Renovations and Repayments.

newgirly

Oh alex some people appear to op lots because they do and earn more than you. But some appear to op lots because they do a myriad of things that your everyday "normal " person wouldn't.

They buy food from discount stores/keep a pantry
Shop for second hand clothes or from very cheap shops
Do bootsales /ebay to make extra
Don't go out a lot or use discount vouchers to,go to cheap places occasionally
Switch utlilities
Do surveys
Grow veg
Use a library
Having the heating off most of the time
Have the minimum amount of cars

I am sure there are untold other tools people use on here to cut costs to prioritise the mortgage ops. It's not always a matter of oping the big surplus left every month, it's often a case of working very hard to create that surplus month after month which is the hard part, long term!
In my situation we are oping a fair amount pm on a lesser wage than you (I believe we established that ?) but for the next few months we will have a bit more, and have chosen to have a break away and then op the rest. Our house is in need of work and that would be most people's priority , or maybe a better car (that would be very welcome too). I guess what I am saying is I think many of us on here, prioritise the mortgage and maybe one or two other things and go without a lot of the stuff that other people think is necessary. Oh and we are all usually good at sniffing out great bargains!

Early morning lecture over, have a good day

gallygirl

AlexLK wrote: »

I've noticed a lot of people on here that seem to be able to OP serious amounts of money, go on extravagant holidays (not been on one of those for years now) and spend a lot more on everyday items but claim to earn less than my wife and I do. Yet at some point some of the same people have said various things along the lines of me being entitled in some way or living from the "Bank of Mum and Dad". Really annoys me, to be honest.

My wife and I like old cars, it's not as if we've got a "fleet" of classic Aston Martins. In fact, discounting the Defender, the most we could get for a car is about £14,000 on a good day.

Reality check time.

discounting the Defender - So, we shouldn't count the present of the brand new 25k car (which Little K has as well) when deciding if you're privileged or not? Why not? My parents bought me my first car. It was an Austin Allegro and cost £300. That's the reality for most people.

the most we could get for a car is about £14,000 on a good day. That is one of your cars. How much would the others be worth in total? And how much do they cost to run each year in insurance, tax, MOT's, parts (I know you service & repair yourself) and fuel (as they're not exactly doing 50+ MPG). That's why others who earn less can have 'extravagant holidays'. They choose to spend their money on that, or on overpaying the mortgage, rather than on an expensive hobby.

I know you've made money from selling cars in the past, but it seems to me you just want to hang onto most of your assets - let's not get started on the pens and watches! To complain you are hard up and can't overpay the mortgage or fix your roof when you could easily sell the assets and at the very least pay off a sizeable chunk of the mortgage if not clear it is beyond comprehension to me.

Truthfully, I don't think I've been the best Dad for the past week or so. Have really tried today and yes, you're right he has been more co-operative.

Sometimes 'adequate' is all we're capable off Alex. No harm in that occasionally .

maman

AlexLK wrote: »

Have been relatively honest with him about his grandmother but haven't thought to get him "involved". As for cooking something grandfather would enjoy, :rotfl: ... you really know how to wind me up before bedtime, maman.

I thought you'd enjoy that!!:D


Perhaps I worded it badly but although LittleK is with you still for a large part of the day he's missing his usual home life. It's further change he's reacting to badly when he only had a short time to get used to last term's changes.


Sorry Alex, but the paragraph you wrote about the school and especially his class teacher is super critical and I'm convinced that LittleK's behaviour/attitude comes from absorbing that. You've every right to form an opinion of teaching methods etc. but you were convinced in advance that the village school would be no more than a fairly harmless, expedient fill-in for pre-Prep years and that's coming across loud and clear. Unfortunately if LittleK leaves there with a feeling of superiority and having 'won' it'll do him no favours longer term either as a child or a pupil.

Goldiegirl

You said

AlexLK wrote: »

Does seem like some people on here seem to think I'm some kind of poor little rich boy, .

Then a couple of posts later, with a completely straight face you said

AlexLK wrote: »

In fact, discounting the Defender, the most we could get for a car is about £14,000 on a good day.

