Half way there and a slight change of direction

elantan

Phew I have reached the half way mark, something I didn't think I would do, first time ever I have managed to stick to a challenge.



Chapter One
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3071580

Chapter Two
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3688361

Chapter Three
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4473857

Chapter Four
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4837850


Hopefully they are in the right order will check once I have posted,

Right quick run down

Husband had a mental breakdown and was off work for a while, I decided I had had enough of just dealing with debt and repeating the cycle so set myself a 100 month challenge to turn our money situation around, wasnt happy just constantly being in debt I wanted to have some savings as well, I was concerned that if we spent all our time just paying off debt when we eventually became debt free we would find ourselves quickly back into debt if something happened and we had no savings.

Along the way we have been on holiday several times, including once to the USA for my 40th, we had got two free tickets to fly by virgin and try as we did we couldnt give them away, so landed up going away ( well you cant let two free flights just go can you?) weve also been to Tenerife Turkey London and possibly some other places I cant fully remember to be honest, its been a wee while since we started now, so we have been spending money which I spose could have went on debt repayments.

Also bought a car as our old Megane was just a total night mare and costing us a fortune so it had to go, also bought the two fires which we love and we finally have some real heat in our house now

I started back at uni, finally finally left Job number1 with the charity I worked with, I now work around my studies not as many shifts and not as much money as I would like, but we are getting there slowly.

I think thats a rough run down of whats been happening I have no doubt I have forgotten things but hopefully they are not groundbreaking things

So where are we now? Well this has been a long and interesting journey, I have found the challenge more interesting in the way my ideas have changed, yes the money is interesting and I have enjoyed learning and trying things but my idea's have morphed from getting out of debt to getting out of debt with some savings, to getting out of debt with some savings and sorting the pension, to hey whats wrong with F.I.R.E (financial independence retire early)

So thats kinda where I am heading now, it's passed just being a numbers game, Its turned into how do we want our lives to be, the future, do we want to work till 70? or do we intend on retiring early ?

So the plan is to carry on the way we are, to work through learning about investing (a whole interesting world) and to pay down that debt and get some savings and a good pension sorted.

Hope you join me on the onward journey only 50 months left to go ... WOW it's flown in

Karmacat

What a beautiful, beautiful post, El! I'm really glad I've happened along less than 5 minutes after you were posting

:j:j:j

Happy shiny new diary :beer:

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

Morning El, great post and looking forward to sharing the next 50 months :T:T:T

Tilly x x

edinburgher

Happy new diary El, I will come along for the ride.

Fully expect you to be a MF MSP in 5 years time

elantan

Thank you very much ladies

well the scores on the doors ( it is April after all ) for 2014-2015 are

Mrs El ... Paid £783 in tax, was due to pay £324 in tax so a rebate due, however, underpaid by £150 in national insurance ( will need to figure out how I pay the extra) so after it all I will be due approximately £300 in a rebate... Now added to this was the lovely £1500 given to me by the tax man, so I think I can officially say I am roughly £1175 in dark tax for the year ( amount paid in tax deducted from amount given to me by the tax man)

Mr El ... Well thats a total different story all together not even worth going into tbh, as we will never be able to dark tax his amount.

So the plan for 2015-2016 is Mrs El, no tax paid at all (wont be earning enough) but getting £1500 from the tax man so I will be up a wee bit, also no NI paid either (wont be earning enough) This does mean though that I wont be paying a stamp towards my state pension this year ( in fact for the next three years till I qualify) now I have paid 25 years worth of stamp so I have ten more years to find, I qualify in 3 years and intend on working a further 15 years, so I will make the 35 year pay in required to receive the state pension.

Mr El well he will be paying tax and I spose in a way the £1500 I will get back will take a tiny wee bite out of his tax but thats about all it will do.

my pension also earned 5.5% interest this year, not great but when i remember that inflation has been sitting at roughly 2.5% then down to even less (unsure what it is currently but I think were nearing 0%) I cant really complain too much.

