Diary of Secret MFW aspirations...

Sixela

I have compulsively read threads on here for as long as I can remember but never posted.

I have a secret dream to pay off our mortgage quicker and we have an offset which is flexible. It is however at such a low rate of interest (1.09%) that my husband says paying it off earlier is actually pointless. He is not on board with my plan. Hence why my campaign to pay it off would be slightly covert! He never checks bank or credit card accounts and leaves it all to me so will not notice if I was to make overpayments, unless dramatic. We are able to borrow from the mortgage reserve and have done (currently 15k taken out of the reserve but 10k of that in premium bonds) but have no other debts. Our remaining mortgage is 85k. We put all spending on a CC and pay off in full every month, credit card earns us £300 in cashback each year.

We have a good income but aside from 3 x £60 child trust fund payments for our 3 kids each month we save nothing. We spend everything we earn. Sometimes more and dip into the reserve to tide us over until payday.

My first priority is to return the 5k to the mortgage reserve, the other 10k in premium bonds could go back in to the reserve at any time so is not really a debt.
We borrowed from our reserve to cover a holiday in July and a couple of expensive months on the credit card but have failed to repay it so far.

As I say we spend what hubby earns every month and don't set any aside, both have agreed several times we need to rein in spending, pay off the reserve balance and start to save (and I would like to extend that plan to making overpayments on the mortgage!) This diary I will use to keep me on track, (I hope) and focus my mind.

Hubby has a good salary so that fact we save zero is I feel quite dreadful, I am nearly at the end of a 1 year temporary employment contract, with nothing else lined up for the new year as yet so belts most definitely need tightening. Most of the time I am SAHM. We eat out too much, buy stuff for the kids on demand and do too much online shopping, way too much ad hoc food shopping and hubby buys self rewards like clothes, music, without a second thought. Both have been in a mind set of we work hard and deserve treats, but I can see that by having no savings we are very exposed should hubby get made redundant etc...
Wow, so I've done it, written it down and who knows where this will lead....! Next need to work out first steps.

blackste

Every great journey begins with one step.
Welcome to the forum sixela. Best of luck with your mortgage. Get the OH on board asap if you can, it will make life easy. Your a woman, and us men are simple creatures.

Andrewboom

I'm not sure it is something you can do without your partners knowledge. My partner is on board with the idea of being mortgage free, but I do all the work.

Getting her to admit she is bad with finances and giving me control of the purse strings was a massive step for us. I'm not sure how she spends has changed a lot, but we now at least avoid any silly charges from cash flow issues.

Pushkin

Hi and welcome Sixela. I was thinking that what me and my DH do might work for your if your OH isn't quite as into this MFW malarky as you are.

I do all the financial management for us - DH keeps an allocated amount of his salary each month and the rest comes to me. We don't have any joint bank accounts so I guess that makes it easier. While I secretly am appalled by what he buys sometimes I figure he has this money and its up to him what he does with it.

Just a thought that this might work for you too...

Sixela

Thanks so much for your replies and suggestions.

OH won't be completely in the dark and has agreed we need to cut back. But even if only I take steps to cut back that will be 50% improvement in the situation as we are both as bad as each other. Also if I plan ahead more in terms of shopping and meal planning then OH will happily eat whatever is planned without question. It's when we have no plan and nothing in to eat that he happily goes off to shop for us (he esp likes Waitrose) and then comes home with a shocking receipt, lots of impulse buys and extra items. So preventative measures which I can take will improve things a lot.

I might try to float the allocated amount of salary idea this weekend and see how it goes. We do have a joint account though with offset to mortgage so it's hard to manage spending as he definitely won't go card free, tried to suggest we both draw out an amount of cash and see if we can make it last the month a while ago and he wasn't up for that!

Sixela

Good first day. NSD for me and on strict instruction OH went to supermarket for a few essentials (bread and milk etc) and stuck to the plan. Nothing else purchased.
I checked the mortgage account and our outstanding mortgage is less than I thought, £80,000 not 85.
We walked to the town to collect prescriptions and did not go for coffee as we normally would. Long chat about finances and agreed that we need to take severe action to stop spending all we earn. OH did not agree to a cash allowance for the month but agreed to much stricter monitoring of all spending. Feel quite hopeful!!

blackste

Its a step in the right direction Sixela, and thats whats important. Also knocking 5k off your mortgage, in one day, good going!!!

Thrugelmir

Return on premium bonds is so low. I'd leave the money in the mortgage. At least that is a guaranteed return.