting to be confirmed but it was bugging me having that just sitting on the account so I requested the payout today. It says it takes up to 5 days to pay but in the past I've had it in about 2 days.


Payday tomorrow, woohoo! It will be nice to see the account at such a high figure, even if it is only going to be for a few days
:rotfl:


I've checked all accounts today & not really many changes. We had our first months worth of cashback paid in, but it was low this month because the switch over wasn't complete until the middle of the month, so some DD's were paid out of our old account. However, it is still money that we wouldn't have got if I hadn't switched us over so I'm happy with any amount. Plus next month will be even higher so it'll be nice to see us getting something from the banks for a change.


I've got all our DD's etc written in my diary now on the dates they are due to leave the account. Of all the methods I've tried in the past (spreadsheets, budget planners etc) this is the most effective for me because I can just open up my desk diary every day, check how much I need for the following day or few days, make sure the bank account has the right amount to cover everything & if I make any payments to anything or transfers I can just write this in my diary too & update the balances to keep track. I can also manually keep track of DD dates that change from month to month (although these are usually just a day or so difference).


Anyway, I am rambling again. Going to switch off for a bit now, might pop back later if I have anything to cross off my to do list.


To Do List


1 load of washing
Buy tax disc holder
Note down all details for phone & package ready to post
Put 10 items on ebay
Sync phone
Check out cheap holidays for 2015
Complete 4 surveys


x

Lucky2

Hi LMG,

Well done on your progress so far, sounds like you're making a lot of positive changes already. I may try your "Tilly tidies" idea into our mortgage account as we won't be in a position to start properly overpaying on our mtge until Sept. Good luck for your MF Journey and hope you have a fab weekend.

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Morning, glad the Tilly Tidy approach is helping. It may only be small but it does make a difference. Bear in mind if you have printed statements they become very long, but great if everything is on line :):)

Best wishes Tilly x

LittleMissGiggles123

Hi Lucky, thanks for the good luck vibes. Sending some positive vibes back your way & hope you had a good weekend.


Hello Tilly, I am assuming you are THE Tilly Yes I have noticed the statements! I get all my statements online to be more green:A but I still notice they are very long statements.


I hope everybody had a good weekend. Mine was wonderful.


A quiet Saturday. We went to the cinema & did a bit of a top up shop, as well as getting a few goodies for the BBQ. We've got a fridge & freezer full of food so hopefully won't need to do any shopping now this week.


Beginning of the month, most bills have left the account. I know there are a few more that go out in the next few days & then some later on in the month. The money is there to cover those bills & some, but I am going to wait a few more days before I make the OP just to make sure I haven't missed anything. Luckily with our new joint account we both have cards, but have lost our PIN's so don't make any debit card payments with them. It seems to work well that way because there aren't any unexpected payments leaving the account & the money that we have in our own accounts is just spending money anyway, so is there for anything we want to spend it on. I am actually hoping that by the end of this month I can transfer some of 'my' money back in to the joint to add to the OP. Hubby is paying for our holiday though so I wouldn't expect him to do the same. We did have to pay the childminder extra this month though because of the extra hours over half term, very annoying. I knew it was coming so had budgeted for it, but it's still £100 out of my pocket that I otherwise would have had if it wasn't for half term.


Tilly Tidies are going great. Back up to almost £70 now. I might use that as a mortgage overpayment on top of the one I have budgeted in our bank account. I might do that every month then, rather than it sitting in the savings account doing nothing. As I said in a previous post, we have 'proper' savings in another account anyway so this account is just a little booster that hasn't got a specific purpose yet. I'll give that a little thought & see what I would prefer to do.


I've been keeping on top of the surveys & the balances are going up slowly. I seem to have been screened out of quite a few lately though & some of them are so long!


We bought some stuff in Homebase a few weekends ago & not wanting to miss out on any sort of freebie I grabbed a Nectar card. I used to have one but never used it so it wasn't in my purse. Anyway, we got 580 points for the stuff we bought in Homebase & since then I have registered my card on to Nectar eShops & Adpoints, so have already built the points up a lot more. The balance is currently on over £8.00 worth of points which is great, plus my Boots Advantage Card has over £30 on it. I'm going to keep both cards ticking over until Christmas & then use the money on both. I also noticed earlier that if I buy anything from Next online I can get Nectar points. I do buy occasionally from Next so I'll keep that in mind. They are on Quidco for cashback but I'm using Topcashback more now as they payout more, but for some reason don't have any cashback for Next. I'll just keep an eye on all 3 & use whichever I think is the best value.


