BachSoon's mortgage mission

BachSoon

Thank you Nichelette, lots in common sounds like a good way of doing things!
Mine is a lot less of a disaster now that we have joint finances which is handy

Well I wrote a long post last week and lost it because the forum logged me out

BachSoon

Oops, posted too soon. To be continued...:o

BachSoon

Anyway, the forum logged me out between typing and posting so my woes this month were lost in the ether. Probably for the best

In terms of my finances this month, the best laid plans and all that. I had set aside out overpayment of £200 from my 'spends' so I knew we definitely had it, with hopefully some extra coming from the household budget. DH said he was getting a company bonus in his pay packet so a bumper month for us :beer: on hearing that, I swept half of my spends into my isa :money: [STRIKE]me, planning another maternity leave, whatever gave you that idea [/STRIKE] assuming that the overpayment could come from the household budget easily.
He then decided that he wanted to spend some of it on giving our bedroom a revamp. Our sheets are as old as the hills, so I can't grumble really. So that's a duvet cover, some curtains and a mirror in pipeline (we did say we'd do it when we had some spare money, and technically he did earn it, so should get some say in how it's used ) so we decided to see if there's any kind of Easter sale. I've put it into he savings until then, but our plans won't come to the £1300 I've moved, so that's still a net saving in our savings account.
He also purchased a new vacuum cleaner on the spur of the moment. Which, to be fair, we were in need of. Ours was smelling like electrical burning :eek: and didn't really pick anything up, which is a bad thing with a 13 month old who likes to pick up every little bit of anything on the floor to put in his mouth :doh: oh and on carpet, it could only really be dragged backwards because something underneath had broken. So really, I can't complain. Plus it was on sale, £70 down from £120 :beer:. PLUS, the amount of dust it picked up from our carpets on a brief test run by DH was really quite something
So I'm not really sure how much will be available for overpaying at the end of the month. I don't think we will make my target of £200, but will have to see whether we can get close. Looking at the positives, we've saved £1800 between our various savings pots this month.
It's been an expensive month in terms of my spending money too... I don't generally spend a lot on myself, but this month I've had to pay for my place on best friends birthday spa day, but I thought I'd go along as it's not every day she'll turn 30. And I do love a spa day but haven't had one in years. £75 gone. I also have a cut and colour booked in, so there definitely won't be anything left. I don't want to move any of the £150 I saved out of my isa.
If we don't hit our target this month, I will see if we can make it up over the next few months with an extra £50 per month for 4 months

BachSoon

Well I swept £50 from the joint account into our mortgage overpayments account in the hope that we wouldn't miss it and I could op it closer to the end of the month. I'm not convinced we'll make it after all, as DH will probably need two lots of petrol before payday
I may have been optimistic in transferring £1300 to savings at the beginning of the month. But we really do need to build them up again after the renovation. I feel better knowing we have some savings aside.
I need to be frugal the rest of the month - much batch cooking etc. The problem is that at the moment, I'm just so tired when I've been to work, come home and seen to DS. Maybe after this week when DH is finished with lates for a few weeks. And when DS is no longer poorly/teething/fighting sleep.

We shall see.

OhtobeMortgageFree

Just popping in to say Hi!
I think I need to be more strict with aiming to put a certain amount away each month like you seem to be!

I always find batch cooking easiest when I just make double the portion sizes for a meal I was going to cook anyway and then just freeze half. Then on Fridays (my work day and when my toddler is in nursery) I don't have to worry about preparing anything for lunch or tea as I always grab a pot of leftovers. Just before having my son though I spent a whole weekend peeling veg and batch cooking and froze enough meals for two months for under £60. My son was breech so a planned Csection and I wasn't sure how much I'd be able to do after he was born. The reduced cost was great, but it's such a great time saver not having to cook every night too!

BachSoon

Hi Ohtobemortgagefree! :wave:

I feel like although I have a plan, I haven't been very strict as I've managed one month but not the second. Theoretically, my goal is £2000 before December of this year, which equals £200 per month from when I was able to start making overpayments. I may increase that to £2,400, which would mean finding £244.45 each month from April payday onwards. That would mean effectively I would have made up for the first two months of this year and overpaid from year 2 of my mortgage onwards :beer:
I think that's do-able with some frugal living, DH and I do earn relatively well between us.

