Cheery's country living adventure

Cheery_Daff

Heating is indeed glorious, and is being appreciated today! 

What is NOT glorious is the leak above one of the new kitchen windows... 🙄 the window has been in for about a year now, and all the brickwork exposed, and there have been NO leaks. Now it's all plastered in and it's dripping, and has created an actual puddle on the windowsill, and another on the floor. No idea how that's even happened, but we can't leave it like that.

Bet the builder is going to be wishing he'd got here earlier in the year before the heating broke and everything started leaking... 🙄

Rusty chicken has had her medicine, but still not better, and I think there'll definitely be a trip to the vets tomorrow to hopefully get out whatever is lingering in her crop.

We were about to escape to the cafe for breakfast but I spotted on f@cebook that they're shut because they have a flood and their roof has collapsed! Aarrgghh!

Mr Cheery has gone back to bed, and I can't say as I blame him 🙄

Might just do an SOA instead 🙄 I tend to compromise by sharing joint income (although I'm sure if anyone cared enough they could probably figure it out specifically from individual things I've said over the years). Quite understand people not wanting to be specific though!

First of all, a cup of tea. I was saving myself for the cafe, but... 🙄

Cheery_Daff

edwink said:

I do admire you so much for all your dedication to your budgets and all the number crunching you do. By the way, they make good reading on here, and as I have said before your thread is so interesting. Honestly, I don't know where you find the time for all that you do at home not to mention working as well, you must go to bed exhausted some days. I think it is so sensible that you have now gone down to 4 days a week with your job and hopefully, once all the builders have finally left your quality of life will be much better with an extra day at home to spend time pottering etc.  Would be lovely to see a pic or two of your finished renovation once it is all done.  How exciting for you both and just in time for Christmas in a lovely warm house. 

Edwink 

I am pretty exhausted most of the time at the minute 🙄 In reality I don't do that much - certainly at the minute I'm ignoring all housework except utter essentials (literally hoovering the living room, washing up a couple of times a week, and I can't even remember when I last did a load of washing). Struggle to find the enthusiasm or space to cook

Mostly at the minute  I'm just firefighting whatever nonsense is happening on that particular day, and trying to do just enough work not to be sacked. Holding on by fingernails waiting for the building work to be over so at least washing up and cooking will be easier!

greenbee

I know what you mean about sometimes feeling like you're doing just enough work not to be sacked. And building work and being cold mean achieving that is sometimes a bit of a miracle. 

Re. the leak - it could just be something random due to the direction/force of the rain. I have a couple of marks on the bedroom ceiling from last year. No sign of a problem on the roof, never happened before or since (well, I haven't checked today!). It some ways it's probably good that it has happened while the builder is around as he should be able to identify the problem Have you checked the gutters above the offending window? 

I've made a list of small jobs to get done this week while my mum is here. Every one done is one thing that makes me feel better. This week I put window film on the downstairs loo window that I've been meaning to do for years. As the person who said they'd do it for me is another one of the people who promises but doesn't deliver, I decided to go with a removable film that's decorative but not opaque, but enough to make it less obvious what you can see (through the rose bush). It look me about 15 minutes, including cleaning the window and all the books that live on the windowsill (I keep my gardening books in there).

Today I plan to clean all the plugholes, as I noticed my bath (which I only use for showers) is draining slowly. So I'm about to go and find the bucket of bicarb in the garage and do those while also cleaning the coffee maker This is mostly displacement activity for decorating and outside work. 

Baileys_Babe

As Greenbee says it might be due to the direction/force of the rain. This happens in our utility room from time to time and a lot of water can enter on the rare occasions it does happen if all the correct criteria are in place.

We have removable window film on our bathroom and en suite windows to offer some privacy. 

EssexHebridean

Greenbee I love the idea of a list of small jobs that all just make things more pleasant, essentially - it’s amazing that something really simple can often just make a tiny little load slip off the shoulders, isn’t it! 