Other plans to ensure we reach F.I.R.E are carrying on collecting wood for the fire, growing veggies and Tilly tidies etc as well, keeping an eye on the finances, thats something that I have stopped already, I start off really good and faithfully record everything, then I have to study or work stupid hours and those receipts dont seem as important as sleeping or eating or even just resting... will need to get back on top of it though.

edited to add: Just added all my other savings/pensions and got a better figure ... works out on average my investments were 9% last year, better than the 5.5% and yep i'm happy with that

elantan

edinburgher wrote: »

Happy new diary El, I will come along for the ride.

Fully expect you to be a MF MSP in 5 years time

Lol Ed just saw this ... yes I will deff be mortgage free... I think if we work really hard we should even be mortgage free when I qualify, that would be nice, qualify and mortgage free giving me 15 years of half decent wages to save and invest for F.I.R.E .. we will see though, I am not going to add stress onto my already stressful life


I dont honestly think there is a political party that would have me :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: and if there was, I dont know if I would want to be a member :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: I think I like to think of myself as an agitating anarchist ... I was watching last night and thinking come on Nicola you can do better, I know you can, I think she maybe expected it to be like FMQ and it wasnt... Did you watch?

edinburgher

I did not, I was very well behaved and had the computer and TV off by about half past eight to read a good book. It must have helped, as I had a great snooze. The Sturgeon general makes a good impression in general, every woman I have spoken for would vote SNP on her manner and 'performances' to date.

elantan

Well when I talk about being mortgage free with Ed it is an interesting quandary really, we are now at the point of our mortgage that when we pay something off of it whilst saving interest ( which is great) we are doing so in the knowledge that there are better things we can do with the money, for example for every £500 extra we pay off we are saving less than £50 in interest if I were to pay it into the pension I would get an extra £125 so by paying off it off the mortgage I am losing £75 plus any interest that would bring in... There is something satisfying though in seeing the mortgage coming down.

So we are Tilly Tidying and adding that to the extra we pay off our mortgage, I will also have to find a wee slush account to save the Tilly Tidies into when we are mortgage free, they really do mount up over the space of the month and I think when we retire we will feel the benefit of those Tidies very much so ( we get the benefit just now as well with interest saved)

This is where I am having to change my thinking though, is paying the mortgage off the right thing for us? Would we be better paying the money into the pension? I have to have a pension for retiring, due to my working life I dont have a great pension, I have saved as much as I could over the years but when money was tight the pension was always the first thing to go, I only had a 1% employer contribution for a year and previous to that I had a small amount (approx £2,000) paid in by a previous employer, so all in all I would say employer contributions have came to (£2,160) the rest of my pension has been down to my hard saving ( when we could afford it) and tax man contributions ( for which I am grateful)

I estimate I need approx £200,000 in a pension so that I can have £50k tax free and draw down at 3.5% for the other £150k giving me a pension of £5,250 a year when I retire ( until state pension and employer pension kick in)

elantan

edinburgher wrote: »

I did not, I was very well behaved and had the computer and TV off by about half past eight to read a good book. It must have helped, as I had a great snooze. The Sturgeon general makes a good impression in general, every woman I have spoken for would vote SNP on her manner and 'performances' to date.

She usually is fantastic ... however last night I was giving the telly big shouts lol ... I am sure she will be better tonight I think Jim Murphy got under her and Ruth's skin tbh, he seemed to know how to irritate them and belittle them and they fell for it, I thought at one point Ruth was gonna lamp him one, If your on twitter have a search for moustache man ... he was the winner last night

skint_spice

Good luck, 5 years isn't long at all now and we'll be cheering you on. x

elantan

skint_spice wrote: »

Good luck, 5 years isn't long at all now and we'll be cheering you on. x

5 years ? 50months now ... dont make it longer :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: