Prosperous soul in the making

Tahlullah.H

Difficult one.  The 23rd is a bit close to Christmas, plus she may want to be on holiday then as well.  I hope you get to a place that meets both of your needs!  I know I always want a tidy - not necessarily clean - home just before Christmas.  It just feels right.  Fingers crossed for you.

savingholmes

Hi Tahlullah - She is due on the 23/12 - and that felt okay when it was rolling weekly - but now it feels like it could be pushing it. That family have had quite a lot of covid positive people in their daily circle but seem to have escaped it themselves so far.

MovingForwards

Good news about the vouchers and potential rise.
The CC will come down more next year, don't be discouraged with the zero.
Fingers crossed your cleaner will want a bit of last minute money.

savingholmes

Just checked my stakeholder pension - it's gone up thankfully - now worth £3174. Just paid in £50 - which will be topped up 25% by tax relief - giving a value of £62.50 on top of earlier figure - £3236. At least this way I feel I am working towards my longer term freedom goals - not just my debt free goals. I am hoping to pay around £50 into my pension extra each month even while I am getting debt free. The £3K+ mentioned above - was half that when I first started the pension 15 years ago. So while growth hasn't been perfect - it is still good. Not bad for a pension I didn't even know I had until they wrote to me! I put in the £62.50 equivalent last month as well. It's in a managed pension fund - with a risk rating of 4 which is medium/high. When I start to put serious £ into mine / DH's / both pensions - I will need to investigate what it is invested in more thoroughly. Currently mine is on a 5 year lifestyle plan - so that sounds relatively safe. I think in the new year - I will try and get my free call with the govt pensions people - but doubt they can give me the type of more financial advice I need.

I am still debating longer term how much to put into our pensions versus the mortgage. Also still debating the merits of trying to buy land in the UK versus Portugal say. It does look like our £ could go a lot further over there. I looked at one couple who had moved from the Uk in their mid 40s a year ago - after selling up in the UK. They bought a house and 1.6 hectares of land for 67k euro - so more like £58K. It cost them £3.5K to move their stuff out there. It is costing them about £1K a month to live - but it sounds like they are living quite a simple life. They get 2-3 months of bad/wet/cold weather a year and houses aren't particularly well heated or insulated over there. Sounds pretty good. DH would love it. DS is still hankering after returning to Oz. DD wants to stay in the UK, here and in this house. Anything else is very scary to her.

I am 4.5 years away from theoretically being able to access pensions - that doesn't seem that long really. (For those who are not aware - I am hoping at some point to transfer an old DB pension with a pot of c£360K to a more accessible pension at some point. This would potentially give us a £75K tax free lump sum which we could use towards the mortgage or live on for a few years). I would still have my current DB pension (worth £8.5K p.a. - and around £13K if I keep working here until age 55 or upto £23K if I work to SPA). My state pension by age 55 is due to be worth £9.1K p.a. - to be taken at age 67)  DH is close to full state pension entitlement too - although his pension provision is only around £106K I think.... It's going up and down a lot this year as you can imagine. Once we're debt free - we plan to pay significant sums to the pension / mortgage / both - still working out the details.

Drawingaline

I am a cleaner working on the 23rd. I always do, then take the time off until the kids go back to school. It may be worth having them in then, as long as they are ok with it.

hugglemonster

Hi SH, sorry I can't offer any advice about pensions I haven't got a clue!

Hope you manage to get the cleaner to visit before Xmas as long as you are keeping safe, as mentioned would be nice before Xmas and you could reax a bit.
 
Make sure you're taking some time off, you've done so much over the last few months - time for a bit of 'me' time.

H x

SandyShores

Hi SavingHolmes, just popping over to say hi.

Your plans for investments/pensions sound really interesting.  I'm so not ready to retire but state pension is just over 10  years away for me and it feels like its looming.  Mr Shores is a few  years younger than me, and after reading your updates and browsing the tinterweb we've decided he needs to start paying in the maximum to his work pension (DC).  We'll still keep adding to his private DC pension - he's got about £85k in that at the moment.  But I think we'll get the mortgage down to well under the 300's and then start thinking about paying more into the private pension too, with the aim of drawing 25% a year to pay lump sums off the mortgage in a few years' time.