Cheery_Daff

Thanks all, yep, strongly suspect it was just the force of wind/rain, and probably not much we can do (except maybe render the outside wall again... but not now!!) Just alarming to see water basically running through the new plaster and making a puddle on the floor...

Anyway. At least it's stopped raining now! We've cheered ourselves up with a little charity shop trip, and a visit to meet our local friends in a cafe, where we refused to talk about the kitchen at all 😁

Feeling marginally better about the world, although still not done any of the planned DIY and I'm off out to band practice now 🙄

Definitely a good idea to have a list of little jobs! Once all these big ones are over I'll definitely be doing that!

greenbee

I've only just got the hang of it EH. Along with just doing one job at a time, finishing it and clearing it up BEFORE starting the next one. 

At the moment I'm trying to get the garden ready for winter, so I have a HUGE list, but everything is broken down into small tasks. Yesterday I weeded the water parsnip out of the stream, and put each bucket onto the compost heap when it was full, rather than putting them in huge bags I can't lift. That way I could have breaks when I needed them. I've done the same with clearing the banks. No more than two garden waste bags at a time, which need to sit on the bridge overnight to drain - put all the tools away, empty them into the bin/large bags before starting the next bit. 

I have a lot of small bits of decorating to do, so need to approach them in the same way. Empty bookshelf into boxes so they're out of the way. Priming is ONE job. Masking is another. Painting the back another. Painting the shelves another. In theory, I could then get it done in a week without overdoing things. And of course, when I put the books back in, no one other than me will know anything has changed  

Fortune_Smiles

I shall be touring the house this evening looking for leaks ☔ Sometimes the weather is so bad here I'm not sure anyone's house stays water-tight.  I let FDawg out for a comfort break earlier and the wind blew so much rain in through the back door I had to get the mop out 😲

Fortune x

Cheery_Daff

Ha, yes greenbee - finishing one job before starting another is definitely something I need to get the hang of! 

And Fortune, I suspect you're right 🙄 And I do accept that a house like this is probably never going to be completely watertight 🙄 But it would be nice if we could actually get the paint on before the whole place started disintegrating 🙄😂

Builder sent a message saying he'd likely be here next week, not this week, to finish the skirting, so that gave me the opportunity to respond with a list 😂 At least he knows what's happening now (and hopefully it will spur him on to finish and get out of our house as quickly as possible before we find him any other jobs to do!) Also very ready to get rid of this skip - it's been here 9 weeks now I think and stuff has been blowing out of it round the garden today, grrr.

Anyway, blah blah blah. Had a cheery band practice and now having a nice hot chocolate 😁

Cheery_Daff

BRUTALLY HONEST SOA

Ok MSE chums - here's my brutally honest SOA. A couple of explanatory points: 

* I have taken exact figures from YNAB monthly averages Jan-Oct this year. This is what we have actually spent.
* I didn't realise until I'd calculated it that there's a shortfall! Of course - I was working full time until September, and now I only work 4 days, so I've lost £376 a month - first job is to sort that out. 

Anyway, deep breath... 

[font=courier new][b]Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet[/b][b]

Household Information[/b]

Number of adults in household........... 2

Number of children in household......... 0

Number of cars owned.................... 2[b]

Monthly Income Details[/b]

Monthly income after tax................ 2995.68 [My wages + Mr Cheery's pension - I've not included anything for his self-employment here as it's looking likely there might be literally nothing before the end of the year anyway]

Benefits................................ 0

Other income............................ 0[b]

Total monthly income.................... 2995.68[/b][b]

Monthly Expense Details[/b]

Mortgage................................ 920

Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0

Rent.................................... 0

Management charge (leasehold property).. 0

Council tax............................. 189

Electricity............................. 72.11 [Just adjusted DD - this should come down further now central heating is fixed & we have more radiators]

Gas..................................... 167 [LPG - actual spend. Hopefully will come down now fewer holes in ceilings and more insulation!]