If you can't see the irony, it's not worth explaining it to you!:rotfl:


You mentioned 'extravagant holidays'. I've got two of those booked in the next 14 months or so. But that's because we no longer have a mortgage, and have worked our entire lives on average to just over average salaries to prepare for this point in our lives. But most people's standards our household income is now low - and because we don't have infinite savings we won't be having these extravagant holidays every single year.


In the real world no one has it all.


There are people on this board who have large incomes, but very large mortgages. There are people who have low incomes, and even though their mortgage might look small to the outsider, it's still a large mortgage for them. Then there's everyone at some point in between.


But what everyone has in common is that they are prioritising what is important to them, and cutting back or going without things that are of a lower priority. Plus in the background, they may be doing all sorts of little things to raise more income - it's generally a work in progress - it takes effort.


As for cars - I might possibly be able to get £14000 for our one car today - but that's because we bought it last year. Prior to that, I was driving a 2003 car and my husband a 2007 model - and we got nothing like £14000 when we sold them. But cars are not important to us - all we are interested in is having a reliable car that gets us from A to B


I think it's a mistake to dwell too much on what other people are doing, and it's best to concentrate on what's right for you. Cut your cloth according to your income and prioritise what is most important to you. If you want to pay a large chunk off your mortgage, flog a car or two. If you prefer to keep the cars, accept that you won't be making large part repayments to the mortgage. It's normal not to be able to do both!

AlexLK

newgirly wrote: »

Oh alex some people appear to op lots because they do and earn more than you. But some appear to op lots because they do a myriad of things that your everyday "normal " person wouldn't.

They buy food from discount stores/keep a pantry
Shop for second hand clothes or from very cheap shops
Do bootsales /ebay to make extra
Don't go out a lot or use discount vouchers to,go to cheap places occasionally
Switch utlilities
Do surveys
Grow veg
Use a library
Having the heating off most of the time
Have the minimum amount of cars

I am sure there are untold other tools people use on here to cut costs to prioritise the mortgage ops. It's not always a matter of oping the big surplus left every month, it's often a case of working very hard to create that surplus month after month which is the hard part, long term!
In my situation we are oping a fair amount pm on a lesser wage than you (I believe we established that ?) but for the next few months we will have a bit more, and have chosen to have a break away and then op the rest. Our house is in need of work and that would be most people's priority , or maybe a better car (that would be very welcome too). I guess what I am saying is I think many of us on here, prioritise the mortgage and maybe one or two other things and go without a lot of the stuff that other people think is necessary. Oh and we are all usually good at sniffing out great bargains!

Early morning lecture over, have a good day

NG, I spent a lot of time last year creating another income in order to save money which is how I achieved the figure I did. We also ebay, don't go out a lot, switch utilities (I'm good at this ) and use libraries.

My point is it does seem my wife and I go without a lot of stuff other people think necessary. I can honestly say I've only bought 5 items of clothing over the past year for myself and we service, maintain and repair almost everything ourselves. Yet, despite this we still cannot afford to overpay large amounts and there's hardly any money left at the end of the month.

AlexLK

gallygirl wrote: »

Reality check time.

discounting the Defender - So, we shouldn't count the present of the brand new 25k car (which Little K has as well) when deciding if you're privileged or not? Why not? My parents bought me my first car. It was an Austin Allegro and cost £300. That's the reality for most people.

the most we could get for a car is about £14,000 on a good day. That is one of your cars. How much would the others be worth in total? And how much do they cost to run each year in insurance, tax, MOT's, parts (I know you service & repair yourself) and fuel (as they're not exactly doing 50+ MPG). That's why others who earn less can have 'extravagant holidays'. They choose to spend their money on that, or on overpaying the mortgage, rather than on an expensive hobby.

I know you've made money from selling cars in the past, but it seems to me you just want to hang onto most of your assets - let's not get started on the pens and watches! To complain you are hard up and can't overpay the mortgage or fix your roof when you could easily sell the assets and at the very least pay off a sizeable chunk of the mortgage if not clear it is beyond comprehension to me.

