Busy Mee's Last Leg

Suffolk_lass

Busy_Mee said:

It is lovely to see so many of our kids have had good financial education. My DD also has savings pots for her car, holidays etc and also her house deposit. She has a Halifax Clarity card for using abroad and building her credit rating but it is set up to be paid in full every month. DS also very good with money but is better paid. I think some of the best lessons you can teach kids is not to waste money and that all borrowed money needs to be repaid.

DD has a friend who lives a very extravagant lifestyle, spending constantly on beauty treatments, designer clothes and expensive nights out and holidays. DD thought she had a really good job to fund all of this but it turns out she is putting it all on credit cards and doesn't actually earn much more than DD. She has recently leased a Mercedes sports car for £500 a month on the basis that she needed something to show for her money, rather than spending it on nights out. Actually she still has nothing to show for her money and all the debt needs to be paid back at some point. I think her only hope is to marry a footballer.   We refer to this girls spending as " shaking the magic money tree" . All joking apart, it is actually really sad because you know it will all come crashing down at some point.

We describe this as a triumph of style over substance - or a "scratch and sniff" lifestyle. The latter refers to those perfume samples in magazines in the last century(!) that you could scratch and sniff, but had no substance so you could not wear them 

savingholmes

Like the scratch and sniff analogy.
Well done on the mortgage reduction / savings increase. 
Hope your DD's house goes through okay. Sounds an exciting opportunity. How lovely to be able to loan her the money

QueenJess

I agree with the financial education.  I honestly never realised or even considered you would be able to put money on a credit card and not immediately pay it off at the end of the month until I came on here about 10+ years ago.  My parents are very risk adverse and would never borrow money (mortgage aside, which they paid off early).  They always told me that credit cards are good for online security and you just pay at the end of the money instead of immediately, so you need to make sure you already have the cash to pay for it.

DS will also be learning about money along the way.  He already knows mummy has to work hard to earn money to pay for food, the house and buy him presents.  He's only 3!  The other day he asked for something and I said I would have to think about it because it was expensive.  He then went upstairs and got his money box and asked if there was enough in there for me.  Very cute.  (Note that he doesn't get pocket money, just small change collects in there when grandparents visit and he likes to play pretend with it).

debtfreeoneday

My kids have often offered their money boxes and savings to pay for things we needed. Things that their savings wouldn’t cover 1% off but it’s still so nice they offer. 

Busy_Mee

That is really sweet Debtfreeoneday. I must admit we did borrow all the kids university money when we built the house ( with their permission ). Thankfully we managed to pay it all back before they needed it.

Busy_Mee

Good Morning from a very dark and gloomy Yorkshire. We haven't seen any daylight for days and you start to understand why we celebrate Christmas with lights and decorations to brighten everything up.

We have had a horrendous spending week. Regular readers will know that our central heating boiler has been limping for the last couple of years. This week it gave up the ghost big style and we ended up with a new boiler, pump and valve and hours of labour. £3.5 k later and I am trying to be brave 

Add to that a new bed and sofa bought for DD's new house and normal Christmas shopping and I am practically breathing into a brown paper bag. The pots are going to be bare, but never fear we won't touch the ring fenced savings. The only silver lining is the amount of TopCashback we have racked up.

DD's house purchase is still progressing well. The vendor has said he wants to complete by the end of the year.....not sure whether that is realistic but DD is up for trying.

All the building work at DS house is finished and he and Mr Mee are painting furiously ahead of the carpet being laid on 21 December. Oh yeah and we paid for the carpet too. The door on the bank of Mum and Dad needs nailing shut now. We always intended helping them both with their house stuff but didn't expect it coming at the same time 

Think that is all, off to the hairdressers this morning.

savingholmes

Ouch to all the bills. We spent a similar amount on our boiler a few years ago and it was well worth it. The difference was immense and our on-going energy bills dropped.

Suffolk_lass

This will make you feel better - ours was £7k fitted - because we live where there is no gas so it is oil!

debtfreeoneday

Ouch indeed to the boiler. But you should well organised so sure you’ll have it built back up ASAP. 

I’m sure there are more lights this year. I’m really enjoying driving past brightly lit houses at the moment when we are out and about. 

Cornish_mum

We are also having a super spendy December (another car repair bill, lots of extra Christmas spending, plus dealing with mice in the house 😬). MrCM is madly busy at work so we have been eating takeaways etc. This has all resulted in me also experiencing frequent paper bag moments.