Oil..................................... 0

Water rates............................. 14.61 [Not on mains sewage - septic tank emptying is included under home maintenance]

Telephone (land line)................... 29.99

Mobile phone............................ 21 [Mr Cheery £6, me £15 - our home internet is wafty and I use this as a back up for work when needed]

TV Licence.............................. 15 [I know it's £13 odd - I save this much because it'll likely go up!]

Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0

Internet Services....................... 8.99 [This is a website of Mr Cheery's, paid for hosting, not getting involved]

Groceries etc. ......................... 340 

Clothing................................ 46 [This is slightly less outrageous when I realised it's actually both of us, and I generally log all charity shop spends under this category, so some of it will be household stuff]

Petrol/diesel........................... 160 

Road tax................................ 60 [Both cars £30 a year]

Car Insurance........................... 50 [TPFT for both cars plus breakdown]

Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 163.97 [Both cars had service & new batteries, also we replaced one car so there was a bit of messing included there too]

Car parking............................. 0 [I am a complete cheapskate and would rather walk than pay - can count on one hand the number of times I pay for parking in  a year - lobbed in with household spends]

Other travel............................ 0

Childcare/nursery....................... 0

Other child related expenses............ 0

Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 73.23 [We've both had crowns and teeth removed, Mr cheery has prescription pre-payment, I have medical exemption and don't pay]

Pet insurance/vet bills................. 190.91 [Er... maybe I should have lumped this under 'entertainment' as this is clearly what we do for fun]

Buildings insurance..................... 10

Contents insurance...................... 9.98 [Both insurances paid annually together - this is last year's sum so will likely increase a bit]

Life assurance ......................... 7.63 [Just me - Mr Cheery was far more expensive and if he dies I'll just keep on working]

Other insurance......................... 0

Presents (birthday, Christmas etc)...... 80 [Looks like I spend an average of £40 a month on birthdays, £40 on Christmas - more than I thought!]

Haircuts................................ 1.5 [Ha - one £18 haircut in the last four years, but let's assume they'll be annual]

 Entertainment........................... 370 [This is both of us - cafes, books, eating out etc]

Holiday................................. 0 [Haven't been anywhere since 2017 - got some of the savings set aside for next year but not actively saving for this]

Emergency fund.......................... 158 [I don't really class it as 'emergency fund' - this is what we've spent on house maintenance as a monthly average this year (not including the kitchen, of course)]

Donations............................... 23

Union fees.............................. 27.12[b]

Total monthly expenses.................. 3291.54[/b]

[b]

Assets[/b]

Cash.................................... 32429 [Obviously at least another £15 of this is earmarked for the kitchen]

House value (Gross)..................... 450000 [Complete guess, likely underestimate, bought for £425k nearly 4 years ago]

Shares and bonds........................ 0

Car(s).................................. 2500 [Another guess - one cost £1300 this year, the other £1500 a couple of years ago]

Other assets............................ 0[b]

Total Assets............................ 484929[/b]

[b]

Secured & HP Debts[/b]

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Mortgage...................... 179904...(920)......2.26[b]

Total secured & HP debts...... 179904....-.........-   [/b]

[b]Unsecured Debts[/b]

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR[b]

Total unsecured debts..........0.........0.........-  [/b]

[b]

Monthly Budget Summary[/b]

Total monthly income.................... 2,995.68

Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 3,291.54

Available for debt repayments........... -295.86

Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 0[b]

Amount short for making debt repayments. -295.86[/b]

[b]Personal Balance Sheet Summary[/b]

Total assets (things you own)........... 484,929

Total HP & Secured debt................. -179,904

Total Unsecured debt.................... -0[b]

Net Assets.............................. 305,025[/b]

[i]Created using the SOA calculator at www.LemonFool.co.uk.

Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.[/i][/font]