Diary of a reformed shopaholic (I hope)

GeorgianaCavendish

I've tried YNAB a few times and there are some good things about it, but I find that level of budgeting stresses me out (and then triggers my spending habits! and I prefer to have broader categories with a bit more flexibility from my own spreadsheets. There are a lot of YouTube videos on the YNAB channel though, I still found those helpful for general financial tips even though I'm not using the platform. 

shoppingobsessed2020

Awww I love my parents.  They’ve just sent me a new water bottle as I was moaning that all my travel cups taste of coffee as my lovely husband hasn’t cleaned them out properly when he’s used them.  I’ve miltoned them I just can’t get rid of the taste of coffee  

had a complete lazy day today just looking and planning.  I still can’t get online with the bank to change the mortgage so I’ve phoned them and awaiting a call back.  This is a huge one as it’s a £80 a month saving, so I really need to do it sooner rather than later especially as we are within the 3 months window to change deal early without penalty.

I still have not tidied the garage and I really should get off my behind and do it. I had a look at my sky bill today as it was more than I was planning.  Movies from when dh was home have been charged!  I’ve changed the pin code so now when he’s home he can’t buy films without my asking.  Did the same on amazon just to be on the safe side.

Having a ponder, next wage for me is going to be on the low side again due to having been signed off and only getting ssp.  Not an issue as we have been managing financially due to no clubs and things for monkey boy.  I also get paid every 4 weeks so 13 pay days for me as opposed to dh 12 and I budget on 12 pay days.  So really we have a bonus month once a year with 2 pay days in it.  This actually falls in November this year so nice bonus in time for Christmas and monkey boys birthday.  This takes some of the pressure off this year as although I know it should go to debt payment, it means I’m covered for monkey boy birthday and Christmas without having to budget.  I’ll still reduce my spend but it means I’m not completely penny pinching and it will pay for my annual Christmas night out with friends.  I don’t go out often but it’s an easy £100 plus when i do go out, if we go out together it’s even more as usually that’s a weekend away.  Not had one of them for a while but last one was London and that was an easy 1k but did include concert tickets and transport.   Taxis, meal, drinks are not cheap when a cocktail is £7/8 in most places now.  Looking at my bank I actually spent £130 on my last night out!  That was with a lift into town and no babysitter.  This year I’m going to need a babysitter so my drinking will be reduced as I don’t like being in charge of monkey boy drunk so will only have a few.  

my pondering and I’m going with if it’s me contemplating this then is it really a good idea, is requesting once the mortgage is sorted a payment holiday on the £450 loan for 2 months.  I would then use the £900 over 2 months to clear part or all of a high interest card  What’s the general consensus?  

My plan is may pay day to clear the approx £375 capital one balance then close the account.

june pay day when pay back to normal is to clear the very and part of the tsb account.  Very account would then be closed.

July I want to clear the tsb account then work on the next account.  

Next and tsb accounts will be kept open.  Next for clothes shopping and tsb so I can have a card for emergencies and planned purchases over £100 but to be paid in full each month.  Will keep the next card locked in the safe so it’s not in my purse day to day.

ideally I want the next, very, Debenhams, capital one and tsb cleared by Christmas.  I think that’s a reasonable goal and can then hammer either the Barclays or mbna cards.

shoppingobsessed2020

Just checked parent pay and there is approx £250 in there between breakfast club, tea club and lunches.  What a bonus that is.  That’s 4 weeks of lunches paid for when schools as back ( it’s already split into sub accounts) 5.5 weeks of breakfast club and 8 weeks of tea club, well only 8 weeks of tea club if I carry on using just 1hr a day.

I’m going to send a little money to parent pay every pay day for the next couple of months so that I can always be a couple of months ahead and when the country returns to normal I can then be comfortably just paying 4 weeks at a time which is £40.25 a week for breakfast club, lunch and 1hr of tea club.  Woohoo one area of my life where I am organised and ahead of the game!

i like to keep some extra on the general parent pay account and not a sub category as it means school trip money is then paid for with no issues which is why there’s £250 allocated to childcare in my budget yet looking at it in depth I can work out what I need for the entire year and reduce that amount.  I’d like to pay the same amount all year round so that it’s a reduced expense.

shoppingobsessed2020

Ok I think I just need to pay £135 a month to parent pay every dh pay day.  That’s saving nearly half what I currently pay a month just by working out the exact figure.  I’m an idiot for not doing this sooner!

