F.I.R.E. Starter, the journey begins

savingholmes

Well done on your achievements so far. Regular money date nights should help with budgeting and buy in. Good luck with your new career goals

FIRE_starter

Thank you @savingholmes. I’m hoping the money dates will increase but in 🤞

A busy day at work after a week off and hopefully one of many more no spend days at work. Otherwise no news. Xx

FIRE_starter

Happy mother’s day to everyone! 🥰💐What a busy few weeks we’ve all had, I’ve not stopped. 

We started preparedness training in the hospital. I’ve  worked as a specialist nurse for the last year so was pleased to be refreshed ready to be drafted to the wards when needed. I’m very keen to do my part and work on the ward so as soon as I’m needed but I am very tearful and anxious. DH has asthma and my DD has been started on an inhaler at the beginning of the month so my fear is that they are at risk. Although DD is young only a toddler and DH is 35 works outdoors in a physical job so 🤞🤞

DH and I are both slightly overweight but active and eat a moderate diet. Dh goes on mountain biking weekend all year and I love to walk but this outbreak has given us a kick up the back side and I’ve taken my running back up (haven’t run with regularity since I was pregnant with dd) just want to be as fit and health as possible. 

I’m so pleased we’ve got a EF together this year, thank goodness with everything going on and DH being self employed without it we’d have had a terrible time this year. We think we will be around the 3k mark with saving, annual payment savings and EF by the end of the month so we can use each of those pots to get through this outbreak. Ideally we won’t  need to use annual payment or savings but these are exceptional times. 

I won’t be out of work so that money needs to cover DH if he has to stop work at some point during the outbreak. Work (he’s a subcontractor with the council doing round works) tell him there’s no need for work to stop as the office staff can work remotely and he works outdoors. I however think non essential work could be stopped and am trying to prepare. We could suspend saving and have obviously stopped socialising etc. so 3k will allow DH to have 2.5 months out of work.

We have also planned when DH work stops I can take overtime on to increase how long I our money will last. Then I’m  hoping after the outbreak work will resume as normal quickly. 

I hope everyone is well and looking after each other. We have sent letters with our contact details to the older people I know on the street. We’ve had nice responses back but no takers yet. 

Stay well xxx

FIRE_starter

Hi all, 
As planned we have taken our small amount of money out of premium bonds to prepare for the loss of work.

We were modelling our our plan on Dave Ramseys ‘baby steps’ we have completed step one £1000 EF and we’re working on step two - pay debt, when the outbreak has forced us to rethink and have decided to skip to step three - save a 3-6 months worth of outgoings in emergency fund. Now we won’t  get to complete that yet but we thought we should increase our fund to 3 months of dh portion of the outgoings as he’s the one to worry about work wise. Then we’ll hurry back to paying debt off. 

Both DS and DD have had a cough and a temp. this week so DH has been at home in quarantine with us - no work ☹️ It’s been really idyllic but it’s only week one 😂 I’ve managed to work from home answering patients calls and responding to emails so I am quite pleased I’m still able to help and this is a revelation working from home. Definitely pushing me to get on with my course and get to some work life balance. 

I hope you're all well

FS 

Savingtomove

We are aiming for FIRE too so going to subscribe to cheer you on.  Good luck in the coming weeks and thank you for looking after us all x

FIRE_starter

Hi all,

The cough and temperature ended up being chicken pox for DS and two weeks to the day later DD has it now too. 

I’ve been redeployed and I am now for the foreseeable future working in ITU. I have no ITU background but I am happy to help in anyway I can at this dreadful time. 

I feel so tired and so overwhelmed at the moment but just want to share some things that have really helped lift my spirts if you don’t mind a change of money saving topic. In my area we have local ladies and gents sewing headbands, scrub hats, wash bags etc for carers and I collected one wash bag today so I can take off my clothes and bung straight into a bag and all go into the wash once I’m home and secondly our hospital trust is distributing free fruit and veg and chilled meals that have been donated by local restaurants etc. to all the wards, ITU etc.  These are such generous acts of kindness and are so very appreciated. 

DH lost 10 days pay for isolation so those weeks pay or lack there of knocked the savings. 

Money wise DH who subcontracts for the council has been told that his work is ‘key work’ so will continue but with me now working shifts in with covid19 +ve patients albeit with PPE, we can no longer feel it is right to take the children to my parents. They do not have underlying health issues but neither do so many of the patients we see and my dad is in his late 60’s. The childcare plan is that Dh reduces his work by a day a week (Works four days has weekend + one day off a week) and therefore take a pay cut and I work my hours in his three days off a week. I think the pay cut is worth the peace of mind knowing we remove contact with my parents. 

We have decided to continue paying mortgage, loan and CC for the time being but to review again in two weeks. We would rather get in early on payment ‘holidays’. 

Has anyone self employed needed to claim for two weeks isolation? How does it work? Are people eligible? I wonder if there is any help for those two lost weeks. Any advice appreciated. 

I hope everyone else is well and staying safe. Xx

FIRE_starter

A little money update here:

loan £18,690
cc £5,488
EF £104
Rental property savings £1,500
Annual payments pot £1,264
Cash £65
Bonds £40 - I think, I need to check 
peer 2 peer £138

What I owe the world - what I have = £21,067

We made a 5 year plan. We decided our debt is so overwhelming that we need to let that do it’s thing and go down over the four years it is scheduled to while we have made a 5 year plan to buy a small rental property. We are saving £500 pm which is in income bonds which will give us £30,000 plus interest. This idea was born of the fear if we pay off debt faster but dh loses his job due to pandemic and the aftermath we would regret not having more savings. So no overpaying debt but saving all we can for now. I know this is backward as our interest on the loan is greater than our interest on the savings but for security at the money we’re going this way. 

Hope everyone is well. 

FS

FIRE_starter

Update of finances:
loan £17,355
CC £5048
EF £150 
Annual outgoings pot £300
Rental savings £3000
bonds £40 - still unconfirmed! 

P2P £142
cash £100
what we owe the world = £19,172

the rental savings have steadily gone but by £500pm however the outgoings have gone up with our daughter starting preschool but not entitled to the 30 hours free childcare until January so 4 x expensive months. Our son started school so we no longer get 30 free hours for childcare we had. That also compounded by the fact I cut my hours in October has meant we have had to nip into various savings pots.

I am feeling very good however that I will leave 2020 in a better position than I started. Debt has reduced and savings have increased! Next year we have even more planned and will focus a little more on debt repayment while continuing the 5 year rental property plan. 
Ill have a look at a more detailed plan before the heat is out. 

Hope you’re all well. 

FS

FIRE_starter

Long time away but back on it. We have a new plan which I think could just be possible of paying off all our debt in 2022. 

Loan £12,075
CC1 £4,691
CC2 £805
total debt £17,439

Currently we knock off £1,032 a month so we need to find an extra £553 a month. We have a holiday booked which is £417 payment a month for the first 5 months of the year so I think the second half will be easier to reach the extra £553. 

We have two kids so childcare costs. Family entertainment is mainly paid for for the year as we have booked the above abroad holiday and a couple of camping trips. We also have passes to some local days out so hoping for minimal big days out this year. 

My work is doing a winter pressures pay uplift 
(Extra £4 and hour) if you do overtime and my husband is on call over the winter - gritting so there is a little extra money coming in the next two months. Because of husbands on call I won’t get much overtime in but it will all count. 

Longer term plan is to buy a rental property but will need to save a significant amount of deposit to do this. We have another couple we plan on doing this with which will make it more achievable. 

Good luck with your own plans for 2022! 

Fire starter. 

FIRE_starter

Updated the signature with new figures. 

FS