There goes the first payment!

Bennettxoxo

Our very first mortgage payment has just been paid!

Did anyone else find the first payment being taken absolutely terrifying even though you didn't need to actually do anything?

Little bit about us. We are first time buyers, my partner and I are both 26 years old and we have purchased a 3 bed semi-detacted renovation project.

We have a mortgage of £121,500 fixed for 5 years at 2.44% with a term of 35 years :eek:

We do not want to be paying a mortgage until we are 61 but the long term does mean low monthly payments while we renovate but we need to get some overpayments in to bring that term down!

We are currently still living with parents while we renovate a few rooms but we're hoping to be in within 2 months, maybe? I have also started an instagram page for our renovation so if any of you want to see the devastation that is our home you can. IG: renovating.no.40

I have already started a few little challenges to try and motivate us to save some money and overpay while we are renovating like the joining the 2020 MFW and the 1% challenge. Our 1% target is £1215.00 so thats what I've added to the 2020 MFW thread. I've also joined the make £2020 in 2020 challenge in hope we can turn what we make into some overpayments and renovation funds.

Any support or advice will be greatly appreciated.


Signature has been updated so theres no going back now.

woodfired

Happy new diary Bennett!!

Congratulations on your first house, your plan sounds very sensible regarding the low payments whilst you renovate it.

I look forward to hearing all of your plans, exciting times ahead!

Bennettxoxo

woodfired wrote: »

Happy new diary Bennett!!

Congratulations on your first house, your plan sounds very sensible regarding the low payments whilst you renovate it.

I look forward to hearing all of your plans, exciting times ahead!

Thanks woodfired.

Very much looking forward to bringing that number down. The hard task will be making sure my OH is on board with the not spending money!

Bennettxoxo

The weekend came and went just way too quickly. Few more things got done at the house. The front bedroom ceiling has now been overboarded so there is no longer a hole and we have boarded the external wall. Almost looks like a new room! Bathroom has been completely ripped out and we've started to strip the paint off the stairs and window sills and frame. Still a long way to go.

Forgot to mention a couple of little things on on my original post.
We decided to start moving £30 at the beginning of every month away into another account that will be used to buy birthday/christmas gifts for our friends and family. Hopefully this will keep us from overspending as we've set a limit of £30 per present and anything we don't spend will be split between savings and our overpayment pot at the end of the year. Gift pot currently for January was £60.00.
And that we have a £3000 emergency fund saved up already that I would really, really like never to touch. The EF is now neatly tucked away in a current account I wasn't using so we won't be tempted to dip into it. Need to have a little look if there is another account I could move it to that could earn us a little interest.

I've started to do a weekly "tilly tidy" and I have moved my what I've earned so far this year from Prolific, OnePulse and Enlighty from Paypal to my current account and then split it in half. £16.86 into the savings pot and £16.86 into the overpayment pot.

I have already dipped into the gift fund and purchased a birthday present for my friend whos birthday is on Friday but only spent £20.59 out of the £30.00 so gift pot is now £39.41. Next birthday isn't until March so will have more added to it before we need to buy another gift.

Nothing more really to report today so I'd better finish my lunch and get back to work.

Bennettxoxo

Evening all.

I may have been a teeny bit naughty last night spending wise but I have done lots of money saving bits too to make up for it.

Positive money bits:
- Yesterday I opened up a new savings accounts with Coventry Building Society so I can take advantage of their 2.5% interest offer which I can move my emergency fund into. Can only move £500 a month so by the time I've moved all the money the 12 months will be up and I'll have to find somewhere else to put it. The savings account it's in currently is earning a measly 0.01% though so at last that will be better.
- I have just been to the shops and used my Nectar points to buy a meal deal for tomorrow's lunch because I'm on training. I would usually take lunch to work with me but since I won't be in my office, I won't be able to heat it up so hopefully buying my lunch before my training will stop me going out on the break and spending too much and either way, it didn't cost me anything. Money saving points to me.
- Just cashed out on PollPass (as I was writing this post). Another £3.00 so £1.50 is off to the overpayment pot and £1.50 to the savings.
- Done a couple of studies on Prolific today. £5.19 ready to cash out and another £5.75 waiting to be reviewed. Might wait for the other £5.75 to be approved and then cash it out all together.
- Very close to cashing out on OnePulse, ReceiptHog and Shoppix. Hopefully can do that this weekend and that will be around another £15 for the pot.

