I'm baaack! And still dreaming of being MF!

coldcazzie

Hello all long time no see!

I thought now might be a good time to start a new thread. I've been absent for a couple of years as we decided to put our house up for sale. We are currently considering whether or not to accept an offer from a couple who have viewed twice.

To remind everyone: there's 5 of us, plus 2 cats. The manshape is employed, and I'm self-employed while home educating our 3 children who are 10, 7 and 5 on Weds (:eek: where did that go?!).

I must confess to feeling rather anxious about the impact that moving is going to have on our finances as we are struggling a bit at the moment, and I'm struggling to see how we can help ourselves. I came here because I know I can trust you lot to give me good suggestions and keep me focussed when everything's going to pot. Once we are moved and sorted I really want to get back to saving/paying down the mortgage as I've been really uncomfortable with us not saving anything this year.

Anyway, I hope everyone is well. I've had a quick read through the latest bits of your diaries over the past couple of days and you're still all massive inspirations! :T

Caz

JimLad

Welcome back Cazzie!

Do combat your worry about moving costs...you might find its a good idea to make a little spreadsheet with all the costs. It might turn out to be more than you thought, but at least you will know and there will be no suprises

coldcazzie

Thanks JimLad, that's a good idea - I have spreadsheets for almost everything so it shouldn't be too much of a stretch to add another worksheet in there lol

We have 2 houses that we are considering, and the financial impact differs depending on which one we go for...

House 1: larger house, larger garden, off-street parking, no garage but potential for one (or a couple of large sheds). Away from the local high school on a quiet side street. Very little needs doing to the house, just a bit of cosmetic stuff, but it's right at the top of our budget and the vendors are not flexible on the price at all, so we'd probably have to pay stamp duty as well as the higher price. We'd have to take out an additional small mortgage which would add around £60-100pcm to our monthly budget. Genuinely not sure if we could sustain that additional strain.

House 2: around the same size as our current house, slightly different dimensions. Smaller garden, only on-street parking as it's up steps off the road, so would prob have an increase in car ins. Much closer to the high school so lots of children/parents milling about/parking/clogging up the road, but that is mitigated by the house being up off the road. Garden backs onto school payground, so potentially more noisy? Needs full refurb, but would be much cheaper to buy so no stamp duty and we could make it exactly how we wanted. Guaranteed nice neighbours as we're already friends with the family in the attached semi.

Worth bearing in mind I'm on call in Dec, Jan, and Feb which is probably when we'd be moving if we accepted this offer as potential buyers are having a baby in Feb and want to be settled by then (understandably).

Both have pluses and minuses. It's just a case of weighing them up. They're about 3 minutes walk from each other so same area so local amenities and travel links are the same.

JimLad

Can i ask your reason for moving before i post my thoughts on 1 vs 2? Most people need a bigger house but seems like house 2 is the same or smaller when you include garden?

coldcazzie

Space is one of the reasons... with me working from home and home edding the kids as well we are in need of more space, although if that was the only reason we would probably just get inventive where we are.

Another reason is we like the area where these houses are - it's where we lived before we moved into our current house. We lived there for 7 years and like the local area, whereas we're not very keen on where we are now.

The final reason is the fact that we were blessed *ahem* with a change of neighbours next door and don't really like them much. I know that new neighbours is not a great reason for moving... and if circumstances were different I'd agree but they are renting from family and the house owner kicked out his nice responsible tenants to move this rabble in so I think it unlikely that they'll be leaving any time soon and tbh I don't think I can take the mental strain.

JimLad

Aha! So pros and cons time! I guess you dont know what the neighbours of house 1 are like?

coldcazzie

Hrm, well, not personally. We have friends who live at the other end of the road who have commented that a couple of the kids near the house we're interested in aren't very nice. Tbh though, I think my kids have been put off playing out by next door's children. If we have a reasonably sized garden to fit the climbing frame and possibly a trampoline in then I reckon they'll be happy, and the houses are near a sizeable park, which is always nice

Last year I, quite by accident, ended up chatting with the lady who lived in the unattached semi next to House 1, who was selling at the time, and who said that the only people on the road that were problematic were the people who are currently living in the house we're interested in. She assured us that the lady who lives in the attached semi was lovely.

I know in the grand scheme of things horrible neighbours are actually quite unlikely, but our circumstances are skewing our perspective somewhat and the prospect of living next door to a friend whom we know is nice and doesn't scream obscenities at her children at bedtime etc is quite attractive. But I'm not sure if it outweighs more space, and off-street parking, and a house that needs very little doing to it.

JimLad

I think that if you knew that house 1 definately had bad neighbours you should take it into account, but as you dont its 95% likely that they will be fine so you shouldnt factor that into the decision.

coldcazzie

While staring at my spreadsheets this afternoon I realised it had been a while since I had checked my QC account and lo and behold my two lots of cashback that I was waiting for had both been approved and were ready to pay into my bank account (I dread to think how long they were sat there and not in my account!)

Must go and stop wasting time on here as I've about 2 hours of work to do and the later I start the later I'll finish and I'm still recovering from the inevitable late night on Saturday as we attended a friend's wedding. Hoping I can get a positive update from the EA tomorrow *fingers crossed*

Muser1

Morning and good luck with your decision. I'm subscribing.

coldcazzie

*sigh* we made a counter offer to the potential buyers... got a phone call from the EA saying that one of them has to work away for a week so it'll be at least next Friday before we have an answer.

I've been looking through our accounts and my spreadsheets and trying to get all my ducks in a row so I know what's what before we move. I really fell out with keeping track of everything and I am regretting it now, plus this year we had a cut in tax credits which has lead to us having to tighten our belts substantially and it's all feeling rather muddled. However, I'm very grateful that I use pots (albeit rather fewer than Tilly does ) to put aside funds for a few things as it means that even though things are tight I still have enough to buy Yule/birthday gifts, clothes/shoes, and we will have enough to pay the car insurance/breakdown cover/MOT in full in Feb.

One area that has spiralled out of control is food. We used to do so well... but we're currently spending around £600pcm on food??! :eek::eek: And I have no idea how! we rarely eat takeaways, we rarely buy lunch, we rarely eat out anywhere, which means that the vast majority of what we're spending is on household shopping... which means (uncomfortable truth time) that it's probably due to rising food costs and my complacency. :mad:

Anyway... I've just done a stock take of my freezers and cupboards, I have a meal plan for the next week or so but I shall try to extend it further. We have our Park meat hampers arriving in about 3 weeks so I want the freezers as empty as possible for when they arrive. I'm determined to reduce it as much as I can. :j