The "Save 12k in 2020" Thread!

Wentthedaywell?

geoffers4 said:

Hi everyone, June has been pretty quiet of course so that all helps the saving figures - reporting a healthy £2357.29 for June therefore. July should be a decent figure too...although does anyone else find themselves dreaming about going out for a pub lunch??
Happy saving everyone, and well done Lomcevak on mortgage-free!

Oooh yessss! Being semi-retired, quiet mid-week country pub lunches are a big perk. I'm salivating just thinking of a homemade pie or a giant ploughman's   Or poshe fine dining somewhere fancy; I'm getting so bored of homemade grub! 

Lomcevak

KeepOnKnitting said:

Congratulations @Lomcevak . Any words of advice for someone on the other end of the mortgage journey?

For me, the thing that really worked was keeping the monthly payments the same and making it all automatic. So when we started the monthly payment was around £1250 a month and I added another standing order for a £250 overpayment (I've rounded the numbers a bit, but you get the idea) which was about what we could afford. Within a couple of months the £1500 felt like the normal payment and I stopped even noticing it, and even though I wasn't doing big overpayments, it  builds up. Then I forgot about it for five years. When we then remortgaged, the monthly payment had dropped from £1250 to £695 (combination of payments and lower interest rate) so I made the standing order overpayment £805. Outgoings still £1500 a month, but the OP much bigger. Then for last two years the regular payment was £280, and overpayment was £1320. That really started to chew into the remaining balance. If there had ever been an emergency I could have cancelled the standing order and just dropped to the required payment, but fortunately I never had to.

Throughout I supplemented with some additional overpayments here and there, including some relatively large ones towards the end (avoiding lifestyle inflation when my salary increased was another really important thing for me), but that monthly standing order did more than half the work. 

One important disclaimer though, paying off the mortgage usually isn't the best investment for most people, and I only made overpayments after addressing pension and S&S ISA contributions. Do it as part of a bigger plan

Good luck!

(I did actually increase the initial £250 standing order to £600 after a couple of years, but explaining it was complicated enough without adding that bit    )

Gizmo70

Gizmo70 said:

#25 reporting in for June (form submitted). This month I managed to save £978 (mainly due to some dividend payments). July shouldn't be too bad but I am expecting August and September to be fairly poor months for saving due to various upcoming insurance payments. Still job hunting but market seems fairly flat.

I somehow managed to put a July bill in against June, so I actually saved £1,065. Updated form submitted.

kev2009

Hi,
#003 declaring £500 for July.
I have submitted the form also.
Many thanks
Kev

Betharooni

#6 declaring savings of £1,673.67 for June so total now £7,651.88/15,000.00.

This was my best month savings-wise, helped by the fact that I paid off my outstanding car finance debt and got final direct debit payment returned. I’m over the moon that I’m over halfway to my savings target at the halfway point of the year and will have an extra £200ish per month to add to my savings going forward. 

Sat down to work out what I’m planning for my finances for the rest of the year and am now feeling excited to see if I can achieve the things I want.

Am on annual leave for the next two weeks so planning to sort out some items to sell. Aiming to get a load of stuff sorted out at home so hoping for a very frugal couple of weeks.

Update form sent.

B x

dd95

Lomcevak said:

KeepOnKnitting said:

Congratulations @Lomcevak . Any words of advice for someone on the other end of the mortgage journey?

For me, the thing that really worked was keeping the monthly payments the same and making it all automatic. So when we started the monthly payment was around £1250 a month and I added another standing order for a £250 overpayment (I've rounded the numbers a bit, but you get the idea) which was about what we could afford. Within a couple of months the £1500 felt like the normal payment and I stopped even noticing it, and even though I wasn't doing big overpayments, it  builds up. Then I forgot about it for five years. When we then remortgaged, the monthly payment had dropped from £1250 to £695 (combination of payments and lower interest rate) so I made the standing order overpayment £805. Outgoings still £1500 a month, but the OP much bigger. Then for last two years the regular payment was £280, and overpayment was £1320. That really started to chew into the remaining balance. If there had ever been an emergency I could have cancelled the standing order and just dropped to the required payment, but fortunately I never had to.

Throughout I supplemented with some additional overpayments here and there, including some relatively large ones towards the end (avoiding lifestyle inflation when my salary increased was another really important thing for me), but that monthly standing order did more than half the work. 

One important disclaimer though, paying off the mortgage usually isn't the best investment for most people, and I only made overpayments after addressing pension and S&S ISA contributions. Do it as part of a bigger plan

Good luck!

(I did actually increase the initial £250 standing order to £600 after a couple of years, but explaining it was complicated enough without adding that bit    )

amazing work! would you recommend overpaying on a house likely to be sold in 8-10 years or save it for the 'forever'home?

Sandyra

Thanks for the advice @Lomcevak , this is what I'm doing so its good to hear it paid off for you, once my student loan is gone I can add that too. Congratulations again, I said it before on the MFW forum but it doesn't hurt to say it again.

Karen's_girl

# 48 declaring £200 for July.....

marycanary

Hello
No 17 reporting £1000 for June. I owe many thanks to slowlyfading for organising this thread and doing all the hard work. It keeps me focused on saving when I could quite easily get sidetracked onto spending, even in lockdown.

Jami74

Finally a better month! Combination of help-to-save bonus, RBS bonus, updated tax code, a little bit of interest and some overtime gives me a cash balance increase of £2,124.64. It's unlikely I'll make my target this year but it is already more than I've ever managed to save before