FinancialBliss: My mortgage free journey…

JonnyBravo

setmefree2 wrote: »

I must say I hate house alarms:p

You mean you hate ill fitted and malfunctioning house alarms.

I'd never have a house without one.

Saved me from burglary once in my old house. As far as I'm concerned they ensure someone else gets burgled.

financialbliss

JonnyBravo wrote: »

You mean you hate ill fitted and malfunctioning house alarms.

I'd never have a house without one.

Saved me from burglary once in my old house. As far as I'm concerned they ensure someone else gets burgled.

Hear hear. For our current house, which didn't have an alarm at time of purchase, we fitted one within weeks of moving in. We get this checked regularly too. The only real issue with house alarms is, as JonnyBravo says, ones that appear to go off for no apparent reason.

We live in a good area here - I've known neighbours get up / come out at 2 or 3am to check out an alarm going off. I'd also always fit an alarm to a house I purchased if it didn't have one as it's a deterrent.

Financial Bliss.

deefadog

Hi FB, regarding the -

House Price Index (HPI). The site I use to calculate our variations in house price has been updated today, so I'll be posting a HPI update this evening:
http://www.moneyfacts.co.uk/economic...riceIndex.aspx

How do make use of the data?

i.e my house was worth 239500 (what we paid for it, had a good deal so may be worth more at the time) in September 2006 - index was - 593.6

Now the index is - 533.5

Any help much appreciated

financialbliss

deefadog wrote: »

How do make use of the data?

Hi DD,

I've got a spreadsheet with columns:

Month, year, HPI, HPI difference, Percent change, House price difference, house price and the house price change from the original purchase price.

I also log into my nationwide on-line banking (mortgage with them) and take a snapshot each Sunday of the mortgage balance. Over the 4 or 5 values each month, I can work out an average mortgage value and from our house value and the average mortgage value, determine our loan to value (LTV).

In a nutshell, if the index has gone up 2%, this is reflected in our house price.

I'm not too fussed about the actual value, but this gives a fair estimate of what our house could be worth. Obviously, should we want to sell, I'd do necessary research at the time to make sure it's being marketed at a fair / realistic price.

As for your £239,500, I've just put this into my sheet at the September 2006 mark and it's suggesting that it may be worth £215,251 based on the index being used. Note: there could also be rounding errors or incorrect calculations in my sheet, so you may want to verify this value.

HTH,
FB.

deefadog

Thanks - how did i know you have a spread sheet for this :rotfl:

Interesting though! - Your valuation would seem about right, although the house next door which is identical to ours is up for sale for £250k - we will see

I guess areas (where you live) are a big factor also! If i could shift my house 200 miles to oxford it would be worth around £650k LoL

gallygirl

financialbliss wrote: »

Hi DD,

I've got a spreadsheet with columns:

Quelle Surprise :rotfl:

financialbliss

gallygirl wrote: »

Quelle Surprise :rotfl:

Hi gallygirl,

Thanks for that – I laughed! The humble spreadsheet is probably one of the best bits of software designed, IMHO. If you have numbers, you can either model, forecast, what if or analyse your data in any number of ways.

And if you’re bored and have your payslip data to hand, try creating a chart with your age and your gross salary per year divided by 1,000, ie £25,000 / pa would be 25.0

If you collate this data, you can then determine if your salary is keeping up with your age, the gap is widening / shortening etc.

It’s all about interpreting the data in a way that makes sense to you – I still like my 12/12/12 chart on post #1, which shows not only how far I have reduced the mortgage to date, but how far I still have to go.

What other weird and wonderful information have you converted into a spreadsheet?

Financial Bliss.

chirpchirp

Sorry FB, I seem to be somewhat distracted today. That's twice now I've posted in the wrong thread!

financialbliss

Savings. We opened a Barclays monthly saver (6.00% gross) in November 2008. I’ve been checked for commitments required from the first of the month, mortgage, direct debits and savings accounts, and just noticed that we have already fed the Barclays monthly saver 12 x £250 payments on 1st October.

Because the account was opened late in November (25th) with £250, was then fed again on 1st December with £250 and each month subsequently on the 1st, we’re ahead of the theoretical savings we should receive from this account.

According to the savings calculator here:
http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/best-cash-isa

we should expect £96.63 after 12 months. Due to managing to get £500 into the account after a few days and funding the account on the first of each month, we already have had £102.17 in interest. We will also get some further interest on the 1st November and possibly another small amount as the account closes, due to the interest being paid in arrears. Account closes at the end of November.


Not quite sure what to do now with this £3k savings, plus interest, eg open another regular saver or just throw the money into our Egg account. Currently the only other regular saver we have is a Halifax 5% @ £500 pm account, but they have recently reduced the rate on the account to just 2%.

I’m seriously considering overpaying slightly more on the mortgage and upping our regular amount of £1,025.00 to £1,100.00 on a permanent basis. Mortgage rate is 4.79% and I’m struggling to beat this without getting into savings accounts with tie ins. Plus, with the ever thread of potential base rate rises, I don't want to lock in for too long at a potentially lower rate.

However, I’m going to do some sums first to see how the extra towards the mortgage would reduce the mortgage interest.

Financial Bliss.

gallygirl

financialbliss wrote: »

What other weird and wonderful information have you converted into a spreadsheet?

Financial Bliss.

My fave at the moment is 19 flight routes from 7 airports, with 5 different time period for each. Appropriately colour coded but doesn't lend itself to graphs unfortunately

financialbliss wrote: »

I’m seriously considering overpaying slightly more on the mortgage and upping our regular amount of £1,025.00 to £1,100.00 on a permanent basis. Mortgage rate is 4.79% and I’m struggling to beat this without getting into savings accounts with tie ins. Plus, with the ever thread of potential base rate rises, I don't want to lock in for too long at a potentially lower rate.

However, I’m going to do some sums first to see how the extra towards the mortgage would reduce the mortgage interest.

Financial Bliss.

Can you reclaim overpayments if necessary? If so, and if there is no limit on your overpayments I would def. overpay.