Gally, if we were to sell all our cars apart from the Defender and Mrs K had a company car (which would further lower her income) we'd raise about £40,000. Most of the money would come from the classics (including a GT6 that I've owned for longer than I've known my wife) and include the TR6 which will be sold anyway. I have about £5,000 in pens and about £23,000 in watches making a total of £68,000. If we sold all those things and paid for the work on the house to be done, I think we'd have about £40,000 that we could use to overpay the mortgage. Hardly enough to pay it off and we'd have no assets worth talking about apart from the Defender which would become my everyday transport, so couldn't be sold. We really don't have the kind of money you seem to think we do.

As for what the cars cost to run, the answer is very little compared to modern cars as there's no depreciation to account for, the insurance is very cheap (around £100 per year on the classics) and most of our cars are tax exempt. They really aren't an expensive hobby.

gallygirl wrote: »

Sometimes 'adequate' is all we're capable off Alex. No harm in that occasionally .

Thanks. Adequate seems to be an achievement for me at the moment.

AlexLK

maman wrote: »

I thought you'd enjoy that!!:D

Perhaps I worded it badly but although LittleK is with you still for a large part of the day he's missing his usual home life. It's further change he's reacting to badly when he only had a short time to get used to last term's changes.

Sorry Alex, but the paragraph you wrote about the school and especially his class teacher is super critical and I'm convinced that LittleK's behaviour/attitude comes from absorbing that. You've every right to form an opinion of teaching methods etc. but you were convinced in advance that the village school would be no more than a fairly harmless, expedient fill-in for pre-Prep years and that's coming across loud and clear. Unfortunately if LittleK leaves there with a feeling of superiority and having 'won' it'll do him no favours longer term either as a child or a pupil.

:rotfl: It did make me smile!

I think you're right about my son, he seems to struggle with change. Today has been particularly bad.

I've no desire to see my son leaving his current school with feelings of superiority. I used to be somewhat like that during my childhood - early 20s. Now I really regret how I treated others when younger. So far as school goes I haven't said anything to my son about his teacher and have told him that his behaviour there has been inappropriate.

Goldiegirl wrote: »

You said

Then a couple of posts later, with a completely straight face you said

If you can't see the irony, it's not worth explaining it to you!:rotfl:

You mentioned 'extravagant holidays'. I've got two of those booked in the next 14 months or so. But that's because we no longer have a mortgage, and have worked our entire lives on average to just over average salaries to prepare for this point in our lives. But most people's standards our household income is now low - and because we don't have infinite savings we won't be having these extravagant holidays every single year.

In the real world no one has it all.

There are people on this board who have large incomes, but very large mortgages. There are people who have low incomes, and even though their mortgage might look small to the outsider, it's still a large mortgage for them. Then there's everyone at some point in between.

But what everyone has in common is that they are prioritising what is important to them, and cutting back or going without things that are of a lower priority. Plus in the background, they may be doing all sorts of little things to raise more income - it's generally a work in progress - it takes effort.

As for cars - I might possibly be able to get £14000 for our one car today - but that's because we bought it last year. Prior to that, I was driving a 2003 car and my husband a 2007 model - and we got nothing like £14000 when we sold them. But cars are not important to us - all we are interested in is having a reliable car that gets us from A to B

I think it's a mistake to dwell too much on what other people are doing, and it's best to concentrate on what's right for you. Cut your cloth according to your income and prioritise what is most important to you. If you want to pay a large chunk off your mortgage, flog a car or two. If you prefer to keep the cars, accept that you won't be making large part repayments to the mortgage. It's normal not to be able to do both!

You are right that I shouldn't compare myself to others but I don't really know how to stop doing so. I'll admit I do it hoping to think "well, I'm doing better" but usually end up thinking the exact opposite. Always wind up doing it when I'm struggling to cope and it makes things worse. Can't see an end to the anguish, to be honest.

My father was quite annoyed with me earlier for complaining about my mortgage / house and said something along similar lines about everything in life being a compromise. Recently he's taken to talking to me about his life before I was born as a means to make me feel guilty and apparently he regrets sheltering me from what he calls "the real world".

