Getting a mortgage and then becoming mortgage-free!

misscousinitt

Late to the party - but happy new home!

It's all very exciting - enjoy!

MCI x

themadvix

Congratulations on the new home Kittenkirst - I've spent the last couple of days catching up on your diary. A new build sounds very exciting in terms of getting to choose exactly what you want (at a price)!

I saw your comment on ATB's diary about your GF's lunches when she's working away - if she's away overnight does the company not offer reimbursement for subsistence? I know my DH's does - something like £20 to cover lunch/breakfast/drinks (that's on top of the evening meal allowance). Might be worth checking out? DH has only recently discovered this, so it might be something that companies don't widely advertise? (I've no personal idea as I'm self-employed!).

*Subscribed*

Kittenkirst

Hi themadvix, welcome along for the ride

For the gf's lunches she gets an allowance for dinner but it has to be spent at dinner time- at one that she regularly stays at she often gets supper from the Starbucks within the hotel and buys yogurt & sandwich etc but it's not always the easiest.
She's pretty good with packing small tubs of nuts, cereal bars & crisps to try and keep the costs down though, and our work do free fruit if you are quick enough to nab it when it goes out

Thanks for the congrats MCI! The tiler finished today and the floor in the kitchen looks fab! still awaiting the quote from our carpenter for the wardrobes, the two expensive firms have called to confirm if we want to go with them but one is £3700 for the two rooms, the other we negotiated to £2.5k but it's still far too much if I'm honest!

The electrician popped in tonight and is putting a socket into our larder cupboard (for the microwave), fitting two light fittings, sorting out the tv panel in the front room & putting 7 more spotlights in the hall and front room!

We have also decided to talk with our flooring guy re vinyl or laminate upstairs instead of carpets so he is popping over tomorrow with some samples & confirm timelines...so we really need the fitted wardrobes sorting!

Fingers crossed for good quotes tomorrow

Supper tonight was cheese on toast with the spicy apple chutney - simple yet fab Got to nip to the lady who gave me the apples after work to drop off a jar of chutney to her to say thank you!

Kittenkirst

Evening! :waves:

Spent this evening whizzing round &getting things sorted. The tiler has finished and all looking good, however he has stacked all the waste on some sample tiles that we need to take back to a showroom

Quote from our flooring guy was fab and we've chosen our carpets for the landing & stairs, the vinyl with border for the lounge, hall & wc, and the laminate for the two bedrooms!

The downstairs will be done by the end of next week which is exciting, we just need to sort wardrobes so we can line it all up.

Our chippy came back with a quote £1k more than one of the glossy firms (for the same materials!!!) so, looks like we're going to ikea this weekend....

Heard whispers at work that we should have news by Friday about redundancies....I'm not sure whether I'm hoping to be safe or hoping to be at risk. The redundancy payout would be substantial & it could be the push I've been needing to try something new...but, finding a new job isn't that easy and my whole package (pension, voucher scheme) is pretty nice.

Took the chutney round to the lady who gave me the apples and she seemed really touched which brightened my day somewhat! :beer:

Payday on Friday...mortgage first goes out on the 20th. First mortgage payment is pretty exciting....

themadvix

Cheese on toast and apple chutney sounds yummy - my standard is mango chutney (sometimes ends up being almost as much chutney as cheese!), so if I get given some more apples I might have to give chutney a go.

I hope the redundancies go the way that's right for you. It can't be nice having that having over your head

Enjoy making first mortgage payment on Friday!

misscousinitt

Fingers crossed on the job front.

Love apple chutney - we have had a shortage of apples this year so haven't been able to make any as yet.

Lovely when small things are appreciated.

All going well for you - glad you got the tiling done quickly - new build, so not as awkward as our 1920s house!

All coming together nicely. it's really exciting. Hold that thought.

MCI

Kittenkirst

NSD today, and discovered if I can prove I left my old flat in March time I may get a partial refund on my home contents (I didn't realise they did that!) I shall be sorting through paperwork tonight for that

Some bad news is the buyer for gf's flat fell through essentially there have been issues with the roof in the hall leading to the flat that the managing agent people should have resolved. They stopped the roof leaking but didn't really repair the inside of the ceiling in the hall.
The buyers surveyor provided estimation of 15k lower than what the gf's surveyor did which is all very odd.

We shall be doing some internet searches & maybe visit CAB about her rights in making the managing agents fix the roofing issue outside the flat door, so grumpy faces all round today!

Meeting first thing in the morning re our re-org at work, so hopefully things will be clear then. I've worked here over ten years so maybe it's time for a change of scenery!

Chippy has come back to us and knocked £700 off the total, so wardrobes and all the shelving etc for £2800, I'm not sure as we could get a well known firm with 10 year guarantee in for that cost, it'd just delay moving in until end November....think if tomorrow goes ok we'lol pop to IKEA and look at options for DIY wardrobes instead

Kittenkirst

Sooooooo after all the build up today was a bit of a non-starter. Announcements were made But we are no clearer unfortunately.

This helped force our decision re wardrobes so once the gf came home from Manchester we popped to Notts to Ikea for wardrobes! We decided if we could get similar to what we wanted from the glossy firms (lowest quote £2.5k if you remember!) then that made more sense and to save the money for other things/starting up our emergency fund again. A Lovely lady called Cally helped us loads and we have purchased our wardrobes with delivery for £1k. A lot of money, but £1.5k cheaper than all our other quotes!

Our TV from John Lewis is arriving tomorrow and wardrobes on Sunday, the electricians in on Monday for sockets in the larder cupboard, adding multiple spotlights into areas and sorting other stuffs, them the lounge, hall and etc being done by our floor guy weds-fri....however We need to clear the rubbish from the lounge the tiler naughtily left!! Grrrr

Will message our lovely flooring guy to let him know that he can do the upstairs now whenever he is free so excited!!!

Kittenkirst

misscousinitt wrote: »

Fingers crossed on the job front.


All going well for you - glad you got the tiling done quickly - new build, so not as awkward as our 1920s house!

MCI

MCI, how long did your tiling take?
The area for our tiling was fairly straight forward, the only more difficult bit was tiling in the understairs larder (which is in the kitchen/diner).

I'm struggling to sleep past 5am at the moment, so am updating our accounts app :money: we got the wardrobes on 0% finance so we'll now have a monthly DD for wardrobes & one for the sofas &dinkng tables & chairs all to come out of our joint bills account.

Pay day yesterday and my (now closed) regular saver funds are also in my current account making it look crazily healthy...debating moving some funds to my (low interest) savings account until we need to pay the different tradespeople over the next month....thinking this will help ensure it doesn't get frittered away unintentionally

EatingTheElephant

Great find at ikea! DD will need a new wardrobe soon so might take a look there. I never think of it normally as our nearest one is so far away.