In my dreams I have a plan

London18

Honestly this remortgage is turning into a right pain in the .... So now the bank want a payslip. Not unusual but couldn't they have requested that last week when they reissued the correct mortgage illustration? Have scanned and emailed that to the broker tonight, but at least one more day lost.

Good news is a friend has a free spare ticket to the theatre this weekend so if I can keep dinner beforehand cheap & cheerful it should be an inexpensive night out. Something fun to look forward to since work is still stupid busy. At least I'd done some cooking yesterday so had some spag bol & veg to zap quickly when I got home at 9pm...

Coffee_Cup

Good luck with avoiding T K Maxx. I go in with the intention of just buying something the kids need and come out with a handbag!!! How does that happen!!!

egoode

Hi London18, I hope you get the remortgage sorted out soon.

I'm similar to you in that I'm single with a mortgage slightly bigger than yours but I'm also from Australia and all my family still live there and I always struggle with how often I should make trips home and over the years have had to make a few emergency trips home which can really mess up my budgets. I'm lucky at the moment that my current job has let me work from Australia on occasion so I've been able to have some longer trips home and also as I'm a contractor means less time with no money coming in.

I just completed on my flat on Friday so still quite new to having a mortgage and look forward to getting some ideas from all the diaries here on how to pay it off earlier than the 25 years it's currently due to run for.

London18

Hi all,
I am still waiting on the blasted confirmation all is OK with the remortgage. Getting a bit fed up now.

Coffee Cup, so we share a love of lattes and shopping. TK Maxx is dangerous as it does have good bargains but at the risk of just buying more....And handbags are definitely one of my weaknesses - I like them to match, or at not clash with - what I am wearing. So avoidance is my current strategy since willpower appears not to be working. Unfortunately I want to buy one of those muscle foam roller thingies for my tight hamstrings and they have them in stock really cheap so somehow this weekend I have to go in to a store and just buy one of those AND NOTHING ELSE. Wish me luck!

Egoode, congratulations on completing and I hope you enjoy your new home. So nice to hear from someone else who knows what the tyranny of distance can do to a budget! My last trip back to NZ was for just over a month and cost me over £3.5k including the airfares. Ouch. I did do a lot of 'touristy' stuff though, and I hadn't been back for over 3 years so felt I needed to get round the country and see loads of family & friends. It's hard judging how frequent and for how long trips should be. My family are pretty understanding and some have come over here to visit which helps. I also did temp contracts for quite a few years after being made redundant so I know what that feels like, two trips back home were 'between jobs' & paid for from savings - at least the last one was paid holiday. How great to get some paid work trips back to Aussie, can't see that ever happening for me.

This board is really helpful in tips for paying off the mortgage early. Even small initial overpayments make a difference and you don't miss the cash if you never have it. I so wish I had started earlier and bought a few less handbags! I find the overpayments calculators quite inspirational - try plugging in a tiny bit extra and see what it does to the overall interest paid and the date it's paid off. It will focus your mind on where you can shave a few pounds off the spending. It's what finally got me going. I love a good spreadsheet!

Coffee_Cup

Cant wait to hear what else you buy when you go in for your ham string thingy :O)

You can do it. DO NOT SUCUUMB!!!!! Good luck

London18

So good news, got confirmation of my shiny new interest rate to take effect from 1 September. Just have to adjust the standing order of the OP and away we go.


Bad news, my iron has died and have to buy a new one sharpish. Found that out at 7am yesterday morning standing in my pants at the ironing board. Cue mad scramble for something that can pass muster for work until I get a new one. (I have loads of 'non-iron' skirts but not many trousers and the weather's got a bit chilly & damp). That will teach me not to do my ironing on a weekend. Any recommendations of a good-value iron welcome! Not keen on anything too cheap and nasty but then I am always tempted to trade up from cheap to expensive on items like this, thinking cheaper = more likely to die early. Dithering has commenced.

