Getting a Grip and Saving towards the mortgage

EatingTheElephant

Happy diary anniversary

try_harder

What a brilliant month you have had and what a result from the regular savers, i must say that i find it very difficult now as i have 6 current accounts and several regular savers and feel like i dont know if im coming or going but i suppose if you want to earn the money you have to work at it .
Well done too on the cashback with the ISA that was really good i am with HL i really enjoy researching and choosing the funds that i want to invest in and hopefully watch them increase in value ,so far they are mostly doing well.
Just seen your post ,we have both been on here a year now ,hasnt it gone quick i love it and it definitely keeps you focused .You have done amazingly well this year and i have tried to follow some of your wise advice.
Sounds like you have a very busy but nice weekend ahead ,the sun is shining beautifully here hope it is where you are too ,have a lovely weekend .

try_harder

Back again BM ,i did write a very long message to you on the 25th March -post number 198 i dont think you saw it and not sure if i explained myself very well .hopefully you will get the idea .Thank you as always for your help .

Busy_Mee1

It's Monday again and I am on the train to London again- this is getting to be a regular routine ! However I have just worked out that with the Easter Bank Holidays I only actually have 12 days to work until our next holiday and 2 weeks off work. Not that I am on a countdown or anything:rotfl:
As predicted the weekend has been fairly busy with lots of what Mr Mee calls money laundering going on. All savings have now been shuffled into the new accounts for the new tax year and I now just need to set up his regular saver and change some standing orders. I ended up having to make a list of financial things to do at the weekend, which shows much there was.
I also managed to phone British G@s to sort out my final bill and they owe us £500. It is a good job because Mr Mee has declared he needs 4 new tyres on his car that will cost £450 :eek: We have all our car expenses at this time of year and I really need to set aside a portion of our emergency savings specifically for cars, so I don't begrudge it so much.
Nothing much else was spent this weekend,the garden furniture we went to look at wasn't very good so we are still looking.
The grocery shopping was done within budget and £53.25 spent out of this month's budget.
I spent yesterday mostly cooking - pasta for lunches, lemon drizzle cake to use up some lemons and a chocolate cake because DD's nice boyfriend particularly likes chocolate cake, and Sunday dinner. The lemon drizzle was frozen and the leftover chocolate cake sent to work with DS, mainly so I don't eat it :A
Think that is all I have to report -have a good week

themadvix

Belated happy diary anniversary!

Excellent 'money laundering' (love that!) going on BusyMee, not sure how you keep on top of it! It is amazing though, what a difference a diary makes to one's focus - it doesn't have to change much in spending habits to make a huge difference overall. I totally agree with you there!

LadyGnome

I am really impressed with all the money shuffling and interest farming that is going on. You had very good results in March. I am off from the end of this week (not that I am counting or anything:D)
Have a good week.

try_harder

What a brilliant weekend you had ,sounds like you have everything well organised ,i especially like the sound of the lemon drizzle cake and the chocolate cake but i mustnt think about it as i am meant to be on a diet .Hope you have a good day.

Busy_Mee1

Gosh that is so nice, visitors while I was at work. It was a lovely afternoon in London - just a pity I was shut away in a meeting room. I did walk to the station rather than taking the underground though and am now on the train back up North. I too am supposed to be on a diet TH but I have been rubbish over the weekend and that is why leftover cake was put in the freezer or sent to work with DS. I have zero willpower !

Busy_Mee1

It's Wednesday and I am back on the train to London for my second trip of the week. I don't mind going but they tend to be really long days.
Anyway I thought I would take advantage of the free WiFi again and do a cheeky mid week update. There is still quite a bit of money shuffling going on and I am slightly concerned that I haven't been able to activate Mr Mees N@tionmwide online account and set up his regular saver. If I don't do this today it won't mature in the 17/18 tax year and it will mess up my plans to achieve the PSA amount for this year. I will have to do some rejigging if I can't do it tonight.
In other news we have received a credit from British G@s for £579.50 and I have claimed £90.56 in expenses. I have put this into my Mortgage offset savings pot for now until the music stops on all the other money movement and then I can work out where it needs to be allocated. Mr Mee wants a chunk of it for new tyres - so frivolous :rotfl:
Mr Mee has also received a £100 Debenhams gift card from work and kindly donated it to me and I might try and save this to buy Christmas presents.

I have spent quite a lot of time on trains this week and I have used the time to think about some new targets. We look like we are on track to achieve operation £50k by June 2017. This will offset our mortgage to under £200k.

Our mortgage has another 7 years to run and is split into two parts:

£169,000 is interest only
£80,429.34 is a repayment mortgage
Total £249,429.34

Once we have hit the £50k saving total in June Mr Mee will have 28 months until retirement and the plan is to try and save as much as we can to offset the interest only part of the mortgage. Mr Mee will receive a good final salary pension and lump sum and hopefully his lump sum and our savings will cover at least the interest only part of the mortgage. We don't intend to pay the mortgage off unless the base rate of interest changes significantly because we have a tracker mortgage of 0.69% and are currently paying 0.94% on our mortgage and we can do better by leaving our money in savings. The repayment part of the mortgage will take care of itself over the next 7 years provided we can make the payments (which we can easily if I carry on working and less easily but manageable if I retire early). Our plan B will be to sell the house and downsize as we have a sizeable chunk of equity in the house and could buy a decent property outright. I am not ready for this yet though having put a lot of blood sweat and tears into building our house. Much will depend on how happy I am at work ( not very at the moment but working on a plan )
So to cut to the chase, we are currently saving £1250 a month and therefore saving an extra £10k every 8 months. Therefore the schedule should look like this :

June 17 £50k
Feb. 18 £60k
Oct. 18 £70k
June 19£80k
Nov 19 £85k

If we can do better and save £10k every 7 months then the schedule looks like this:
June 17 £50k
Jan 18. £60k
Aug 18 £70k
Mar 19 £80k
Oct 19. £90k

This will mean we will have £90k by Mr Mee's retirement date :j I would quite like to push it to £100k but I am not sure how realistic that is, so for now I am going to stick to the above.

So this all sounds easy in theory but we all know how easily I can get knocked off track, it will only take one of the kids to get married or a brilliant trip somewhere exotic to come up and that could put a serious dent in the plans and I will have to work longer :rotfl:

Anyway enough rambling for this morning and off to work. Have a great day

try_harder

What fantastic numbers ,i am always amazed by how methodical and focused you are i could do with a Mrs Buy Mee1 in our house sorting all our finances out for us sadly i have left it very late and i will still be ploughing away for many years to come .I like how you have a plan b because as you say you never know when there might be a spanner thrown in the works so its always good to have an alternative .
Have a good day ,its beautiful here again today hope it is in London too.Keep up the good work i have absolutely no doubt you will reach your target with glowing colours.