The Mortgage Free Roll Of Honour

youreds

a. The date you decided to become a MFW
Jan 2004 when we moved to a bigger house

b. Mortgage Debt at its highest
£90,000 when we moved, but with £25,000 offset, in hindsight we shouldn't have offsetted, at the time it didn't suit.

c. Mortgage-Free Date
This Monday August 8 2011 when the contents of the Investec Hi 5 account arrive in the current account

d. Your one pearl of wisdom.
Remortgage, Remortgage, Remortgage! Always make sure you're on the best deal.
Before the Jan 2004 move we were technically mortgage free,we had a £23,000 endowment mortgage from 1988 & £25,000 sat in savings. Madness! But thankfully this site was discovered then, here I am 7 years later Mortgage free - 18 years early. God knows how much interest I've saved, it's a great feeling.

No MFW diary, but if I get time I'll start a thread detailing how we did it, quite a few things happened on the way.

nomoredebtslavery

a. The date you decided to become a MFW
2003 Divorce, redundancy and subsequent self-employment
b. Mortgage Debt at its highest
£74.000
c. Mortgage-Free Date
Mid 2010 my 40th year
d. Your one perl of wisdom.
Erm I have more than one, sorry:
1. In terms of being mortgage free - get an offset mortgage (FirstDirect) and live within your means. Any surplus reduces debt. Offset mortgage gives flexibility to over and underpay. Must be disiplined though.
2. Do an annual budget, mortgage, council tax, insurance etc.... Divide by 12. Understand your outgoings and smooth out the winter bill peaks.
3. Do not have any credit card debt and do not take out a car loan. Save for what you want - do you really need it?

I resolved never to take on any more debt. I drive a 7 year old car that I bought with cash, no way will I ever take out a car loan again. I'll never buy a new car again as I did in 2000. Second hand cars are fine and depreciation is much reduced.

Having little or no debt gives you a great deal of personal freedom. You can manage your time on your own terms.

I work for myself not for the banks.

Good luck all.

Temrael

a. The date you decided to become a MFW
It's always been a goal, and for years we have made overpayments but we began to turn our attention to it in earnest about this time last year when we switched to a First Direct Offset mortgage (as it made chipping away at it that much easier).

b. Mortgage Debt at its highest
£110k

c. Mortgage-Free Date
19th of August 2011 - the day after our son got a place at university with his excellent A-Levels. So just in time for a new financial challenge! :rotfl:

We actually have about £9k on 0% credit cards but we will easily accrue enough savings to be able to repay these before they begin to attract interest.

d. Your one pearl of wisdom
When you get close to being MF, look at slow stoozing via a 0% purchase credit card or two. We used M+S and Tescos. We just did all our monthly spending (shopping, petrol etc.) on them and then transferred the money we would have spent from our current account directly into the mortgage. You need to be sure you will be able to pay the cards off by the time it attracts interest though.

If your mortgage is totally flexible though you could always withdraw from the mortgage and pay it back to the cards in an emergency (you would still have saved a year or so's interest on £10k or something).

We did some Matched Betting too (raised about £1k in 3 months or so) but that's not for everyone and needs a lot of care and attention.

Cappsy

a. The date you decided to become a MFW
2005 when the endowment shortfall letters started to arrive.

b. Mortgage Debt at its highest
£39500

c. Mortgage-Free Date
August 2011

d. Your one pearl of wisdom.
Overpay what you can while return on savings is low.

Pinner_Ram

I recently signed up to Noddle and was pleased, though not surprised. to see a credit rating of 5/5. I then reviewed my various accounts to make sure they were correct. I then decided to pay off my mortgage (had paid it down to £5k a year or so ago - was 4 years into a 10 year fix) and also to ask for my credit card limit to be reduced from £12k to £4k on a card that I want to retain for overseas use (Nationwide).

Shock, horror! I did this and found that my credit rating had fallen to 4/5.

I am assuming;
1. as I do not have a mortgage, lenders may assume that I rent whereas I actually own a property outright, and,
2. they view the limit reduction as being due to the fact that I did not trust myself with it!

I am very annoyed by the credit rating system.

PR

RosieTiger

Dave_Velasco wrote: »

Well I am not yet a mortgage free person yet but can you help me out to become a mortgage free one? I am open to learning how.. Just want to know some simple guides as I am currently facing a bit of problem on my current mortgage status.

Hi, you need to post in the main mortgage free board, this is just the roll of honour for those who have made it.
Plenty of guidance in other people's diaries, if you have specific questions ask there too, generally someone will know the right answer.

Redyam

Congratulations to everyone that is mortgage free, it really is the ultimate in financial stability.

There are threads all over about being debt-free, about saving a deposit up etc. But mortgage free really is the pinnacle. :T

Grayzee

11 payments to go:j

System

Decided: 1984
Achieved: 1985
Maximum mortgage: £20,000


Tip: Move from central London to Wales during a housing boom.

Abyss

a. The date you decided to become a MFW.
When I first took out the mortgage, in March 2004.

b. Mortgage Debt at its highest
£143K

c. Mortgage-Free Date
29/11/2011

d. Your one pearl of wisdom.
Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves.

e. And if you had a mortgage freedom diary on MFW, a link to it.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/2685869 It's not much of a diary, I have always been a bit rubbish at keeping up any sort of diary!