Crunchy pays off the loan early, and other stories

crunchy_time

Hi all!

It’s been a while! I have started an instagram handle for this journey too and it’s hard to juggle the two.

Quick update. 

Husband got paid today. Money shuffle done! October was spendy but November will be better. So far £675 in big spends pot. Expecting a spend of £330 soon and my car MOT at end of nov. But another £600 at end of nov if we don’t chip into this money. Once these are sorted we will split this big spends pot into cars, house maintenance and improvements and emergency fund. That’s the target over the next 2-3 months. 

Planning a frugal Christmas. We have one non believer now which makes it better in term of expectations.

will try and be better at updating xx

ohdearhowdidthathappen

What's your IG handle, will take a look

crunchy_time

ohdearhowdidthathappen said:

What's your IG handle, will take a look

I will private message you! X

crunchy_time

Evening all! And happy Friday!

Gosh it feels like ages since I last checked in with my diary. Lots to report.

- Husband has had another promotion to a role he is very excited about. 

- I’ve had a slight cost of living pay rise which landed into my account today as it is pay day - £582 extra this month. I think this means I am now on £17300 ish per year before tax but I won’t know for sure until dec pay. The £582 is back dated to April.
- The £582 windfall is split equally into 3 lots of £194 - savings/debt/house.
- I have already spent £150 on house stuff in the Black Friday sales to make our living room more comfy and a light for our study as well as a duvet cover for our son because the other one is too babyish (bought 5 years ago).
- My car is booked in for MOT next week then we need to save £330 for Ed psych assessment and then we can start our pots thing. I want £500 in the bank as an emergency fund and then we save £100 each month into the following pots emergency(until it gets to £1k then stop)/car/house. 
- Anything extra in the month goes towards debt first port of call is the credit card 2 which we are hoping to get rid of by the time the 0% ends in April.
- Hopefully husband will get a bonus in dec and that will pay off the sofa loan meaning we can chuck the extra £40 at credit card two as well. 

- Husband and I are going to chip away at home improvements where we can but the main thing is getting the credit card two paid off ready for what ever increase we have for our mortgage this time next year.
- Next years holiday plans are two uk cottage holidays we need £375 a month for which is very achievable. Will start saving for these next month.
- We have one week left in our budget and I think we are going to be ok. 

We’ve gone back to online food shopping for time and helping us to budget. It’s not perfect but it’s one thing less to do at the weekend.
- I’ve started running again and am aiming for a half marathon next year.

Savings are now £2389
Credit card 2 is £1774
Credit card 1 is £5239
Loan is £9828
Sofa loan is £250

So so far so good xx

crunchy_time

Evening all!

Football is on. Gin in hand. Friday has arrived and it’s a pay day Friday as well! 

I’ve just completed the money shuffle. I’m ashamed to say that we were about £250 over our food budget this month mainly due to husband using his credit if he bought anything therefore me not keeping proper track. Frustrated. This month I am sticking to online food shops. I don’t mind if it’s goes £50 over but £250!!!!! 

My car MOT was only about £40! Considering I have had it only a year (although it’s 7 years old) and spent £1500 on it already I’m pretty pleased.

I have planned out Christmas now so just need to pay for it. Keeping it as cheap as possible. The children’s lists were a lot more reasonable than last year! 

Other good news is that we have finally paid off our epic holiday from the summer so we can start saving for our two uk cottage holidays next year!! Of course this will cost us less money so we will have a bit more to play with for debt pay offs. 

Crunch x

crunchy_time

Yay! Just looked at my nutmeg account and our savings are now just shy of £3000 which is 1 month of emergency fund for us! This would be enough to cover all of our direct debit bills and debts if one of us was to lose our job or to be completely honest, if husband was to lose his job. 

Our aim is to save up three months of this which all being well we should achieve by the end of 2024.

Husband has also just got off the phone to put solicitor and our legal issue is worse than we thought. It is likely that we will be paying more fees in the future. Although the issue is not our fault so we shouldn’t really. Can’t really say anymore than that.

Crunch x

ohdearhowdidthathappen

All looking good crunchy.  Sounds like we're on similar tracks, trying to save emergency funds, pay off lingering debts and put pots away for the coming year.  We're doing 2 UK cottage holidays too this year and aiming to save around the £350 a month mark
Lovely news on the pay increases, it all helps!

crunchy_time

ohdearhowdidthathappen said:

All looking good crunchy.  Sounds like we're on similar tracks, trying to save emergency funds, pay off lingering debts and put pots away for the coming year.  We're doing 2 UK cottage holidays too this year and aiming to save around the £350 a month mark
Lovely news on the pay increases, it all helps!

It does sound like that!  Nice to have someone to follow with similar goals and mindset.

I think we are planning to save £375 a month. 

Crunch xx

crunchy_time

More news from the Crunch camp!

Husbands Christmas bonus figure is.

£8k!!! By the time it’s 40% taxed though it would be £4800. Enough to pay off the sofa loan and smaller credit card as well as put some money in savings.

Feeling very grateful for this. I thought it might be about £2k tops but this will set us up for next year and perhaps change our strategy for next year as well. Husband and I are going to sit down this weekend and look at our spreadsheet again.

Crunch xx

enthusiasticsaver

 Great news on the bonus.

The legal issue is a pain though. 

Having a cheaper year holiday wise sounds sensible.