Keeping all the balls in the air

caliew

Juggling - Kids, Partner, Dog, Home, Car, Work, Study and Rest of Family

I got on the property ladder at 23 as a divorced single mum to cut a long story short I was renting with my ex husband and he said he would have had a sports car by now if he didn't have a baby, so I left him got no maintenance and he did get his sports car. I worked 12 hour shifts, paid for my mortgage on a Northern Rock together mortgage and passed my driving test by 24. Then a credit card came through the door, this was in the year 2000 I was 24 I questioned it and I was told it was a good will gesture as I had a mortgage, so what did I do - I didn't get the terms and conditions orchestrated and I bought a car on it (as you do at 24)! And I dropped a ball I got myself in a pickle, luckily parents helped me as I worked more and more hours to get out of mess, except another ball dropped - little son preferred to stay with grandparents.

Then when I was 26 and my son was 4 I met a lovely man and we fell head over head with each other and after 3 months of knowing him fell pregnant, my parents hit the roof! Which is probably what I would do if my daughter does the same in the future, I told my parents I was already a single mum to one child and I could cope with another. My parents said the new baby would be loved and luckily even though I was with my sons dad from the age of 17 to 23 beforehand and that didn't work out, my partner who I only knew for 3 months when I fell pregnant my daughter we are still together 14 years on - so I guess you don't know what is around the corner. Dropped the family ball with that one.

So by 27 partner moves in while I am pregnant and helps with the mortgage, back on feet the property boom hit and the flat that I bought in the year 2000 at 30k doubled to 60k in 2003 and we sold that.

Bought a lovely 2 bedroom house at £108000 as couldn't quite afford the 3 (north east of England wages not great), son came back had his own room daughter slept in our room til 3 and then post the age of 3 we slept on a bed sofa downstairs for 6 years while my son and our daughter slept upstairs, during that time I was a PA working with some very clever managers and I decided to get a management degree myself, it was crazy looking after a lady with 500 staff, looking after a toddler and at the time it came to light my son had learning disabilities. So I deliberately dropped a ball, the work ball to concentrate on the study and look after son.

During that time paying a mortgage on one wage I had to think of other ways to bring in money whilst studying so I sold on eBay, Gumtree and got freebies from freecycle in own time and upcycled them and sold them on. I stupidly thought once qualified I would slip back into being a Personal Assistant or Manager it didn't happen so easily, I had to temp, temp, temp and when you are the temp in the office you go in there fighting fire do your job and then you are not needed anymore as you have helped, the rejection was unbearable (I always wanted someone to say hey we will offer you a permanent job but it didn't happen) - Work ball dropped

I made the decision the only way to pay the mortgage and get some consistency is get a permanent job it didn't matter how long it took that would be all I would focus on, so for 5 months I didn't have a wage and it was hard as my partners salary could single handedly not keep us afloat so again sold off household assets on forums and painted and decorated whole house top to bottoms - looking after our next biggest assets after the kids and family. I enjoyed that time because I had more time with the kids but partner ball dropped as he felt I wasn't pulling in the income we needed.

I got a full time job and as partners wage not great to get diy done so my wages went into decorations and finally I had the money to move to that much needed 3 bedroom. The value of the house by then was £128000 so we had about 60k in equity then but upon investigation it materialized that extending would work out more beneficial so we remortgaged and took on an £83000 mortgage in 2012 and the value of the house now is £156000. Now my focus is getting the mortgage paid off I have been paying more and I think we are at about £79000, I am 40 tomorrow and I aim to be mortgage free by 50 which is doable.

My son has had to be educated in a special school and its been tough juggling, but with a lot of love he is doing great he passed his motorcycle cbt first time and he passed his car theory test first time with headphones on and passed his driving car practical test first time all at 17, not bad for a kid on the autistic spectrum and with moderate learning difficulties. I am so proud of him he is 18 now and is doing voluntary work at a birds of prey centre and photography. I do feel that I have dropped a huge ball with him because of having to be at work full time and he prefers to spend time at my parents.

Our daughter is 12 and she is a fantastic dancer she has done some semi professional work and I would never let her stay at my parents as I am afraid I will not get her back as they treat my son so well my daughter would probably love all the treats and not want to go home. The dancing does eat up the money to go on the mortgage overpayments - but hey we have to live

I have just switched jobs as my last job was finishing at 8pm at night not getting in home til nearly 9pm and that was dropping the family ball, my partner was confiding in other women in my absence and also I found a leaflet from a box of you know whats in his car but he says the texting are just friends and the box leaflet is from the previous car owner as it was wedged under the glove compartment and nothing to do with him (dunno if partner ball going to drop) but he said as I have been working late that is his reasons, so hey I have to give these 14 years a chance or all of the blinking balls are going to be dropped and roll away.

I am 40 tomorrow my dad is going to be 80 soon he has a heart condition and my mum is going to be 72 soon she has critical kidney disease, they have been great in helping me and helping to bring up my children and I don't want anything to upset them again otherwise the family ball will drop. Its hard being in a full time job knowing they are ageing and I cannot get any support from tax credits as I owe them an overpayment back from when I dropped my hours.

Am I the only one who cannot keep all the juggling balls in the air at once? Or is someone doing all this successfully and paying off their mortgage?

Its hard to keep all of the balls in the air and I hope I will get to my end goal of paying the mortgage by 50, I hope my partner is faithful and I hope

pathtofreedom

Didn't want to read and run, but well done for keeping going, with everything you've been through it doesn't sound to me like you've dropped as many balls as you think. You're only human, you can't do everything yourself.

