Waddling towards the flight of mortgage freedom

mrspuddleduck

Having lurked for a few weeks, I have been so inspired by others' diaries...so thank you.....and I am determined to succeed with my own - have some focus on this journey!

A bit of background, currently mortgage is at £136900 with just over 22 years to go, with 3 years left on a 2.54% fix. We had a lightbulb moment last August and were given a spreadsheet to use which transformed our outgoings and i'm an evangelical piggybanker now - it looks like we must have been wasting £10k a year on very little! A family member paid off a commercial loan for me, and I've just finished paying them back, so now have the spare capital to make mortgage overpayments. We haven't noticed any change in our quality of life since our lightbulb moment, and have a holiday to the continent next month all saved up for! Our aim is to be mortgage free in 12 years - however we are hoping for a duckling to hatch at some point - for which I'm sure the target date would need adjusting! For now, we are going to try to do OPs of £425 and save £500 each month.

I'm hoping by keeping a better track of some piggybanks and make savings there. I'm already good at changing energy provider, renegotiating sky each year - as that is a luxury Mr Puddleduck will not forego, and a low cost phone deal. Although I am far from perfect as I discovered yesterday I had been paying £1.50/month for paper-billing on my landline for the past 18months! :eek: I'm going to look at the food, petrol, and my spending money piggy banks first to try to increase the OPs. I could easily save money on dog food but as they are my substitute ducklings, I do spoil them! Maybe less treats though!

So today is day one of making every penny do the job of three, as i have read on here. My brother is off work, and home, for the first time in months today so I am seeing him - he suggested brunch at an upmarket restaurant but I persuaded him to look in his overfilled, YS only freezer! So that will save the pennies and I'm going to cycle over to save petrol (and the environment!) too. I'm off to a wedding reception tonight - I never know the real etiquette about gifts so always take one....I've picked up something for £1, and wrapped it nicely so hopefully it will look dearer than it was! Going to drive tonight to save taxi and alcohol costs as well.

Hoping my new shiny debit card will arrive today from a certain supermarket bank - discovered their loyalty points can be used at 3x the value for eurotunnel crossings so planning on saving those for next year's holiday! I've put some things on fleabay - so hopefully they will bring in some extra £s to top up the OP. and I've returned to Sw@gbucks and already got a £5 paypal payout so that will add to it as well.

Off to walk the dog now, and hopefully keep it a low spend day!

Viking_mfw

Welcome! You seem to be off to a flying (not waddling!) start

Good luck and looking forward to following along.

beanielou

Happy shiney new diary
Keep wadling

penny*pincher_2

:wave: Welcome!!

Sounds like you have some great plans I am looking forward to following your journey :T

shangaijimmy

Howdy :hello:

Jessy103

Yay a new diary!! Good luck with your journey!

mrspuddleduck

Thank you all! ��

Yesterday was a positive day. Grand total
of £4 spent by only having a couple of soft drinks at the wedding. Today has been a bigger spend....went to the dentist and had a filling so that's a £50 dent in the savings but not the end of the world. As the supermarket is next to the dentist, MrPD asked me to get him breakfast with his "pocket money" and I was very good and didn't buy any extras! It's the car service tomorrow but that is budgetted for so fingers crossed it is within budget!!

mrspuddleduck

So today was The First NSD:j

Had the car serviced yesterday, and it was £70 under budget so that is going in the OP pot. I always fear the worst with the car as it is 13years old, but it just needed 2 new tyres, and I'm lucky to have a garage that are great.
Stocked up on YS bread last night at Mr T's so the freezer is packed now! Kept to the "top-up" list as well
Have meal planned for next week too, so hopefully that will come in under budget and then that will leave some left over ££s for the OP pot!

Tomorrow won't be an NSD and I will get strange looks as always when I go to the Land of Ice to stock up on toilet roll....I fill the trolley......but at £1 for 4 rolls, I've never found anywhere cheaper without resorting to the economy versions which I suspect may be a false economy.

I fear the one of the dogs arthritis is playing up again so have made a batch of turmeric paste to see if there is an improvement over the weekend, otherwise it is a visit to the vets on Monday for some opiates! I don't begrudge spending that money though, and we self-insure anyway as there is just no point once they become elderly for the massive excesses and long lists of exclusions!

mrspuddleduck

Good Morning! Really enjoy reading everyone else's diaries and they'd are full of inspiration and motivation! I've had another 2 NSDs and stuck to the budget on the weekly food shop on Friday. Returned an overpriced candle to ASD4 I ordered before my MFW moment......glad it was damaged as I felt less silly returning it, rather than just I don't need to be spending money on candles!
Have spent yesterday and today tidying, sorting, de-cluttering and cleaning! We go on holiday in a couple of weeks and detest returning to any housework so that is added motivation at the moment. In amongst the de-cluttering I am listing as much as possible on fleabay!

Kittenkirst

Good going on the eBay listings: I've had a little spree this afternoon and got 9 items listed so far which I'm pleased with. I always find it a log process to list things though!

How's the turmeric paste working on the dog?

mrspuddleduck

Thanks for asking.....OH thinks she's fine, she's playing with the other dog, trying to chase her tail and bombing up the stairs when she gets the opportunity...but I'm still not convinced...will give the paste a bit longer to work but she's happy in herself so that's the most important factor I think.