FinancialBliss: My mortgage free journey…

financialbliss

Sepa74 wrote: »

Why does it give me great pleasure to imagine the desperate phone calls to senior managers at home, escalating the problem internally, the scurrying around to understand what's gone wrong and set expectations with the business while I'm sitting peacefully in my kitchen in my dressing gown, cup of tea in hand?

There is something dark and truly evil inside me... :rotfl:

Brought a smile here!

Situation back to normal - showing £24,010.61, which was what I was expecting to see earlier.

More later - off out with kids on a cycle ride so I've been told by 'er indoors :eek:

FB.

financialbliss

Evening...

Where exactly has the last week gone? Last posted precisely 7 days ago with the intentions of giving regular updates throughout this last week.

Had quite a stressful week. Something cropped up, which I don't particularly want to discuss / make public at present. Have been stressing about that these last few days and not wanted to put in an appearance on MSE this week...

Feel a bit more positive today. Went swimming this morning, which due to free swims that form part of the kids paid for swimming lessons meant we all got in for free. We also found a 20p in the lockers, which are free, but you need a 20p coin which you get back, so we were 20p up.

Brother in law dropped in this afternoon and helped me carry a 32" CRT old style TV upstairs, which we have swapped with an old 28" CRT TV that we threw out today! The 28" was our first TV which we purchased when we bought our first house / mortgage 15 years ago, so it had served us well. The 32" was freebie too. Got this TV set up in a spare bedroom for the kids - video, Playstation 2, DVD player etc.

Had offered to run a MFW 2012 challenge this morning, but originalmiscellany was just setting up a 2012 challenge at the time.

Need to work out a 2012 OP amount before I sign up, but can't be that difficult to do, as there's only so much you can overpay before you become mortgage free.

FB.

curlygirl1971

Looking forward to seeing you over on the 2012 challenge....it wouldn't be the same without you. Bit like the absence of WynnVegas......it just doesn't feel right. All these Wannabees achieving their goals! :mad:

Hope this week is better/less stressful for you

financialbliss

curlygirl1971 wrote: »

Hope this week is better/less stressful for you

Was stressed to the point I wasn't sleeping. But having calmed down somewhat, I've seen things in a slightly different light. No speculating please though - I may discuss at a point in the future.

On a separate note, our first Tesco CC bill came in (well on-line statement) at the weekend at a massive £1,004.98 :eek::eek::eek:

Not sure if it's good news or bad that I just need to pay a minimum of £25 off the balance. Seriously, I'm not judging anyone when I say that I can see how easy it would be to get into debt. A few of those and we will hit the credit limit rather sharp-ish, so I'm hoping that this first bill is my biggest bill for this credit card.

Pondering over how much to pay off. Paying too little means we hit the credit limit sooner, but paying off too much leaves less funds to divert to mortgage savings. Got until mid-December to make the payment.

FB.

wynnvegas

curlygirl1971 wrote: »

Looking forward to seeing you over on the 2012 challenge....it wouldn't be the same without you. Bit like the absence of WynnVegas......it just doesn't feel right. All these Wannabees achieving their goals! :mad:

Hope this week is better/less stressful for you

No fear CG,

I'm on my way back....

Cheers,

Billy

wynnvegas

Hi FB,

We did a similar thing this time last year and very near maxed the thing out. So long as you're on top of it, and I can't see you having any issues there, I'd throw the money at the mortgage. Glad you're feeling better.

Cheers,

Billy

abouttimetoo

financialbliss wrote: »

On a separate note, our first Tesco CC bill came in (well on-line statement) at the weekend at a massive £1,004.98 :eek::eek::eek:

Not sure if it's good news or bad that I just need to pay a minimum of £25 off the balance. Seriously, I'm not judging anyone when I say that I can see how easy it would be to get into debt. A few of those and we will hit the credit limit rather sharp-ish, so I'm hoping that this first bill is my biggest bill for this credit card.

I know exactly what you mean FB. When I did some large scale stoozing a couple of years ago (large by my standards anyway, I can't remember the full amount but it was somewhere between £25k and £30k) I was horrified by how little they wanted as a minimum payment, it's all too easy to get into debt

Good luck with your plans

Regards
ATT

Peonie

abouttimetoo wrote: »

I know exactly what you mean FB. When I did some large scale stoozing a couple of years ago (large by my standards anyway, I can't remember the full amount but it was somewhere between £25k and £30k) I was horrified by how little they wanted as a minimum payment, it's all too easy to get into debt

Wow, I don't think I could handle the stress of having that much credit card debt, even if it is in an account somewhere. I don't think stoozing is for me.

financialbliss

Peonie wrote: »

Wow, I don't think I could handle the stress of having that much credit card debt, even if it is in an account somewhere. I don't think stoozing is for me.

Hi Peonie,
On "paper", ahem, a spreadsheet, it's quite simple....

• Apply for a 0% credit card (CC) (which I've just done - Tesco)
• Switch all spending to said credit card
• Pay a much lower balance off or minimum each month
• Use cash that would have gone on CC to overpay mortgage / put into mortgage savings
• Clear mortgage and repay CC before the 15 month 0% term ends

Effectively, I'm moving my mortgage debt from 2.5% to 0% and on paper, it looks like a winner.

It could all too easily go ever so pear shaped for any number of reasons, but I'm hopefully organised enough to keep on top of things.

FB.

Peonie

In January I took out a 0% card for 13 months to cover some of our house moving costs and in total have put £1,000 on it (so £22k in comparison is huge). As the house move did not go to plan we were still able to invest £2,000 into our ISA savings in March. I still have £480 to pay off before the 0% ends. I like my spreadsheets and they tell me how much I need to cover the debt and other costs each month but I'd rather it was gone and I did not have to think about the large(ish) payment at the end.

FB, how much interest will you save in these last few months by overpaying/stoozing?