Rennovations and the price to pay..

Pengwern

Car insurance has been renewed at £100 less than last year. Not had any luck with other sales yet, I have 2 items listed and we will see what happens. We did however take the old copper piping from our house to the metal person and gained £123 for the hard work of cutting it up and sorting it out for them. I am also keeping a pile of the metal off cuts from the plasterers. Hopefully that will add a few more £ to the pile. Not much other CC debt news as the monthly payments are slowly being taken throughout the month. the frustrating thing is that our mortgage fixed rate ends at the end of the this month and the best deal we could get for the next 3 yrs has a higher interest rate. so that is another £50 per month to the mortgage.


We still have 2 rooms to finish in the renovations and I cannot wait for them to be done. I will feel that once the builders are gone I can crack on with paying down the debt and trying to save some money for the next rooms in the house. I will not start anything I cannot pay for in cash.


cc3 £5100
cc4 £2600
cc1 £2700
cc2 was £8200 now £7901
cc5 £9000

Moneyfordreams

All sounds like us... we bought an average house that we thought would need a kitchen and bathroom and some cosmetic work. £28k later (£17700 currently on cc :eek: ) We definitely had more motivation when we were younger. It seems twice as hard

Kitten868

Hello there,

I think you have the same mortgage provider as me. Starts with a H? They do have much lower rates but you have to go through a broker. I went through L&C who are free to use. It cost £999 (to the mortgage provider) which is just added to the mortgage and I've got 5 years fixed at 1.89% rather than the 2.89% mortgage I was offered and so definitely saving me money. Search for their intermediary mortgages on google and see if you can do the same.

Keep going xxx

Pengwern

Hi yes we did go through a broker, the thing is we have 3 mortgages with 1 out of sync with the other 2. So we are stuck with the current provider until we are able to tie them in together, this should happen at the end of the next 2yr deal. hopefully by then we will be in a better LTV bracket as well so will be able to shop around and get the best deal.


A few more things found to put up for sale but no luck actually selling them. Car seat still not listed, need to find the instructions.


Any ideas on old radiators, any value in the scrap or do I just take to the tip?
Current benefit is that I have just stoped paying nursey fees and only need after school club. I have reduced my childcare voucher amount to cover them plus a bit extra for holidays. So I am awaiting the end of the month to see how my extra I actually get in my pay. Not as much as I have reduced it by due to the tax and NI.


Yes remote_control I am not going to be able to pay any extra off the debt until all the renovation work is done. I have the plasterers finishing today, the paint is purchased and that is our job for the next week. the floors and radiators get fitted the week after. Then that is it for money to contractors. we still have a patio to lay but that can wait until next year when the weather gets better and I can see how much money if any I can spare. Just paid for the annual chimney sweep and had a load of logs delivered. I really need to factor those costs into my budget as I always forget about them. the only bonus is that I put £20 a week in an account for things like that. it stems from the days when I had a cleaner. When I cancelled them I saved the money instead and it has helped a lot. When I clean the house I look at the account balance to give me a boost. unfortunately it is not healthy at the moment due to those cost I just mentioned.


Off to an antique fair this weekend to see if I can pick up some original xmas presents that are not plastic.

Pengwern

Hi, managed to secure some lovely xmas presents that were not plastic and for super cheap prices. some lovely dessert forks to go with a backing cook book and a only wooden step for our house, amongst other things. it was lovely to get out and away from the building work.


Spent the weekend picking paint colours and cleaning up after the plasterers. A never ending job. I also managed to sand 1 out of 3 windows ready for painting. Its just a shame its still raining. Worktops are being fitted today if they ever show up, currently 1 hour late.


I put a few more items for sale, 1 is being collected tonight so that is an extra £10 to add to the top of the microwave (still not got a pot to keep the sales cash in!). Another supposed sale but they never showed up to collect. this is happening to me a lot at the moment. It makes me very annoyed, but I have now stopped going out of my way to make it easy to collect. they can collect when I am home, therefore if they do not show I have not been put out. I am also frustrated that some lovely wood that was too big to be stored undercover is now so water damaged that it is only good for firewood. it will be chopped up this weekend and put in the wood store to dry.


Another CC payment was made today


Still no boiler so our gas bill will be low this yr!


No spends on anything this weekend except the weekly food shop of £48. On Sat we had a party invite so my daughter was fed and I ate the leftover food!! Husband was fed at work. On Sunday the in laws fed us a Sunday roast so we did very well.

Pengwern

Quick head over to my diary to say they collected the insulation so I actually have an extra £10 in my virtual tin. No other progress to report I am afraid.


Just waiting for all the other cc payments to go through and I can then give you all an update on the new totals.


Plaster is slowly drying and we are digging a hole to enable the water main to be connected. that saves us a virtual £190 in a days labour.

Pengwern

Hello


So many people have not turned up to collect items they took time to ask questions about and arrange a time to collect. so frustrating. 1 person did show and brought some breeze blocks for £20 so some more money to add to the pot.


We dug the hole and I filled it in so 2 days labour at £190/day saved. This weekend we also moved 1000 bricks. They were an over order and by some luck we only have been changed for half of them. we have another renovation project to do that will make use of them. they were on our drive so causing a massive nuisance, so they needed to be moved out of the way. took the best part of 2 hours. Not something I want to do again.


a few more payments to cc have been made, but 1 left to go out at the last day of October. never too sure whether to count it in October or credit it to Nov. Anyway the sooner it goes the better it will be.


Still have no heating and the rate of progress with the flooring I cannot see us having any for another month. First frost last night and I really noticed that temp change.


We went out on Sat night and I drove, so we reduced our drinks bill and saved on a taxi. We have not brought alcohol from the supermarket for the best part of a month, I am beginning to notice the difference in spending that I make. I have also limited the no. of shops I do online at Sainsbury's. I have managed to carve some time to go to Aldi each week. it is hit and miss on the product quality as we are still finding out what we like, but generally very pleased and I am on average spending less. it helps as online you have a £40 min shop or you pay delivery. I usually top the shop up with non perishables, but it does impact the monthly average.


I currently have £100 in my account until I get paid, I am hoping that will be there for the next week as everything has been paid for this moth so far. Just what to do with it. Save it all into an accessible emergency fund or put it to one CC or a bit across all of them?

remote_control

With my money at the end of the month I pay it off the second smallest balance. I'm working on the smallest balance on the 1% challenge. This was when I get to the 1% challenge for the second smallest balance, it will be even smaller - if that makes sense!!

I hate no-shows on the sales!

Pengwern

Hi

I like that idea remote_control think I will do something similar. I think I will pay it off the cc that ends not the soonest but the next one. It is a smaller balance and I worked out it will still have £500 when the 0% ends. So if I can send any extra I can then hopefully be closer to zero and could just about pay it off rather than looking for another balance transfer.

Electrican did not show today coming Thursday now! I need power to get my boiler working, well I also need the tank installed too. Hopefully we will be slightly closer on Thursday to heating and hot water.

I am also hoping someone will want the dozens of pallets we have, with bonfire night soon I was hopeful they would go.

I spend £15 at Aldi this weekend I’m trying to make it last the week. Looks possible but it will be tight. That means I have only spent £140 on food this month which is amazing.

SusieT

Pengwern wrote: »

I am also hoping someone will want the dozens of pallets we have, with bonfire night soon I was hopeful they would go.

If you are buying logs for a wood burner, why not cut up the pallets for that? they are great for splitting and using to get it going when its gone right down. Its only the blocks that have nails in, and those can be removed when its split - or do what I do and use the wood and take the nails out of the ashes!