So pick the main things you're wanting to focus on, I think that's partner, kids, mortgage. Really though you need to include yourself in that list too, as everything you're saying is for other people, and your kids will leave eventually.

So could you make a list of little things you could do to help towards all those categories? eg a date night with partner once a month - can just be a dvd at home but send son to the parents, and daughter to a friends. Find a way to make some time for yourself too, as if you're crazy frazzled with worry you won't be able to help yourself or anyone else.

Mortgage_Minimiser

Another one who didnt want to read and run.....all i can say is WOW!
I dont know how you've kept any balls in the air at all, never mind focussing on what you've dropped. Everyone has their challenges, but i think you have managed yours amazingly!


Think about all you have achieved so far, and this mortgage free thing will be easy for you

Good luck. You are fabulous!


MM
x

A_Frayed_Knot

First of all. Today's your day

:bdaycake: Happy 40th Birthday :bdaycake:

PTF has a great idea for the date nights and for everything else. If you can arrange to have "spare" time (like all of us want) by being organised, then other work tasks may just fall into place.

Personally I find the batch meal cooking, saves me so much time, I use it in other ways to earn extra pennies, (like the bay of e) all which goes towards o/p my mortgage.

As for your kids wanting to stay with your parents, why not let them have maybe a weekend away every now and then, giving you time with DH. I know that grandparents will let GC away with more than they would their own kids so of course, they want to spend time there.

You've started your journey be it mortgage free or just life sorting. Seems to me, a happy stable family life, will bring on the MFW journey you can both work at.

Anyway nothing too heavy for today - Enjoy your 40th Birthday and look at it as a fresh start, by that, I mean - a whole new outlook, being happy, enjoying life, being organised and a goal for being MF by the time you reach 50 :beer:
I didn't even have a mortgage at 50 :j :eek: I took out my first mortgage at 52 :eek:

selloptape

Well done! It's so hard to keep it all going, it sounds like you've done a brilliant job so far. Hope you have a lovely birthday and best of luck going forward x

coxj2901

It seems like you have been juggling a lot balls and I think you are doing a fantastic job! Just remember to take some time out for yourself occasionally.

caliew

Hi, taking it onboard we need to not just concentrate on getting that mortgage paid but living our lives also. Partner being very extravagant on birthday, he bought me some lovely clothes by himself for my birthday beforehand and the shop assistants asked do you want a carrier bag? My partner said "well I would look a bit stupid carrying ladies underwear around metro centre!" I will never get the whole carrier bag costs thing, I can understand its to help environment but its going to cause more expense to heighten security to identify who is walking out of the store who has bought the items and who has stolen them.

So lots of extravagant gifts which will put the extra mortgage over payments on hold for a bit. But will definitely take everyone up on having a date night and will keep you posted what we do. Like the idea of the new LISA's which are for young people to save for a house and they get 25% extra interest so certainly I will be encouraging my son to get that soon. His biological dad is such a let down he has the title 'Lord' but isn't paying a penny in maintenance for my son, he got his sports cars, big house, ponies and went on to have 2 other sons - its so sad he never has wanted anything to do with my son but hey its made him stronger when I approached child support agency years ago they just responded something along the lines of "do you not think your ex he is living beyond his means?" but that wasn't for me to investigate it was for them, so I gave up trying to pursue it. There are probably loads of men getting away with not paying for their offspring and there are probably loads of kind men paying for other mens offspring.

Glad we don't need his support my partner and I seem to be doing fine towards our 10 year mortgage free plan.

Mortgage 79000 - House Value 156000
Wages 19k myself partner 18k boosts up 21k with overtime, household income 40k on a good year on a bad year 28k

Managed to slash the monthly bills right down, I change providers every year on comparison sites. All clothes and food tend to be bought with voucher codes or found online clothes stores Romwe from China I think (usually free delivery) and everythings5pounds.com.

Stopped watching DVDs (traded them on musicmagpie and other books and dvd sites) and now download free movies and books. Go to local community centre for fitness classes (only charge £2 per class or £15 per month membership). Daughters dance classes are only £5.50 per hour and they are doing fantastic. Son's photography hobby costing a bit however he is beginning to get paid for his work and he is doing a wedding soon for cash, he has done christmas shows and community events and has been paid in cash and vouchers. Found a cheap dog wormer called diatomaceous earth that works out cheaper than buying worming tablets.

After my bad credit card experience I have not had a credit card for over 10 years and my partner was paying on a credit card for 15 years and it wasn't going down as rapidly as he thought, finally he got rid of it last year consolidated his cards and we went down the route of getting a loan through recommended peer to peer lending and that is working out much better as the interest rates are so low and the debt will be paid quicker, once that has gone he intends to put that money used on that onto mortgage to accelerate our ten year plan. Or we may become peer to peer lenders ourselves through the company it all depends on interest rates where we place it I think you can get the returns on the savings at 3.5% to 6.5%. The mortgage is only on a 2.69% fixed rate as we have secured rate so low it makes sense to use that saving by making extra payments or save under peer to peer and then withdraw and pay a lump sum on mortgage, but I think because of compound interest I think its best to just shift the mortgage with overpayments.

Any bargains against day to day bills please let me know to keep the bills down to get mortgage free quicker, it will help me to keep all those balls in the air!