The Edcawber Principle

beanielou

Also hoping that all is well in your world

beanielou

How are doing?
Missing your posts

edinburgher

Credit card balance now at £9,999.99

Suffolk_lass

Hooray, you are back! I have missed your posts. That is cracking progress too on that credit card balance.

When are you finishing work for Christmas? - It's a bit different over here with no paid work but the various projects are running to the wire - resealing the camper van while we have use of the barn so it is under cover and also the front garden works (3 tons of sand and gravel being delivered tomorrow!) so there is sufficient parking. I must get my bum in gear and go get the other bits I need for the latter as I have two people coming to help me level the area tomorrow and then I want to try and get some done before Christmas - Oh and I have four hours drive to go get my Mum from Peterborough Station on Thursday as my DB-i-L is putting her on the one LNER train that starts at Glasgow Central and doesn't need a change at Edinburgh Waverley. Happy days!

If you are not back before, have a great Christmas - I've just been signing up to the savings and mortgage OP threads for next year too

edinburgher

Hi SL

I finish up on the 23rd, so in my final week of work. It has felt like a bit of a slog.

Your projects sound exciting/exhausting, I have a colleague who has aspired to a camper van for the last decade or so and talks about it every day :rotfl:

4 hours of driving sounds miserable. I am currently not a fan of driving after smacking the car off a crash barrier in the Scottish Borders on the way home from visiting family in Newcastle. The repairs were approved yesterday, but the garage are being a PITA re. booking us in to get them completed.

beanielou

Great news on the CC

Boo to the car troubles though.

Suffolk_lass

So sorry about the car trouble. I can relate - driving down the M74 I am always struck at the ice on the road when we have been to my Mum's in Ayrshire over Easter - not least because we saw an artic do a wee slide that mercifully he managed to recover without jack-knifing.

We also normally cross on the A66 from M6 to A1 - I realise that is too far south for you going to rellies in Newcastle but it is my favourite and most feared road. The snow poles are 8 feet tall (says it all really) and it is so open. I remember some of the high moor farmers lost flocks of sheep in the "Beast from the East" where they froze to death in what should have been the lee of the walls but the drifting got them.

The forecast suggests you have snow imminent in the next day or two - be careful out there!

edinburgher

We had a lovely Christmas, with far too much food, treats and booze as usual. I'll get on the sackcloth and ashes in a fortnight, but until then there will be more of the same! :beer:

Present highlights included a bottle of my favourite whiskey in the world and a Blu Ray copy of the new Godzilla movie, which I loved, even if everyone else thought it was a pair of holey underpants :rotfl:

Mrs E and I have decided on a (slightly) radical change of direction for 2020 and have committed to paying off our outstanding credit card debt by this time next year. This is in the region of £11,000 (Mrs E BT'ed a small amount last year). To do so, we will need to sell DD's ISA holdings and use these, as well as making some lifestyle sacrifices such as no adult presents for our usual birthday/mother's/father's day/Christmas holidays, trimming budgets and using my 13th wage.

I feel very conflicted about this decision, but the credit card debt is a serious negative in terms of cash flow (£11,000 of credit card debt costs nearly £250/month, even with no interest). We have to remortgage in less than a year and this remains our single biggest financial consideration, as we will need to borrow £160,000 and are considering either extending or moving house.

DD's investments remain a key driver for us, we have absolutely internalised this as a parenting goal and it brings us a good degree of comfort as regards the eventual costs of education or housing and BOMAD assistance. As things stand, however, we have a large lump of money that could be better used, so we're trying to keep our heads in charge of our hearts.

If we can pay off the remaining debt in a year, it should take less than a year to repay these investments after that and be ready to extend/move debt free bar the mortgage by the end of 2022. I considered paying the investments back over a longer period with generous interest, but as always, it makes no sense to pay more interest than you need to.

2020 will bring several positive cashflow events which will help to speed this up. My tax punishment will end by the end of the financial year (a previous employer underpaid); I have a 3% salary pay rise coming in April, followed by a 5-6% increment next October. Those are all guaranteed, so good for planning purposes.

In addition to this, we plan on taking out another long mortgage to make it easier to save cash and this should reduce the currrent monthly payment by 25% or so.

Cautiously optimistic, but already feeling bad re. ISA.

beanielou

I think it sounds like a good plan & TBH the year will fly.
You are lucky that you know you have increases in income to come.
YOu can dom this

Suffolk_lass

Depending on the type of remortgage you go for, beware of long dates. Ours runs until August 22 and despite the interest being low (0.49 above BOEBR) and the amount outstanding now less than £18k it is not worth us paying it off early because of fees - with hindsight I would look at the cost of application and redemption fees and admin charges when I looked at products.

You might not think you will want to overpay it now, but you still may change to focus on that at some point before its term ends so worth modelling a few options on your trusty spreadsheets when it comes to it