I do exactly the same with batch cooking... Great minds think alike my problem is, now we have DS, when DH is at work on an evening, I can't be bothered to cook I tend to only really eat things like beans on toast, scrambled egg etc (which I acknowledge probably does nothing for my lack of energy ) I think I'm also suffering a lack of inspiration for freezer meals. We're veggie so things end up a bit samey - lentil ragu, curries, bean chillis etc. The repertoire need some work I think.

FIREdoc

*waves*
Lovely to have have some company - similar life stage/numbers etc. Looking forward to reading more of your journey.

OhtobeMortgageFree

BachSoon wrote: »

Hi Ohtobemortgagefree! :wave:

I feel like although I have a plan, I haven't been very strict as I've managed one month but not the second. Theoretically, my goal is £2000 before December of this year, which equals £200 per month from when I was able to start making overpayments. I may increase that to £2,400, which would mean finding £244.45 each month from April payday onwards. That would mean effectively I would have made up for the first two months of this year and overpaid from year 2 of my mortgage onwards :beer:
I think that's do-able with some frugal living, DH and I do earn relatively well between us.

I do exactly the same with batch cooking... Great minds think alike my problem is, now we have DS, when DH is at work on an evening, I can't be bothered to cook I tend to only really eat things like beans on toast, scrambled egg etc (which I acknowledge probably does nothing for my lack of energy ) I think I'm also suffering a lack of inspiration for freezer meals. We're veggie so things end up a bit samey - lentil ragu, curries, bean chillis etc. The repertoire need some work I think.

I'm not veggie but I don't really like the taste of meat so often make meatless meals during the week. My freezer currently contains veggie lasagna, curries, casseroles, bags of pre-cut veggies to just throw into the pot for speed on a weeknight, soups, cheese scones and some peanut butter/banana/oat bars which my toddler loves!

BachSoon

Hello everyone :wave:

Thank you for visiting.

I have op'd the £50 that I set aside. I wasn't going to op it until the end of the month in case we needed it. But decided to throw caution to the wind I may regret it next week or so, I may not! I made a spreadsheet while at work today. I mean, I worked really hard today [STRIKE] but I worked through lunch and got in early, so really it all balances out [/STRIKE] nothing fancy like how many months or whatever that we're cutting off - I'm not that excel literate - but just a simple one listing each month and how much we've op'd in addition to our usual payment. So far it stands at £250 - must try harder :rotfl: however, it made me realise that if we stick to £200 per month (but still making up this month's shortfall) and if we can put together an additional £2,400 to cover last year when we couldn't make any, we would have op'd an additional b£12,000 by the end of our fix in 4 years time. That's motivation for me :eek: hence today's throwing caution to the wind. I feel like this is the new target.

Ohtobemortgagefree, our freezers sound very similar :j now that I'm on the up from my pnd, I really need to get back into cooking new stuff or some variety really. Also need a big shop so think I might have a mooch through some recipe books tonight once DS is in bed.

Thank you FIREdoc, good to know there are some similar people around... I shall seek out yours too! I like something interesting to read for DS's night feeds (i.e. stop myself falling asleep in the nursing chair ) and for his bedtime feed too.

I must also make sure we don't overdo the scrimping though. DH and I have had a tough year with everything going on - we hadn't realised just how much having a baby affects your relationship and we're being careful on that front and making sure not to lose sight of 'us'. With a holiday to book :rotfl: it's only in the UK and 'us' is mostly walking/national trusts and sightseeing and all self catering but still, must make sure there is enough in the holidays pot.

Nichelette

Hi Bach, thought I would seek out your diary to say hi! We actually sound quite similar, I'm veggie too and love batch cooking and freezing . My slow cooker lid exploded recently so I bought a triple slow cooker to replace it :o. It's really good for batch cooking and it's handy being able to make veggie stuff for myself and meat stuff for my husband, though I'm quite lucky he'll eat a lot of my veggie meals.

Some of the national trust places are lovely. Husband was forced to retire from football after getting injured last year so I get him on Saturdays for the first time ever lol. Now we have some extra free time and the weather is improving joining the national trust is one of my plans so we can go on some nice walks and the like.