London18

Oooh a successful MSE weekend. Free ticket to theatre Friday night and only £10 on dinner and £8.50 on drinks (cheap for me anyway).

Saturday was an NSD, but then I didn't really leave the house, that helps.

Today, I made it in and out of TK Maxx without buying anything at all! Not even the foam roller thingy I wanted as they don't have the cheap ones left. Did wander wistfully in the knitwear for a while as they have lots of lovely Kew cardigans in stock. Then gave myself a shake and got out before I cracked.

Then I went to Aldi. Well that was a surprise, they even sell organic milk. It's the one organic - rather than free range - product I really won't compromise on (mainly due to farming practices and animal welfare reasons). I confess I have only been to Aldi once before, & that was before Xmas when I went to buy cheap champagne. It was so crowded I just bought and ran. Today I got some Parma ham, normal (British free range) ham and some other bits and bobs for lunches. Much cheaper and hopefully just as nice. That will teach me to be a supermarket snob.....

And in S@insbrys I got a 16 pack of Andrex quilted loo roll for £6. I am bit princessy on TP (I have IBS and spend a bit of time in there) and like the nice stuff. Since there is only me, it will take a while to get through all that. Now I just need to find somewhere to store it all.

Bought a new iron for £30 but it's 2 metre cord and too short so that's going back to A@rgos and I've found a similar one with a longer cord £5 cheaper at Rbrt Dyas instead. Hopefully they have it in local store as can pop up tomorrow in lunch break.

giblet1979

Sounding really focused...great stuff! x

London18

A difficult day at work after a not so fun week, so thank goodness for a bank holiday weekend and wine in the fridge. Had to deliver the redundancy news to someone whose is not taking it well (stroppy rather than upset, not sure which is worse from my end) and sort out a staff member who seems to think coming to work is optional and got his wife to call in sick for him when he is hardly on death's door. Frankly I wouldn't be surprised if he got his mum to write him a note at this rate, every day this week the excuse has been different and his attendance record is ridiculous.

So a sort of MSE day. Got the letter from the bank confirming the new interest rate and repayments from next month. Can't believe it will save me nearly £200 per month in interest. Yay for overpayments.

Saved money on lunch through the simple approach of not having time to eat anything (apart from a banana). Making up for it by hoovering up everything in the fridge now.

Tomorrow will not be so MSE as getting my hair cut and coloured and it isn't cheap. But have put it off for so long, roots are no longer roots and more now just "hair with blonde tips".

Off to visit friends for the rest of the weekend and apart from going bearing gifts i.e. bottle of wine and maybe some chocs or a houseplant, it won't be an expensive weekend. Looking forward to some nice country walks and good food (friend is a genius cook).

London18

Shame about the Bank Hol weather, no walkies for me after all, watched a movie instead.

MFW activities not going too badly:

• Made lunches 3 days this week, so I saved at least £2 per day probably more.
• Applied to switch to a new Bank account and getting £200 incentive to do so. Should have that in a week or so . It was a bit if a customer service nightmare so also getting £25 compensation for being mucked about. It obviously pays to complain
• Got the email for the £125 M&S vouchers for joining Sky.

Now I know Sky is a bit non-MSE but I used to have BT Vision and Broadband and they were replacing all the boxes & signing up for a so called 'free' new one was more expensive than Sky over 12 months And watching TV means I don't go out and spend loads. My justification anyway, works for me.:D Saving them to get some new winter knee high boots as soon as the winter stock comes in.

Have also applied to switch energy suppliers through a cashback site - £35- so that should come through in due course. And of course the savings on the electric/gas will be good as well.

Feeling a bit under the weather today. Woke up with a horrible migraine which is still lurking and not sure if it's the medication I've taken but I've been feeling very queasy all day. Really really hope it's not a vomiting virus on the way. Someone at work spent the weekend with the usual horrible symptoms and only got back yesterday. - so cross fingers she wasn't still contagious.:(

So not eating much for dinner and aiming for an early night.