Start at the very beginning.

Brindlebabe

Thanks guys. When I’m stressed generally then money is definitely one of the things I get stressed about. I find it helpful to remember 5 years ago I was really skint and wasn’t as worried about it then, so I should relax a bit more now! 

Husband has arranged to have the flat valued next Wednesday just to get an idea of where we stand. He’s very set on moving as soon as the 2 year fix is up in Feb, so it’s just a question of when to get it on the market to mean that we move just after that time. As long as it’s not lost value since we bought it I think we’ll sell. Which is a shame because it’s a nice flat and I hate moving! But ultimately my husband isn’t suiting to having upstairs neighbours and a busy road outside and we can’t change those things without moving. Plus it would be good for both of us to be a bit less urban and a bit more rural. Possibly thinking about renting somewhere close to where we grew up - it’s more commuting, but hopefully manageable, and it’s a calmer place to live.

Anyway - I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves. First to have it valued, then think about when to list it for sale, then probably around Christmas we can look for somewhere to rent. 

In the meantime - continuing £500 monthly overpayments. Overspent last month, but have been paid again now so this weekend I’ll sit down with the budget book and hopefully get us back on track. 

Hope all well with everyone.
Bb x

Brindlebabe

Haven't updated for a while...
Still managing regular overpayments but is boring but bringing down the massssive mortgage total each month. 

The exciting news is my husband arranged to have the flat valued recently and it was valued at £265000-£270000, we paid £235000 for it less than 2 years ago so that's amazing news! I was just hoping it had gone up by a few thousand to cover the fees involved with buying/selling and the new windows! I don't really believe it until it sells though... They might have just over-valued it to get our custom, and the markets are surely all over the place at the moment, and we can't sell until February as we'd need to pay a £6000 fee to get out of our mortgage fix, so not popping the champagne just yet. It has taken the pressure off a bit though. We're planning to rent, partly because my job has just under 3 years to go and then I'll probably look for a job elsewhere, and even within that 3 years I'm likely to move between hospitals so I don't need to be exactly where we are now. I am so fed up of moving every few years, I thought at 33 I'd be past that, but I try not to moan too much about it, it could be worse. Probably won't save much whilst we're renting but I can't face the stress of getting another mortgage just to sell it again. It's been bad enough the last 2 years, so will try to enjoy renting and the freedom that comes with it. I hated renting before we bought this place but now I've been on the other side I'm hoping I'll see it a bit differently. 

Other news... have spent lots lately on boring things, like GMC license and indemnity for work. Also the luscious brindle girly has needed a couple of vet trips, she's fine though, but expensive. The excess on her insurance is about £80 so big things are fine (she had some X-rays which required an anaesthetic and was £800!!! Insurance covered it though), but little things needing a consultation and antibiotics add up! She's worth every penny though, obviously. Haven't been so good at taking food to work, partly because I'm preparing for an exam on Thursday and have been stressed about it for a few weeks now. Not even bothered about failing it at this point, I'd just like it over with. Husband has bought a £550 guitar, we managed to sell an electric piano (hardly used...) to my dad for about £300 so that covered some of it and he's not bought anything for a while. He does actually play the guitar (very well in fact) so it will get more use than the piano did! Budget still not exactly on track but better than it was when I last updated. At least I know where we've been going wrong now instead of it being mysterious. 

Hope all well with everyone.

Bb x

ruby_eskimo

That's a really good valuation after only a couple of years, fingers crossed when you come to sell that the housing market hasn't crashed by then   Best of luck with the exam!

Brindlebabe

Hello again, been a little while since I updated..

So.. flat is on the market but no offers as yet. It went on about 4 weeks ago and initially we had loads of viewings, about 18 in 2 weeks, but no offers and last week no viewings at all until 1 yesterday.. All the feedback from the people who have looked have said that they don't like the main road, or they'd prefer a house, so not much we can do about any of that. The estate agent thinks that since lock down people are reconsidering moving and just hunkering down until after Christmas. I wonder if they've over-valued it, so I think we'll have a chat about reducing the asking price next week if the people who viewed yesterday don't show any interest.. I don't mind if it sells for less than they valued it at... I was surprised it was so high in the first place. Would like to move asap, but equally, no actual rush, other than my husband likes to be moving forward, and likes a plan. 
Would be looking to rent somewhere outside of the city, have a couple of friends who live a bit more rurally (or are in the process of moving out) and would be nice to be near some of them. My best friend is pregnant, so would be lovely to be able to walk to her's, my husband loves babies it turns out... I'm adamant that we can't start to commit to renting somewhere until we've at least had an offer, so trying not to look at stuff for now because we saw the perfect house and it went. So feel a bit stuck, but I think we need to do what everyone seems to be doing and just hunker down until someone makes an offer - even if it's weeks away. 

The alternative would be renting our flat out, but I really can't be bothered to go into being a landlord at the moment, and what if the tenants trash the flat?! So just trying to convince DH that we can live here until such a time comes that someone takes it off our hands. We've got our mortgage broker/financial advisor guy looking into changing the mortgage arrangements incase we're still here in Feb when our 2 year fix ends, so if we haven't moved by then will be interesting to see what the mortgage payments are then.

In the meantime I've stopped overpaying which feels a little disappointing, but we need more in our savings account so that we can pay deposit/rent for any overlap. I did any extra shift at work this week to boost it a bit as we're not making as much progress as I'd like. It was both of our birthdays this week so even though celebrations were limited by lockdown (and me working nights this week) still cost a bit in presents, afternoon tea and birthday cake. 

On the plus side - I passed my exam(!!!). Which is amazing. I thought I'd probably need to resit as I felt quite underprepared going in to it. So I had mentally put aside £660 from savings for the re-sit and committed many of my evenings and weekends for the next 4 months to revising. So not needing to do that is a massive bonus! Only one more professional exam I need to pass now then I should be finished. (I am 34 so you would have thought my exam days were over but there we are...).