Negative money bits:
- I went to the pub last night for food and drinks with my besties. I did only spend around £15 and we don't see each other very often (we have a very dysfunctional friendship. We're all so busy we can go months without talking or seeing each other and then when we finally do, all the goss we've built up comes out.) so really it was a bit of a treat. Probably won't see them now until the end of March so i'll have time to save some money for our next catch up.

Tomorrow is tilly tidy day so I will sort that out when I am home from work and move to the overpayment pot.

I'm currently wondering how long it will be before the OH realises I haven't been sat here doing coursework like I said I would but am in fact reading through some diaries....

datlex

Congratulations. Definitely daunting the first ever payment going out to them. For me my first payments to my mortgage were actually over payments as I wanted to get in the habit of over paying as soon as I could. Now it is habit to pay extra.

Bennettxoxo

Hi datlex, thanks for stopping by. Very scary. I'm hoping they will get less scary as we go on. Do you have a diary too?

Been quiet on the MFW front although I have made a few little MFW decisions tonight.
1. Overpayments are going to paid on the 28th of every month.
2. £50 is going to be sent to the overpayment pot on the 1st of the month. Regardless of whether I am earned anything extra on surveys and what not, I am overpaying £50.00 at least!

Positive money bits:
- Coventry Building Society savings account is up and running and the recurring payment is sorted.
- Tilly tidy was also done for this week - £2.75 is split between the overpayment pot and savings.
- OH has begun making lunches to take to work instead of buying rubbish or visiting the work vending machine thus saving us a couple of pennies and I'm hoping he gets so into meal prepping he will offer to make both of us lunches when we finally move into the house.

Two more days to squeeze a little more into the overpayment pot if I can but it is currently standing at £78.83 :T

eastantrim4

Devastated that you gutted the bathroom - loved the colour!!!

Bennettxoxo

eastantrim4 wrote: »

Devastated that you gutted the bathroom - loved the colour!!!

Oh god no, I couldn't live with the blue!! :rotfl:

It just had to go. The snazzy blue toilet is staying put for now though so it's not completely gone.

Bennettxoxo

We did it! We made it to the 91st January aka payday! _party_

Today is also first ever overpayment day. Just shuffling the last few bits and pieces about before I send it off this evening.

Just cashed out on a few sites
Prolific - £6.89
OnePulse - £3.70
So half (near enough) to the overpayment pot, half to the savings.

I'm still waiting for the £3.07 from PollPass to hit my account and other studies from Prolific still haven't been approved :wall: so can't add that to the overpayment pot yet which is annoying unless it appears/gets approved before I send the overpayment tonight, it will have to go into next months overpayments.

I was going to move all my wage left from last month over to the savings like is did pre-mortgage but I need to buy a couple of things this week for the house reno so seems a little pointless to move it and then have to move it back.
Plus, I am still very much getting used to all these new bills coming out of our accounts and I'm a little scared to move things in case we get caught short because I've forgotten something. Might move whatever is left near the middle of the month, I should be safe by then.

Positive money bits:
- It's payday:j thats pretty positive.
- I have put my parking claim in at work to get my £3.90 back. Will probably hit my account middle of Feb once it's approved but that can go straight into the overpayment pot.
- I have left over pasta bake for lunch today so today will be a no spend day.
- Tonight I will finally set up my overpayment/budget spreadsheet so I can see where every penny is.

Overpayment pot currently stands at: £84.13 :T

themadvix

Bennettxoxo wrote: »

I was going to move all my wage left from last month over to the savings like is did pre-mortgage but I need to buy a couple of things this week for the house reno so seems a little pointless to move it and then have to move it back.
Plus, I am still very much getting used to all these new bills coming out of our accounts and I'm a little scared to move things in case we get caught short because I've forgotten something. Might move whatever is left near the middle of the month, I should be safe by then.
[\QUOTE]

Definitely agree that it's wise not to overstretch yourself at this point - however tempting OPing is! I know it took us a while to get into a position where we could OP - money for renovating had to come first! (And yes, all the bills are scary too!)