Mortgage free by 2021?!

hiddenshadow

Thanks BW and lippy!

Ireland trip was really good - too much driving on narrow/twisty roads for my liking, but we really liked the look of the Irish midlands. Seems like the tricky bits will be 1) finding a rental (seem OK online but estate agents said they're like hen's teeth) 2) making sure we get good broadband (online estimates will say one thing but doesn't necessarily equate to real life). I think both can be dealt with, especially in the short term if we opt to rent in a town centre rather than further out, and then we can see what we think about the longer term.

Did get ill last night - ate at a curry house and had naan bread which I was promised was gluten-free...it was decidedly not. Thankfully (?) only spent 3 hours violently ill and have been a bit tired/groggy today, not looking forward to going back to work tomorrow.

Survey money has come in, and with a bit of budget fiddling have managed to get the mortgage balance to £132,999.99. That should make September a 3-brick month for colouring in.

Friday should be payday for me, sometime next week for DH. He'll also chat with his boss next week sometime about plans to move to Ireland...fingers crossed that goes well.

hiddenshadow

Interesting blog post here: http://www.budgetsaresexy.com/2016/09/financial-empowerment-game/ (the stores list is US-based but fairly generic)

By that list, we're probably level 5 (baby baller). I suppose if we do sell the house next year and cash out our equity that might take us up to master baller status. As the blog post says, though, it's not so much about how high you can get, but what level you're likely to want to buy things at (for us, probably level 4).

So that's pretty cool that we've already reached that financial milestone (of sorts).

Financial geekery aside, this week has been quiet. Went to work on Wednesday but then didn't feel well Thursday. Yesterday there was a miscommunication at work (quelle surprise) which meant I ran around London in the morning which wiped me out for the afternoon. Feeling OK (though very tired) today, so at least that's something.

Finally have a bit more clarify on the np0wer screwup - they're switching us back to E0N at some point, and in the meantime we're getting free gas/electric as they're legally not allowed to charge us. No idea what deals will be available once we're back with E0N and can re-investigate best prices, but free energy has to be cheaper than anything out there right now. We're not going too nuts, though I did run the dishwasher after sundown last night. :rotfl: We also got notified that we should get cash back for switching even though it hasn't been 3 months and we didn't really switch voluntarily, but if it comes through that's £30 free.

Not sure if I ever posted but we got our window repaired for £150 and now it's good as new. Cancelled the window replacement so that's £3k not spent. :j Also got a recommendation for someone who could come clean our windows, which is on our to-do list (though might wait for spring so they're nice and clean pre-rental/selling).

Not much else going on, really. Finally have my specialist appointment next week, so hoping that will move things forward to finding a diagnosis. Would like to get this all settled prior to moving to Ireland, plus it should help smooth things out with work if I can have a plan for how to manage my symptoms. Granted, it's looking more likely that I'll need to change jobs when we move based on the team dynamics at work, so maybe it'll be irrelevant. At least DH should get a sense of his work situation in the next few weeks, so that should help us plan.

Work pension contribution finally kicked in, bringing our net worth to just shy of £200k. That doesn't include any appreciation in our house value since we bought it, so I'm pretty pleased with that.

hiddenshadow

On the subject of motivating yourself to OP that extra bit, I shuffled £8.14 around the budget today, just to get a more obscure tracking device (month we'd be if we didn't OP) to the next month. Does mean less to find next month to break another thousands mark though.

September OPs: £0.00
September Offset Savings: £1,618.83

Current (offset) balance: £132,991.85
Month we’d be in to get to our current balance without OPs: March 2024 (+5 months!)

2016 Overpayments: £14,522.59
2016 Offset Savings: £5,101.99
2016 Interest Saved: £18,715.19

Total Overpayments/Offsets: £44,741.05
Total Interest Saved: £47,176.14

Daily Interest: £9.11 (down £0.12)
Monthly Interest: £281.78 (down £2.96)
September 2015 Interest: £588.40 (down £306.62)
September 2015 Daily Interest: £19.61 (down £10.50)

House Bricks: +3

Mortgage reduction: £28,677/£30,000 (95%) (Average: £3,186.33/mo)

Made it out of the 133s!

Stocks & shares ISA: £1,000/£1,200 (83%)

No change

Net worth increase: £66,315.93/£65,559.14 (101%)

Work pension contribution finally came through! Rather amazed we made this target early, actually. Net worth is currently at £200,843.38. :j

MFIT-4: £26,508.15/£90,000 (29%)

Almost 7% ahead of schedule.

hiddenshadow

October off to a quiet start. Specialist appointment on Friday was interesting but (unsurprisingly) inconclusive, waiting on bloodwork tests and will need to get nerve tests done in Cambridge. May pay to go private for that but will see what the timeframe looks like first. Might have more scary tests as well, but see what they say about the first round.

Money shuffle partially done - mortgage interest has applied but not the payment so that appears as if it's gone backwards, looking forward to the text in the morning fixing the numbers. Still waiting on interest/reward payments from all but N@tionwide who were nice and prompt with their interest payment.

Good weekend of MB, still have £150+ to shuffle away from the bookmaker but am trying to do that slowly so they don't notice. Should be able to OP £200+ this week though.

Had a massive declutter/organise of my knitting supplies, have consolidated everything into two large plastic bins with some overflow. I recognised all the yarn but don't remember buying quite a bit of it. I've been pondering going on a yarn diet so this should be incentive to not buy yarn for a while...maybe all of 2017 if I'm good.

Watty1

The financial empowerment game made me grin. I was sidetracked by the stores though, recalling that in Madrid recently Chanel and Zara were side by side. Now I can buy anything in later but not the former
Although thinking about it I suppose I could blow all our savings on the former ....oh interesting thought

hiddenshadow

Watty1 wrote: »

The financial empowerment game made me grin. I was sidetracked by the stores though, recalling that in Madrid recently Chanel and Zara were side by side. Now I can buy anything in later but not the former
Although thinking about it I suppose I could blow all our savings on the former ....oh interesting thought

I suppose you could play it out further by figuring out what you could buy and still be able to eat/have shelter/pay bills/etc vs not.

lippy1923

Great figures Hidden and love the budget link!

shangaijimmy

Been absent for most of September and slowly catching up... 3 eat, so envious! Great progress as usual and dare i say it expected!

hiddenshadow

shangaijimmy wrote: »

Been absent for most of September and slowly catching up... 3 eat, so envious! Great progress as usual and dare i say it expected!

Thanks SJ!

I'm trying not to get complacent on the progress we're making (granted, this has ramped up since we reduced pension contribution, so not exactly "free"). Especially with my unknown health issues, it's always in the back of my mind that our progress could be halted if we lost my salary (though ideally I'd still be able to freelance part-time from home, worst case scenario).

hiddenshadow

Genuine money shuffle this afternoon. Topped up all the accounts and made an actual OP! £1,533.06 off to the mortgage. Should put the mortgage balance at £130,390.57.

Signature updated - technically finished with the 2016 MFW challenge amount 2 months ahead of schedule. :j