Pay off debts before Baby number 2!!

crunch_time

Thanks OrangeFairy! Yep trying to stay positive. Just want to pay it off and start putting into place the plans we said we would do once we had started a family. We are the same - about £1000 left after paying everything we need to pay for. I'm doing small targets at a time as the bigger picture is harder to look at! Ha ha!!


Good luck with your journey too! Shall be following along


Crunchy xx

crunch_time

Dear Diary


Had some progress these last few days!


Positives:

• The roofer has quoted £300 for the roof now instead of £400 - £100 saving for the slush fund!! :j
• Had an MSE moment when I changed home insurance providers and will be saving £10 a month!! :money:
• I have decided to cancel the cleaner at the end of July. It was only a short term thing due to being so knackered in this pregnancy and struggling to deal with tiredness and work and housekeeping - saving £40 a month!! :money:
• Husband cancelled Netflix off his credit card (I don't know why he set this up on his credit card!! Not very MSE) saving £6 a month :money:
• Husband also moved iTunes payment over to his bank account and has requested a £20 line in the budget for films and music out of his spending money!! (it was on his credit card again grrrrrr). saving £15 a month roughly. :j
• Husband also cancelled his gym membership (that he never uses bless him he is so busy) Last payment will be end of July. saving £49 a month :money:
• WE DONT HAVE TO PAY THE PARKING TICKET!! The company cancelled it after husband protested that he paid and perhaps had entered his car reg wrong! saving £60

This means £71 of savings for July's pay day and a further £49 a month on top of this for August pay day!!

Very exciting!


Also we started looking at a re-mortgaging today. After years of being on interest only and only starting to repay this year (long story for another time) we went through the now very lengthy questions online for our existing bank and it is been approved in principal. Just waiting now to go into the bank and get things finalised so fingers crossed. The figures talked about so far mean that we wont be any better off monthly but we will be paying off around £50 a month more of mortgage a month!! Woohoo!!!


Negatives:


Slush fund money so far for the month to pay off debt at the end of July
£350 from my pay
£50 left from other things
£440 from husbands pay on Wednesday
Total: £840.

Minus
£300 for roof
£460 for energy company - to put into savings account for now until issue is resolved.
Total: £760.

So £80 in an emergency fund for the rest of the month! Eek!


Hoping not to dip into it. Its going to be tight but I'm sure we can do it. Hopefully we will have money left over from our own spending budgets and food budgets to add to it for next month.


It hasn't been the great start I had envisaged but it is a brilliant start in so many ways.


Husband read the diary today so far and I think it has spurred him on even more seeing our journey in black and white. We nearly had a NSD but he ended up making pancakes for dessert and 'needed' nutella, butter and eggs but we can use those for he rest of the week and it can come out of the weekly grocery budget.


Here is to a NSD tomorrow and to staying within our budgets for the rest of the month!!


Crunchy
xx

Jonesy88

What a lovely positive diary! subscribed x

crunch_time

Dear diary


Just a quick update for tonight!!


Positives:


- Husband has FINALLY done expenses and cc2 will be reduced from £703 to £467!! Finally getting some movement!!!
- Had another MSE moment today when instead of renewing my Microsoft office sub I will transfer over all my docs and photos to the skydrive. saving £59.99 a year or £5.99 a month :money:
- I have also itemised what is to pay off on our credit cards so can say to husband 'that extra £20 has paid off the emergency petrol from April.' This will keep us both motivated when slushing away these accounts!!


Didn't have a no spend day today as planned but we took a picnic for our walk and paid £3 for parking, £6 for drinks in a pub (so I could use the loo - the woes of pregnancy, and £5 on cakes for the walk back. Usually we would have spent more than this so this is progress!!


Have a good week everyone!!


Crunchyxx

crunch_time

Dear diary,


We went through the lengthy over the phone application for a new mortgage today. It looks like things are going through so fingers crossed we will be offered something good tomorrow. We tried last year to re-mortgage but we were refused because of the level of our debt and husband had a discrepancy on his credit file.


We would like to move in a few years. We are country people living in the city and know that the house will appear smaller with 2 little people in it.


Husband and I have had many a day daydreaming about where we would go, what sort of house and what our life would look like. Then the reality of bigger loan, needing more equity not to mention money in the bank to pay for a move makes us step back a bit.