Hope all keeping well in this miserable, boring and uncertain time.
Much love,
Bb xx 

twinklie

Well done. My DH is 50 and still studying for professional exams after having a career change in 2016. So I don't envy you...he's waiting on some results on Tuesday. Enjoy the gained time you weren't expecting to have by doing a bit of what you fancy.

Moneyfordreams

Congrats on passing your exams ... it certainly is life long learning in your profession  

ChasingSunshine

Congrats on passing your exam. It’s lovely to not have that hanging over you any more. Hope you have a nice break before the next one. 

Good luck with the flat sale. Fingers crossed you get an offer soon and can start planning next move. 

Brindlebabe

Hi,
So another 3 months have passed and I am just getting around to updating.. I suppose better to do it infrequently than never! 
We decided to take the flat off the market at Chrismas, partly because the interest was dwindling and no offers, and partly because I'd applied for some jobs so it wouldn't have been practical to move until we knew the outcome of those. 
To cut a very (very) long story short the jobs situations sorted themselves out and we'll be staying in this city for the foreseeable future, at least likely for the next 2.5 years anyway. But in September I'll slightly change my job role for 12 months with less money but better out of hours arrangements, and I'll almost certainly be able to pick up a few extra nights/weekends to make up the difference. So that's a good thing. I might decide to (or be unable to) make up the whole shortfall but it will make a real difference not doing so many nights/evenings/weekends so that's good. 

Still thinking that we'll sell the flat anyway, mainly because of the noise, but also we're keen to get somewhere a bit more rural (albeit with minimal impact on my commute hopefully). My best mate has just moved to a village outside the city which seems lovely and we're inclined to go there too, however, we'd be renting and it would probably cost more, and suitable rented properties (especially with doggy-face) don't come up all that often. The flat can't be re-listed as a 'new' to the market property until 14 weeks after we've taken it off, which brings us to the middle of April. What with the lockdown hopefully easing that might be a good time anyway, and my husband has other priorities to moving at the moment, especially concentrating on some intense therapy that is helping him understand himself. So just for now we're trying to stay in the present, in our flat, and not worry too much about the future. 

Boring financial updates - some wins some losses...
I've cancelled out broadband package today as it had run over the 12 month offer and was now £36 per month, so have signed up to a new 18m offer with nil to pay for 3-4 months which is handy. 
In process of trying to remortgage (yes, I know) which is taking longer than I thought, mainly because the admin is so painstaking. They want me to prove that the flat isn't, and hasn't been 'staircased' which I'm sure it hasn't because I"ve never heard of it, but how can you prove that something hasn't happened... Once its through we'll have changed the mortgage supplier and gone to a tracker with better rates, and then I'm hoping to get back to overpaying. In the meantime we're on 3.3% interest which equates to about £850 per month which isn't brilliant... But I'm trying not to stress too much over it. 
Car passed its MOT with only £12 to buff the headlights so that was a definite win. Its old so if it were to need a lot of work we'd have to scrap it and go without for a while which would be a pain. 
Managing to limit supermarket weekly shop to £70 per week for the last few weeks, and avoiding little top ups in between which feels more in control. Trying not to get too much take out either, which is sometimes better and worse. On the whole I think we're doing well considering the circumstances though.
Managing to save around £1000 per month the last 2 months which is very satisfying, even if not overpaying the mortgage.. I figure at the moment whilst we're considering moving its better to have the money available for moving costs rather than tied up in mortgage. 

Hope all well with everyone. 
Feels like we're through the worst of this now (please...) so hope everyone managing to start smiling again and making some plans to look forward to (even if super flexible who knows if they'll get cancelled again plans..)
Bb xx

South_coast

Staircasing is usually a shared ownership thing - it's the term for when you increase your share from 40% to 50% for example. If there's no shared ownership on your flat then I'd assume that was clear from the lease (as there would be no other party named) - it might be something the lender has encountered on another flat in your block? 

I'm also looking forward to smiling again - and even more so to when I'm not wearing a mask and people can see me doing it!

Brindlebabe

Thank South_coast. I'm sure you're right. I'm just going to write 'not staircased' on the form and hope that that's sufficient. They have a copy of the lease already. 

Money-wise this week: Husband has gone gluten free to try to improve some gut issues that he's been having. So that's slightly challenging with the grocery budget - at least until we get the hang of it. I'm vegan and the oven is currently not functional so there are quite a lot of limitations on food anyway! Will have to replace the filament in the oven as soon as I get some time. Don't want to get an electrician in if we can do it ourselves but will involve a bit of online video work first I think..
I've got plans to make a vegetable stew and a curry, and Dahl this week so a few cheap cheerful no-oven, gluten free, vegan meals planned. 
Husband also went to dentist this week for the first time since pre-Covid life. This is conventionally a very expensive outing as he invariably needs something doing, however, this time, the dentist said he's teeth were excellent so just a cheap NHS check up fee to pay. Hooray. 
Plan for today is to book a long weekend away for the summer, but that can come out of the savings so I'm not going to sweat it. SO desperate for a holiday! 
Other nice thing is I've been giving/receiving bits and pieces from the local 'buy nothing' group on social media. Have given away some stuff that's been in the attic for a while plus some read books and some money-plant cuttings, and gained a pair of converse, some new cuttings, some unread books, some welly liners and 2 pairs of tights. 
Also - travelling by e-scooter to work (and nipping around the local area) which is free to NHS staff during lockdown, much more efficient than walking and more environmentally friendly than driving. Plus, quite fun. So that's been a rewarding development. 

Hope all's well.
Bb xx