Navigating the ups and downs

rollercoasting

We have a stove!!! £350 which is a bargain. Now just need to figure out how to remove the aga. Perhaps I should start a bet on how long it will take to get it installed and working (and how much goes wrong along the way!)
Frugal week mostly achieved apart from stove purchase. Having some folk over for dinner tonight so got to buy a couple of bits but not very much - wombled blackberry and apple crumble for pud and home-grown pork for main.
Got to pop to shops now to sort that out and then make some more kindling this afternoon to keep building up the supplies. Got 2 bins full so far and just about to start a dumpy bag load.

Meeting up with ma and pa on Saturday and they are taking us to a local circus so that should be good. Have some pennies set aside for this so just have to resist my mum's ever present encouragement to spend......

rollercoasting

Good news....dh has sold some stuff!! We have £2.5k to allocate!! So that's going to go off debt 1 and to pay off balance of stove. Wondering about adding to emergency fund, but worried about frittering it away. I really didn't think we'd sell anything that quickly so really chuffed with that. He still has 3 more things to sell, but it's not really the right time of year to sell these things, so I think we need to hunker down and wait until Spring....if he gets what he paid for things, it will be over £2k. Find it very hard to be patient!!!!

Still I'm going to maintain payments to cc1 at same level and I'm also rounding off various pots and chucking change at it too (Love how ynab does this now...its very motivating)

Budget pots are super tight. We have about £20 in food and £20 in petrol to go until I get about a further £42 On 21st of the month. Got a 3/4 tank of fuel and plenty of food in so it's all to aim for. EF has already been used up as had to buy dd new shoes.

We do have another EF of £400 but it's inaccessible at the moment as we are owed it by a relative. Should be able to get it all back in next month or so, so that's good news. Will need to lock it away when it comes in as we're much more diligent if we can't see it.

Roll on end of month.

Scott-Weiland

God that sounds a nightmare re the Aga/heating etc i hope you are getting sorted now.

I have had a nosey at your SOA it looks okay to me the only thing i would review is your life assurance, join topcashback and i bet you could get the same level of cover for a lot less.

rollercoasting

Scott-Weiland wrote: »

God that sounds a nightmare re the Aga/heating etc i hope you are getting sorted now.

I have had a nosey at your SOA it looks okay to me the only thing i would review is your life assurance, join topcashback and i bet you could get the same level of cover for a lot less.

ha ha yes it is a nightmare. As I write I now have a lovely new stove sitting pretty (but unconnected) in front of the very still connected aga. No progress as yet!!

Good tip on the insurance - it is high - I did only recently organise it and went full whack with it as it covers me as the major earner (had a breast lump scare) but yes - I had thought it was on the high side too. I will do some checking out and see what's what.

rollercoasting

Rollercoasting ups...... Got a letter from an old insurer saying they owed me £30.12 and the cheque had expired so I needed to contact them for a new one.
Rollercoasting downs. Then spent 56 minutes on hold waiting to get through to organise said cheque. Not sure it was worth my time!!
Now trying to sort out issue number 2 with another insurance company. It's going to be a loonnnng evening.

Scott-Weiland

How did you get on regarding the cheques???

rollercoasting

Nothing received yet at all!!!
SSE promised me a refund for poor service too and that hasn't materialised either!
Will be chasing things up on Friday.
Been a long poor month so far.
Nothing much in current account and still got 6 days to go. Sigh.

Debt wise - things are going down:

Debt1.............................5295.9....Now £3995.90 (25% gone)
Debt2............................20570.....Now £20470

I've got some work expenses to come in shortly - over £100 which is good. I think I will chuck this into car saving pot though as didn't manage to save anything this month. I am already owed a fair bit more so might be getting another £100 before too long.

DH has possibly sold another item. If that happens it will be another £500/£600 off debt 1 which helps.

Aims for next month are to put something aside for Christmas. To have a minimum £100 buffer in both current accounts (no idea if that will actually be possible, but anything will help) and to have a QUIET month please if there is such a thing.

Onwards and upwards.

rollercoasting

Oh yeah.....New stove still unconnected!!

rollercoasting

A little saving win. We needed to buy a toaster as ours had broken, our grill in our oven is also only half working, but also now we definitely don't have an aga. Looked at Topcashback and I had £19 to cash in - found a well reviewed toaster at a bargain price brand new on ebay for 23.99 with free postage. So for £4 we have a new toaster.
Happy days.

New months money is in on Tuesday. Been doing some planning ahead....first real month with 1 salary eek. All looking OK though.

Time to look back too - here's how we have done:

• DH's work account is funded 1 month ahead already so now I will be covering November costs. Saving going well for NI& tax too - all on track
• Food budget spent £317 against a budget of £300. Cupboards are bare now though.
• Fun budget spent £54 against budget of £50 - this was an unavoidable meal with my folks.
• unexpected spends which we coped with is the stove at £362. This has been paid off already.
• CC debt reduced by 25% thanks to a sale. Hoping for some more good news here within the month - not as much but still progress.
• DH & I meal planned all of this week so that's progress. Need a big staples shop though as a lot of things to replenish this month.

So all in all - good progress.

rollercoasting

Budgets looking ahead:
£300 food
£30 fun budget

Into savings should be going £150 for car savings, £50 for Christmas £20 for dog.

Want to end month with £100 buffer MINIMUM in my account. we've been at zero this month on one occasion and I risk charges if we go OD...so this is a must do.