Sorry about ranting on about my financial situation being difficult. This month is going to be worse than in a long time as I'll only take my salary for looking after my parents' properties. I do want to do the right thing, put the effort in and make some more money to finish off my house and then start making larger overpayments. Unfortunately, it seems my own issues get in the way and I don't know where to start. The whole thing I find quite overwhelming.

gallygirl

AlexLK wrote: »

Gally, if we were to sell all our cars apart from the Defender and Mrs K had a company car (which would further lower her income) we'd raise about £40,000. Most of the money would come from the classics (including a GT6 that I've owned for longer than I've known my wife) and include the TR6 which will be sold anyway. I have about £5,000 in pens and about £23,000 in watches making a total of £68,000. If we sold all those things and paid for the work on the house to be done, I think we'd have about £40,000 that we could use to overpay the mortgage. Hardly enough to pay it off and we'd have no assets worth talking about apart from the Defender which would become my everyday transport, so couldn't be sold. We really don't have the kind of money you seem to think we do.

As for what the cars cost to run, the answer is very little compared to modern cars as there's no depreciation to account for, the insurance is very cheap (around £100 per year on the classics) and most of our cars are tax exempt. They really aren't an expensive hobby.



Thanks. Adequate seems to be an achievement for me at the moment.

68k is still a massive amount to have in realisable assets, don't knock it.

Sometimes 'adequate' is all we're capable off Alex, don't knock it .

You're stuck in the 'sandwich years' - where you're the meat between your parents and Little K's bread. They both seem to be of the 'doorstep' variety at present, hang on in there :grouphug:.

newgirly

AlexLK wrote: »

NG, I spent a lot of time last year creating another income in order to save money which is how I achieved the figure I did. We also ebay, don't go out a lot, switch utilities (I'm good at this ) and use libraries.

My point is it does seem my wife and I go without a lot of stuff other people think necessary. I can honestly say I've only bought 5 items of clothing over the past year for myself and we service, maintain and repair almost everything ourselves. Yet, despite this we still cannot afford to overpay large amounts and there's hardly any money left at the end of the month.

I wasn't suggesting you don't do lots of those mse things alex, more that you don't know the extent that others may go to in order to op. I don't want to pick apart your previous posts, but I will say perhaps you are underplaying the amount spent on cars overall if you are struggling so much to op , if like you say your are frugal in most other ways.

The obvious way to settle this is to bite the bullet and post you soa, it's all subjective where you should cut costs, but it may give you are more honest picture.:)

Goldiegirl

AlexLK wrote: »

Gally, if we were to sell all our cars apart from the Defender and Mrs K had a company car (which would further lower her income) we'd raise about £40,000. Most of the money would come from the classics (including a GT6 that I've owned for longer than I've known my wife) and include the TR6 which will be sold anyway. I have about £5,000 in pens and about £23,000 in watches making a total of £68,000. If we sold all those things and paid for the work on the house to be done, I think we'd have about £40,000 that we could use to overpay the mortgage. Hardly enough to pay it off and we'd have no assets worth talking about apart from the Defender which would become my everyday transport, so couldn't be sold. We really don't have the kind of money you seem to think we do.

But you still have more assets than many people, particularly people of your age.


And why do you think you need to pay the mortgage off at once? Again most people on here are doing it gradually.


In the outside world most people don't overpay their mortgage at all - it's a nice to do thing, not an essential thing.


You just need to remember, you are just like everyone else - so pick your priority item and concentrate on that. You can't do everything at once and nobody expects you to (apart from you, of course!)

AlexLK wrote: »

:rotfl:
.

My father was quite annoyed with me earlier for complaining about my mortgage / house and said something along similar lines about everything in life being a compromise. Recently he's taken to talking to me about his life before I was born as a means to make me feel guilty and apparently he regrets sheltering me from what he calls "the real world".

.

Actually, that's just about the first thing your dad has ever said that makes sense - life is indeed a compromise - and in a lot of ways you have been sheltered from the life that most people in this country lead


As for talking about before you were born..... maybe that's just an old person thing - they enjoy talking about the old days, and it can be very interesting. Maybe he's telling you thse stories while he can.... not to make you feel guilty, but to pass on the stories.