Mortgage free by 2021?!

hiddenshadow

SJ, if we didn't have software that makes budgeting easy (and if I weren't obsessed with tweaking our budget) I wouldn't risk it either.

Not much to report financially...today was meant to be our Clyde$dale switching day but I called up to confirm after noticing our accounts hadn't changed since yesterday, and it's in their system as February 15. They can move it forward to January 27 at least, but still annoying..

Did manage to find £43.23 with budget tweaking, and got another £3.33 from S@ntander credit card cashback, so that's on the way to the mortgage. In theory have another £130.01 through budget fiddling, but want to wait until later in the month to commit that as it's due to reducing various pots (my allowance, eating out, etc). If we do manage that it'll offset the last of the higher-rate interest, which would be nice.

Fitness-wise the week was a mixed bag. Came down with a head/chest cold coming back from my work trip last week, so spent Saturday-Wednesday feeling fairly miserable and not venturing more than 2 feet from a box of tissues (went through a whole box on Tuesday alone!). Made it back in to work yesterday and today and used the stationary bike in the gym both days - counting those as both "runs" as my lungs wouldn't be up to anything outdoors or running-like at the moment. Hoping to get out for a run over the weekend, but will have to see how I feel.

Also did leg lifts yesterday (100...lbs? kg? Anyway, more than I thought I could lift ), and push-ups today (19! still shocked). So, not too bad overall on the fitness front, despite 8 days off in a row between travel/illness.

Sundaysgirl

Yay to the budget tweaking and boo to feeling ill! Hope you feel better soon.

hiddenshadow

Thanks Sundaysgirl! Felt better yesterday but now have stomach cramps today for some reason.

Between that and the snow (!) I'm definitely not running today. Should be able to get back on the stationary bike tomorrow at least.

MIL paid us for the door install - £500 instead of £540. No mention of the £40 birthday cheque that I couldn't cash due to using my nickname, so fingers crossed she's forgotten about that. If so, at least that almost cancels out the £100 she gave us for xmas despite our objections. Bank won't clear the cheque until Friday but then it will go as an OP. :j

Swagbucks survey money has come through as a £25 AGC, so that's off to the mortgage as well.

Spent yesterday diving into the Bullet Journal system - not sure how well it'll work for me (as I do like things digital and available on multiple devices), but I love to-do lists (especially crossing things off them ) and want to work on my horrible handwriting, so it seems like a possible win-win. We'll see - starting with a cheap notebook from my old work since that's lying around, but pages have already fallen out so if the system does work I'll use next month's allowance to pick up a nice notebook (currently eyeing a Leuchtturm1917, not too bad for £13ish).

Can deposit MIL's cheque at the end of this week, and next week is payday (so our regular £1,400 OP). Roll on!

lippy1923

Hope you're feeling better now. I've had a lingering cold all year so far. Loads of people are ill and it just doesn't seem to be shifting anywhere fast.

Well done with the fitness as well. That's great progress

hiddenshadow

lippy1923 wrote: »

Hope you're feeling better now. I've had a lingering cold all year so far. Loads of people are ill and it just doesn't seem to be shifting anywhere fast.

Thanks, I feel less death-like, still going through tissues at a good clip though.

Well done with the fitness as well. That's great progress

Thanks! I haven't really noticed any noticeable improvement thus far (running still feels like quite a slog, and lifting is quite challenging), but I do like the feeling of accomplishment post-workout at least. Today was my 9th workout of the year, so I suppose I can't expect miracles quite yet.

hiddenshadow

£10.81 cashback from TSB arrived today. Not quite the £15 we could get, but not bad.

Master spreadsheet is predicting a total 2016 reduction of £30,001.28 if we do the £500 from MIL and the £130.01 budget tweaking money this month, and maintain the £1,400 OP the rest of the year. :j Hoping that can be further added to with bank interest, purchase cashback, possible bonus money, possible raise money...who knows what else. I would say ebay money, but I don't have anything to sell and DH refuses to part with his things! :rotfl:

Definitely excited to see the goal in sight (if 11+ months down the road)...

Ali-OK

That's a fabulous reduction to focus on :T

Forgot about T$B cashback on contactless, better get using it!

shangaijimmy

Great numbers, very envious!

hiddenshadow

Ali-OK wrote: »

That's a fabulous reduction to focus on :T

Thanks, I thought it was going to be a stretch, but maybe not! Of course, easier said than done with our planned OPs, but fingers crossed we can make them every month.

Forgot about T$B cashback on contactless, better get using it!

Last week I got DH to put through £30 of our vet bill contactless and pay the remainder with a different card. Usually we only use it for his underground transport, which is ~£200/mo - we'll see if we can max out the £300 this month with that [STRIKE]£30[/STRIKE] £60 extra (just remembered we'll have another vet payment at the end of the month with annual checkups, so that's another £30 contactless!). Our cards don't want to work half the time in stores, though (today mine failed at M&S), which doesn't help.

Ali-OK

Food shop at £25 a week budget in Ald! is probably a good regular one for me to use - fingers crossed it works in there ok.

Do you send money over to refill back to £2k after using it too to keep the max on interest?