I'm always trying to find new ways to save us money now so that we can make bigger overpayments, or just so the money we do spend is being spent more wisely.


I've not put anything on ebay yet. I just didn't get round to it last Thursday & then Sunday the weather was just too nice to be stuck inside photographing and listing stuff. I am going to wait now until this coming Thursday because I don't want the auctions ending mid week when less people are looking. I'm going to do as I previously said & list on a 10 day listing starting Thursday.


I did look at a few holiday ideas for next year but still had no inspiration. I will keep looking & hope something jumps out at me that has an amazing offer with everything we are looking for. Wish me luck! :rotfl:


Well I hope everybody's Mondays are going well. I've had a productive day & will hopefully have a relaxing evening. Looking forward to a new episode of Game of Thrones.


Tonight's To Do List
The usual 1 load of washing!
Sync phone (yes I know, still not done)
Do some surveys


Nice small list tonight.


x

LittleMissGiggles123

Not got much to report but thought I'd pop by anyway & just put down a few things so I remember them.


Firstly, my to do list that I set yesterday is done. I didn't bother syncing my phone in the end because I deleted some photos & apps that didn't need to be on there, so that has freed up some room. I will sync it at some point but there is no real urgency anymore.


Have checked all accounts today & all is looking ok. I've decided to make a list now of all the little 'pots' that I have, whether they're reward cards, cashback or Tilly Tidies. As these pots are being used for treats & presents, I think it will be nice to see exactly what I have got so when I know I've got a birthday coming up I can check what can be used from these before spending 'real' money.


So here goes


Tilly Tidies pot £82.86
Boots Advantage Card £30.10
Tesco Clubcard £19.00
Nectar Card £4.45 (less than what I thought but that was because I had the wrong number etched in my brain:rotfl:) I also have 164 points to transfer across from adpoints & 20 points from nectar canvass, so this will take it up to £5.37.
Onepoll accounts £13.50 & £9.00
Valued Opinions £1.50 (getting screened out ALOT lately)
Inboxpounds £9.45
Toluna 4955 points but I have done quite a few surveys with them the last few days so quite a lot pending. I have decided I'm going to keep the points until I can get a more suitable reward. A £5 photobook voucher would be nice, but I might not end up using it & I would definitely get more use from something like an Asda or Boots voucher
Topcashback account
- £1.43 payable (got to hit at least £10 before they will payout though)
- £41.16 confirmed, waiting for these to become payable
- £164.93 pending (tracked but not confirmed yet, although I have no doubts they will be confirmed as they are all genuine transactions)
Quidco £6.63 tracked awaiting confirmation


I had a nice surprise from Quidco today. I logged on a few days ago & I had £5.52 confirmed. I was going to leave it there but decided to request the payout. Checked my bank today & there is a pending payment of £26.27 from them, so when I checked the account it looks like another payment was confirmed before they did the payment run so they put it all through.


So actually that's quite a bit in the pipeline, good for gifts that would otherwise be bought with the money sitting in our bank accounts. I'll keep track of this & occasionally update to see progress.


Another thing I want to do (stolen from a diary I'm reading on Debt Free Wannabees) is to set myself some goals in different categories. The categories that is used are Financial, Home & Myself. I'll set these in a separate entry though as this entry is getting a bit long!!


x

LittleMissGiggles123

Wow, just totted that up & it comes to £384.93. I know its just values rather than real money, but it will still mean that I can buy £300 worth of presents without spending any cash. Plus then the Tilly Tidies add up so by Christmas I should have a nice little cushion there.


x

mouche

Just read through your diary LMG and you're going great guns! What you said about the sun making you spend less money is so true as well. My LO is only 2 but his favourite thing to do is to have a kickabout with his dad and then go to the playground - all free and yet he has such a lovely time. Look forward to reading about how you get on.