Good going knocking £10k off your debt.  In hindsight we should have got back onto the property market earlier (and maybe taken a bit more time to pay off the cards and loans) but we are where we are.  And we aren't in a bad place really - and it can only get better.

Look forward to following along, Sandy

savingholmes

Drawingaline said:

I am a cleaner working on the 23rd. I always do, then take the time off until the kids go back to school. It may be worth having them in then, as long as they are ok with it.

She came today - thank God. She says she is hoping to do next week - just depends on whether she can get childcare.

hugglemonster said:

Hi SH, sorry I can't offer any advice about pensions I haven't got a clue!
Hope you manage to get the cleaner to visit before Xmas as long as you are keeping safe, as mentioned would be nice before Xmas and you could reax a bit.
Make sure you're taking some time off, you've done so much over the last few months - time for a bit of 'me' time.
H x

I am now off until the 4th Jan. I have felt sleepy and completely wiped this week - so the right time for an extended break. I tried studying but it felt like everything was just leaking out my head!

SandyShores said:

Hi SavingHolmes, just popping over to say hi.
Your plans for investments/pensions sound really interesting.  I'm so not ready to retire but state pension is just over 10  years away for me and it feels like its looming.  Mr Shores is a few  years younger than me, and after reading your updates and browsing the tinterweb we've decided he needs to start paying in the maximum to his work pension (DC).  We'll still keep adding to his private DC pension - he's got about £85k in that at the moment.  But I think we'll get the mortgage down to well under the 300's and then start thinking about paying more into the private pension too, with the aim of drawing 25% a year to pay lump sums off the mortgage in a few years' time.

Good going knocking £10k off your debt.  In hindsight we should have got back onto the property market earlier (and maybe taken a bit more time to pay off the cards and loans) but we are where we are.  And we aren't in a bad place really - and it can only get better.
Look forward to following along, Sandy

Hi Sandy - you can only draw 25% taxfree lump sum once from each pension - and only then if they qualify. Alternatively - from a drawdown pension you can take a certain % a year tax free if you don't opt for a lump sum. My defined benefit pensions don't offer much taxfree lump sum at all - and the amount of £ I'd lose per year is too high. You may find you need to transfer your pensions at some point into ones that allow flexible drawdowns rather than fixed annuity style ones. You would need to seek independent financial advice to review your options and how your pensions fit your circumstances.

savingholmes

My retirement plan - if we retire / semi-retire at 55

• We will have each accrued £9.1K state pension to access at 67
• I could have £13.5Kpa. from age 67 - or a reduced figure if I take it early (other than on ill health grounds)
• I could either try and move my first ever DB pension - worth £6K p.a. at 60 or £7.7K p.a. at 65 - or a few months ago £355K if I transferred it into a flexi drawdown option and can find an IFA who will do it (no success so far).
• Assuming we both keep our jobs until then - we hope to more than double DH's pension provision. Otherwise we will also find that we pay more tax than needed as he might not have enough £ to live on if he was reliant only on his pension - meaning I have to draw more from mine. By helping him build up his pension - I am also hoping to mitigate the impact if I was to die before him - and then he got half or less of what my pension would otherwise be worth - especially as he would also lose access to my state pension entirely.

If we stay in Britain - likely to need to earn £ doing something to get us through to age 67 - if we went abroad and bought a house with land outright from our equity - and then lived on around £1K a month - our £ would stretch much further. I could then work partly on the land with DH - and then also have time for writing and art. Who knows what will happen between now and then. Our thoughts could change entirely - we just want to give ourselves choices. We would qualify for a really big repayment mortgage - but I don't want that pressure - however if we could get a big interest only mortgage long term - that could make the difference between whether we stay in the UK or move abroad. I am a planner - I have to see myself as working towards something big - e.g. freedom - to motivate me in the here and now.

@SandyShores presumably if the worst came to the worst - you could downsize - so you also have other options you could explore if you needed to.

savingholmes

Alternatively - if I could cope with the weather and isolation - I could buy a croft on the Isle of Skye and build my own place. TBH - it would probably take longer from there to get back and see relatives than it would by plane from abroad...