I've been feeling a little anxious these last few days about all this because after we have achieved this hurdle the next plan was to save for a move. I was getting ahead of myself thinking about it and then worrying how we would achieve it when we have so many other goals and needs too.


I often feel my role in the family is to keep everyone happy and have sacrificed myself in the past to make sure of it. When husband has expressed his desire to move I have got out my spreadsheet and got stressed thinking about all the things that need to happen in order to achieve it.


We have had a few good chats over the last week or so about the state of our finances and have agreed that debt payoff is the number one priority and we wont even think about moving until we are in a position to do it the way we want it. We don't want to over stretch ourselves again.


We have achieved a lot in the past 5 years - I have retrained which involved going back to uni, we have got married, had a baby and now have another one on the way. Its time to sort ourselves out. Not all your dreams can happen in 5 years!!


I'm not going even entertain anymore thoughts about moving but focus on maximising where we are living and paying off our previous life. There are loads of positives which totally outweigh the negatives.


It will mean so much more when we have got there ourselves with sheer hard work than accumulated more debt to do it.


Worrying about this has stupidly overshadowed my excitement about this baby. I have decided to focus on this now which is how it should be and not think too far in the future.


One day at a time, one week at a time, one month at a time.


Husband gets paid tomorrow......... I can start to put money into pots at least!!


Feel better now thanks for listening!!


Crunchy xx

crunch_time

Dear diary!


Positive news about the mortgage!!


Fingers crossed we in the process of being approved for a repayment mortgage!! Woohoo!! The cost per month will be £801. Currently we pay £724 which is £524 interest (as it is an interest only mortgage) and then £200 we pay to pay off the capital. The good thing is that the changes and savings we have made to our joint account direct debits so far will enable is to pay the £75 extra! Its a 2 year fixed rate and will enable us to pay off nearly £8,000 in this time! :beer:


This is such a good result for us as we have wanted to get onto a repayment for so long! Celebrated with a tub of half price Ben and Jerrys last night! Very MSE :money:


The downside is that we have to pay £499 admin fee to set it up and then £175 for a survey. We are going to see how much it would cost extra per month to put this on the mortgage.


I am going to save the £200 we keep for capital repayment this month until we can know more.


Positive news about energy provider!!

Energy provider has allowed us to pay the amount we owe to them in 24 monthly instalments of about £20 interest free. This frees up the money I put aside to go on either paying own the overdraft or towards the mortgage admin fee. Woohoo!!


Husbands attitude


Husband utteres the words 'I don't want to buy any beer this weekend because I want to spend my money on other things!!'


.....this is progress.


Savings accounts


I have decided to take a leaf out of T2rry's book and set up some spend savings accounts going forward. They are:


- Christmas & birthday presents (for husband, toddler, baby and myself) - £400 for the rest of the year. Haven't started yet so will have to catch up so £67 a month from now till December.


- Clothes - We have talked about saving up money a year to spend on clothes and think about investing in things. £50 a month will give us £600 a year. Initially I will use mine to pay off the £80 sitting on my credit card I used to buy maternity clothes and then save the rest for when my body resembles something of being normal again!! We also going to start wish lists so we don't just fritter it away on stuff we don't need.


- Clothes for children - I worked out we spend about £100 a year on toddler clothes and shoes so for both children I'm going to save £15 a month and try and get as much as possible secondhand.


- Car maintenance fund - for car tax, MOT and service throughout the year. Start with saving £100 a month


Our focus now is to get through to the end of July without going over budget for anything, sorting out the mortgage and anything we don't spend goes into the slush fund for the challenge. Wish me luck!!


Crunchy
xx

OrangeFairy

great news about the mortgage

Sounds like you are getting really organised. It will start to pay off.

Do you know if you are having a boy or a girl or is it a surprise?

OF x

mum2one

sounds like your going great guns, congratulations on baby no 2,

xx

Seasidegal58

Wow - you're doing fantastically! Wonderfully organised and motivated and yay to your new mortgage!

What jumps out at me is that you and your OH are pulling so well as a team. Will make the whole debt paying experience so much easier.

Well done!

crunch_time

Thanks Seasidegal58 OrangeFairy and mum2one for your kind comments.


Baby will be a surprise which is nice as we found out last time.


Husband and I have been so rubbish for so long it does feel great to have common grounding. We wanted the same things we just were rubbish at talking about it and making proper plans. I feel this is the start of great things.


Budgeting and money management is for life not just for debt pay off!!


Mwah!
Crunchyxx