Cazmanian_minx's MFi3 diary

catshark88

That's fantastic news, well done!

setmefree2

cazmanian_minx wrote: »

I have everything so tightly crossed that I think something may drop off!

:rotfl::rotfl:Good Luck

cazmanian_minx

My solicitor has emailed me to say the contract has been sent to the buyer's solicitor and the estate agent has changed the sign outside to SOLD (stc).

I'm tentatively starting to think about what to do with what remains of the equity after mortgage, fees and ex-husband have all been paid off. Originally I was going to pay it straight off the new mortgage, but my family and my OH feel strongly that I should keep it separate and if I want to use it to help towards the mortgage, it should go in an offset account in my sole name.

So the initial plan is to put £3,600 in a cash ISA offset against the mortgage and the rest in a normal offset savings account and just transfer the maximum to the cash ISA each year, so once we've got the mortgage paid off, I have a nice big tax-free lump sum sitting there. However, I'm wondering about opening an ISA for investment as well, what used to be a stocks & shares ISA, to see if I can get a return that beats the mortgage rate.

As I understand the new rules for this financial year (and PLEASE someone correct me if I'm wrong!), there's now no mini and maxi ISAs. A mini cash ISA is just called a cash ISA and can have a maximum of £3,600 in it and you can also hold an ISA in which you can either have up to £7,200 of investments (if you don't hold a separate cash ISA) or up to £3,600 of investments (if you do hold a cash ISA) and it's your responsibility to make sure you don't go over the relevant limit. Have I got that right??

Of course, the temptation is to go and buy a new camera, a couple of Canon L-series lenses, a decent weathertight backpack and so on and so forth, but I'm going to be good - in fact, I'm challenging myself to try and win all the kit upgrades I want via camera competitions!

Caz

Little_Mama

Fingers crossed it all goes to plan from now on and you should have a wee treat, just remember to do it in moneysaving fashion, like buying it through quidco or topcashback!:rotfl:

Best of luck
LM

cazmanian_minx

You know that old saying about not counting your chickens....? :rolleyes:

Whilst I was sitting in the bank this morning, waiting for my CHAPS paperwork to be checked for sending the deposit to our Scottish solicitor (I feel very broke right now!), my phone rang. It was the estate agent.

"Oh, hi, could you drop a set of keys off with us today for the surveyor tomorrow?"

?!????!?!?!?!??!

Turns out that the last surveyor valued the flat highly enough, but gave the potential rent as £20 below what the lender requires as a minimum. The buyer wants the flat badly enough that she has persuaded her lender to allow her to pay for another survey herself to see if the rental value comes in any higher, so we have surveyor number two arriving between 9 and 10 tomorrow morning. If he doesn't bump up the rental figure by £20, then the lender will refuse to lend and my sale will fall through AGAIN :mad:

We're actually probably going to be here tomorrow morning, but the estate agent wants to see the surveyor before he comes here and show him a few examples of recently-agreed lets in this area to prove that rents are on the rise round here and he can safely value it at what's required and the keys are the strategy to get him into the office. Slightly devious, but if it gets my sale through then I don't care!

Caz

catshark88

My word you are being put through it...

In a year's time, you will be sititing outside your lovely new house with a gin and tonic in your hand and laughing with your OH about the tribulations you once went through when leaving London...

Kaz2904

Fingers crossed for today then!
I hope it all went well for you.

setmefree2

What she said:D

cazmanian_minx

Helloooooo!

We're in the new house and it's fabulous :j:j:j We've still got boxes everywhere, but I have enough stuff sorted out to be able to start working again, even if the weather is so lovely that I don't particularly want to:



(that's the view from the field below our garden :D:D:D:D:D:D:D )

Still no news from the second surveyor, but the agent said they'd start chasing it yesterday, so fingers crossed. Fortunately the first mortgage payment on this place isn't due until July 5th, and I'm HOPING I'll have completed by then. At the moment I'm a scary £201k in debt, according to Microsoft Money :eek::eek::eek:, so my current challenge is to get that down - I paid off £1k this morning and am now transferring my eBay money daily to my business account rather than weekly, so I can get the interest-bearing cards paid off ASAP (my business 'lent' me £5k towards the deposit since we didn't have the deposit for the flat, by not paying the last stock bills off its credit cards, so I have to pay that back first to give me some wiggle room in my cashflow).

Anyhow, the local post office is open today, so I shall get my beads packed up and potter off down there to introduce myself and see if we can work out some sort of system where I can leave a bag for the postman, because we've only got one very tiny postbox in the village and I'm going to more than fill it every day once I'm up and running again.

In the meantime - :beer: - cheers!

Caz

catshark88

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!

What a view, that is absolutely gorgeous.

Don't worry about the mortgage, even horrible big ones soon come down when you put your mind (and ingenuity) to it and hopefully it will only be huge for a month or so.

We started the MFi3 challenge on £273k and are will go sub £160k when July's payment goes in, so nil disperandum (no idea how to spell that!).

Enjoy!