Extending our house without extending ourselves beyond our means

PurpleFairy26

Evening diary land, struggling to sleep so thought I'd read some diaries and catch up on my own
Payday has been and gone so pots all topped up. Despite best laid plans of a budget, I'm about £170 down each month until April thanks to a tax !!!! up, which I still don't see how it can be right but can't argue the numbers which means that basically our savings will just have to be reduced by that, we can't cut it back anywhere else. I guess we're lucky that we can do that but it makes me annoyed when we were just really starting to plough on. Anyway, onwards and upwards, we are still in a much better position than we have ever been in so I shan't complain too much.

Town planner and architect must be on holiday together for the whole of August it seems, am going to try another approach tomorrow.

Much needed day at home tomorrow (albeit working) am hoping I can get caught up with the washing outside as I have been having to put it on airer and it just doesn't seem totally dry despite the humidity/warmth

I've opened two long term financial products at the weekend and will plan to open the same for DH when either one of us gets a pay rise to cover the cost. That will hopefully give us a decent return in 10 years which we can do something decent with. Hoping to look at one or two other things over the next 12 months so that FIRE could be a reality with a decent plan.

Need to spend some time looking at our life insurance products to make sure we're not paying over the odds and we have sufficient cover.

My new financial year starts in a few weeks (just the way it worked from when I started budgeting) so a nice clean tab on my excel sheet. I'm going to try and weave in a small overpayment to my BTL mortgage so I can see that coming down, so at least if I have to remortgage at some point it's less. Given it's in 2 parts, and part 2 is higher rate I'll get it off this. The other part is so old there is no point moving it anywhere as the rate is v good. Good to see this week the house next door but 1 to my property sold for £20k more than mine was last valued at about 4 years ago. This makes the ltv much more appealing if I did have to port it at some point.

Need to also do do some exercise at some point this weekend. Hmm, maybe Friday night would be a good starting point.

PurpleFairy26

So I've managed to set up my mortgage overpayment which is a good start and I've managed 2 runs, but the best news this past week is that planning has been confirmed :j:j:j oh my :eek:

It's taken a ridiculously long time for no apparent reason it seems but anyway, that's all in the past. We're a few months off securing the final funding element but that just means more time to save and hopefully in the meantime we can finish the last room in the house. I've booked the plasterer and stripped 3 of the 4 walls and emptied loads of stuff out will message the carpenter tomorrow with some timescales to give him a bit of notice. Should be done by autumn I would like to paint 2 other rooms, but that shouldn't take long am hoping a few days off work will allow me to break the back of this in a few weeks. This means the only rooms left would be ones affected by the extension so no reason to do anything in there until after the build.

Must update my to do list for the next few months to cover planned items round the house. Feel like I need a medium term exercise challenge too, may have a look on a running app for inspiration.

DH boss has given him a small bonus for all his help last week, will go to savings

1LuckyLady

Great news about the planning and your dh's little bonus

crazy_cat_lady

Congratulations PF - on the planning, and the bonus!!!

hugglemonster

So sorry I thought I'd posted to say yay to the mortgage overpayment, yay to the planning and yay to the bonus!

H x

PurpleFairy26

Morning, busy busy busy here but all in a good way. Managed to get my bike serviced and repaired (well it's in at the moment) for no charge which would be a result.

We've given back some items we were storing for someone so feel like a decent amount of space has been regained, so we have a bit of sorting to do there now. I might rearrange some furniture for a change.

Managed to bake some goods at the weekend for the week ahead so feel a bit more ready to face the week with packed lunches and the like. Some soup to make later to use some black beans from my use up list. Yesterday's use up involved some chocolate spread in a cake. Win, win

Tonight's use up is Christmas Brie from the freezer in bacon, courgette and Brie risotto . Hoping the use up from the freezer will have an impact on a much reduced food spend this month. Got some items yesterday and hoping for only fresh produce until October. Let's see how we do :eek:

Have had the paperwork for the 2 financial products we opened along with a privilege type card which I need to investigate for discounts etc... need to keep an eye out for the 2 gift cards they promised me for signing up, and the cashback of course.

DH got a voucher for his birthday which I will put the money in savings for an item and use the voucher for other gifts.

Managed my longest pop op run of 5 miles yesterday. Hoping for another 5 miler later in the week. Also fitted ina gym session and realised how much I'd missed it, again will try and fit in another in my working week if I can.

Am starting to think about C and what I can do in advance as it's such a busy time for lots of other reasons in the lead up and work is particularly busy between October and mid December. I might make some chutneys to give so I can start to think about those and get them done and out of the way. Hopefully will have some of the storecupboard items already which will keep the cost down.

crazy_cat_lady

That risotto sounds amazing PF. And I think I'm almost talked round to chutney and jam making - they are good ideas for Christmas gifts

PurpleFairy26

Morning diaryland. This is the recipe for the courgette and Brie thing, it's yummy

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2986/courgette-bacon-and-brie-gratin

Going to do another run today which will be good and some more cooking, cakes have all but gone so need another, will see what's on my useup list, I have my sights on some mincemeat from last Christmas

This weeks good news is the holiday insurance have paid out :T well the money isn't in the account yet but I have an e mail with the amount :T just need a sensible conversation with DH about when we might rebook :cool:

Still plodding on with the house, boss agreed to some leave in a couple of weeks so that's good. Only annoyance now is that neighbour is building a small extension (no issue with that in principle) however, he's not discussed it with us and it's going to be joining our house and they have already dug the foundations without any discussions. Just another thing to resolve.

Talking of extensions, must ring our builder today. Want to get things moving.

crazy_cat_lady

Really pleased that the insurance have paid out. Excellent news!

PurpleFairy26

So the insurance money has hit my account to their word and has been duly filed in savings in a bit to get hold of our food spending I've decided I really do need to actively multishop. I.e. buy different things from different places, which to be honest I have always done, but not necessarily actively - I just tend to rotate and buy all my shopping for that time in that shop.

So project started in earnest yesterday and whilst car was in for a manufacturer recall, I spent 30 minutes going round aldeee taking photos of the price labels of things we might buy from there and last night i wrote them all up in my bullet journal so when shopping I can compare them. Plus ultimate aim is to do this in others shops and then only get what we get from each shop and go in roatation and buy enough until we're there again. The only none negotiable is milk which we buy fresh from the local farm, happy to continue to do this as a) it supports a small local business and b) it's the scrummiest thing you've ever tasted c) it comes in glass bottles which we reuse

Sorted 2 more boxes in spare room into one other box with a lid, which means we can stack it. Just 1 bag to sort and then empty the room before next week when plasterer man is coming.

New budget year starts on Friday this week and I love it as I get a whole clean sheet (well aside from all the numbers) :rotfl: I'm going to make a copy of it, so that this time next year I can compare it and see what changed so I can learn from that.

Made chocolate, black bean and chilli soup this morning. Didn't have a couple of the ingredients so substituted onion and carrot for leek and bns (both frozen) still smells amazing. Lunch sorted for the next couple of days for only pence per portion