Learning to live within my means

astrocytic_kitten

Thanks @One-step-at-a-time, just realised we’re at almost exactly the same percentage paid off - go us!

@Sarahwithlove I’m really lucky to have a good pension through work, a 15% contribution goes in there at the moment. I was late in starting to seriously save in a pension though so could do with upping it to catch up. The plan is to first get to 6m emergency fund, then as you say do a split between mortgage / pension / continuing to save for a 12m emergency fund. 

I’m hoping to move house next year so there’s a lot of variables in there too with that. By the time I reach 6m emergency fund things should be clearer though...I have a tendency to really overthink this and get too far ahead of myself (there’s really no point agonising now if it makes sense to increase pension ASAP or if I should wait till after I move for mortgage affordability because I have a vague memory that some lenders take pension into account when calculating affordability and some don’t), so I’m trying to keep myself to focusing on debt paid off as first goal then 6m emergency room as second goal and plan to think about the rest at the time....as much as I really want to start with mortgage OP right now!

Sarahwithlove

I would wait until you have moved as they will look at your take home pay as well when assessing for a mortgage so you don't want to reduce it yet if you can. You can always save up along side and pay an extra lump sum after you have remortgaged. 

astrocytic_kitten

Thanks @rugbymadfamily, that’s a very good point! How exciting 😃

On the pensions/mortgage, I’ll spend some time looking at impact on take home pay and how that might change affordability closer to the time, and maybe talk to a broker about it too. One told me last year that some lenders will be flexible on large pension contributions as they can easily be decreased, and if it ends up taking me several months or a year to find a place I’d rather be getting the benefits of pension contributions during that time. But who knows what the world will be like by then! I’m expecting it to be about 8 months till I’m ready to start looking.

astrocytic_kitten

Popping in to confess that I have slightly blown a hole in December’s budget and am approx £40 over budget. 

3 reasons: I forgot about a Christmas present I needed to buy, I have a couple of grocery deliveries lined up in December where I’m spending more on food than I’d budgeted (amazing how all those minor Christmas treats add up), and I spent an unbudgeted £9 on a top from an auction site that I’ve been looking for and had search alerts up for over a year.

Trying to decide how best to fix it. I’ve moved money in YNAB as much as I can to get to ‘only’ £40 over budget. Obviously the simple thing to do is cut back on the grocery shops. 

But... I have some cashback ready to cash out that will cover the rest of the overspend. I was planning to put it to either debt or savings, but I’m so reluctant to give up my Christmas food shop of treats. My inner toddler is stamping her feet and insisting it’s been a long hard year and I’ve been so careful and frugal with groceries all year, and I deserve all that cheese and chocolate and wine 😂

Going to sleep on it, but I’m leaning towards letting my heart rule my head this time and putting the cashback to the treats.

Sarahwithlove

I'd be tempted to do same tbh and just let the cash back cover it. Like you said its been a long year for us all and with lockdown I imagine you have managed to pay off more than you probably would have so it's a win-win either way. 

astrocytic_kitten

Well, I think I’ve managed to cover the overspend without touching the cashback. I’d double counted something, forgotten I was due a refund for a delivery that arrived in pieces, and was also keeping an extra tenner in my ynab yoga pot in case an online workshop came up that looked interesting. So I think it should all be ok, but have also got in such a muddle I’m
going to leave it for a few days in case I’ve got it wrong again 😂

Happy December all!

enthusiasticsaver

I would not worry too much about a £40 overspend. I think a lot of us look at all these Christmas goodies but I don't know about anyone else but we are usually still eating them in January and want to get back to normal eating. In view of the lack of socialising this year I have limited our Christmas treats as it will just be immediate family. So instead of a big tin of celebration or quality street chocolates I have bought 2 small boxes of Lindt chocolates, some fancy crisps and nuts but around 50% of what I normally buy and some fancy biscuits. DH and DD1 are lactose intolerant so I am not buying tons of cheese and putting on loads of weight. GD1 and I will do some Christmas cake and gingerbread men baking. 

astrocytic_kitten

I’m the opposite @enthusiasticsaver - I’ve gone to family for the past couple of years so I’ve not really had to get in much in the way of extra food for Christmas other than wine, mince pies and baking supplies (I provide the home baking and desserts as my contribution). This year because I’m high risk and also utterly exhausted I’m staying home and having to cater for myself 😆

I’ve ordered some nice cheese, a few posh ready meal type things, some pre-prepared veg etc that I can just whack in the oven, mince pies, chocolate and wine. Other than the mince pies and chocolate it’s all the sort of thing I used to buy in my food shop year round, but stopped in 2020 as I worked on keeping my grocery spends low. Everyone feels sorry for me being on my own but I’m secretly looking forward to a few days of chilled luxury and no work / cooking / baking.

enthusiasticsaver

That sounds heavenly Kitten. I enjoy Christmas and having family over and visiting them but I think sometimes it might be nice to have the house to myself especially at the moment when DH doesn't go anywhere. Luckily it is a big enough house we can both have our own space when we get fed up of each other. Just having to think about myself for a few days might be nice though. Chocolate and wine would be in my essentials too. 

joedenise

Another couple looking forward to Christmas on our own.  I've "done" Christmas the last few years so it will be nice to just have what we fancy rather than the traditional Christmas dinner (although having said that it's not that traditional as we never have turkey because none of us are particularly fond of it!).  So this year we're going to have slow cooked lamb shanks because that's what we want - really looking forward to them too (and so easy to do!).

No chocolate here though but plenty of alcohol - not just wine!