Drawingaline

Sounds like some grand plans. 

Can you get a payment holiday on the loan? I took one with mine last month, but I am allowed two a year anyway. Then the bank contacted me and offered two extra months if I needed it. Is it a low interest rate? Remember it will still charge interest during the payment holiday, but maybe look at how much it charges per month compared with the cc to make sure it works. It's the kind of thing I would probably do, just to reduce the number of debts I had, pay off a few of the small cards/accounts, get m closed and roll the payment into a bigger card. 

shoppingobsessed2020

I have no idea what the interest rate is off the top of my head.  I know it’s high and I know there’s approx £40 a month being charged in interest.  I need to do the calculations properly but my plan is to wait till I’ve sorted the mortgage.  I don’t want to do anything with any payment holiday till the mortgage is sorted.  I’m absolutely terrified of getting told no we can’t switch mortgage deal due to our high level of debt.  This is one of the main reasons we are staying with the same provider as I believe they don’t credit check when swapping deal especially as we are not changing the term.  the other reason is I can’t actually be bothered as when we were looking for mortgages originally it had to manually go via the under writers due to dh tax situation as the computer doesn’t handle no tax very well.

i have potentially freed up £200 a month when the mortgage deal changes and by reducing what I pay to parent pay.  Then there is the £250 mortgage overpayment which I can’t stop unless I go to the bank with my poa documents.  I am hopeful that as the poa is registered for the mortgage they can just transfer that across to dh account and I can stop the standing order that way.  Again I don’t want to change this until the mortgage switch has happened.

if all else fails I’m just going to be really naughty and log on using dh log ins.  I’m not supposed to as I should have my own poa log ins but didn’t see the point setting them up as I work city centre and have always just been able to pop into the branch to sort anything out.

Hurry up and let the mortgage deal switch happen so I can do an amended soa.  I want to start blasting this mess and a potential extra £450 a month will make huge inroads into paying things off.

the only thing is I don’t want to stop over paying the mortgage.  I like at the moment that we are covering the interest and slightly more with the overpayment so our main payment is coming off the capital but I KNOW that the £250 would be better off servicing a much smaller individual debt on a higher interest rate.

I don’t even know when our debt free date is at the moment.  That’s terrible, I’m hazarding a guess at 5yrs not taking into account any pay rises or promotions or bonuses (this years just went on a card which sucks as usually it goes on something for the house) although the sooner he gets promoted the better as that will make a huge difference to our debt free date.  I then just need to juggle the cost of his next qualification without actually increasing the debt but I don’t see that happening as i think at a minimum we are looking at 5k for that.  Although once he has that there’s no more big ones to pay out for.  I just need him to be on board with this and stop spending when he’s home.

shoppingobsessed2020

A miracle has happened.  Ive cut the grass myself!  I’ve still maybe a fifth of the back garden to do (whirly gig is full of washing) but I’ve left the lawn mower out and will do it once the washing is dry and in.  Just saved myself £25 by not getting the gardener to do it and it was so much easier than the last time I attempted it.  Ok I was 5 months pregnant with spd when I last attempted the grass so wasn’t the best decision I had made.

i emailed the bank through the website last night as I’m fed up of not getting on to sort the mortgage out.  Now have a phone appointment at 11am tomorrow.  Bit of a pain as it will take a couple of hours when I know what we want to do but it will mean it gets done and sorted.

just got to dig out the mortgage paperwork and bits ready tonight.  Will make monkey boy a packed lunch so he can grab it when he’s hungry rather than asking me and interrupting me. He’s generally very good like that and will stay out the way of I’ve got an important call.

in other news today’s been a no spend day, I have to amend my grocery shop that’s due this weekend as a neighbour wants a few bits (she will square up with me when she gets her items so I don’t mind ordering) and I need to pack as monkey boy is going to my parents to stay on Monday.  

We have all been isolating but I have to go into the office next week and every week for a couple of things that can’t be done from home and with monkey boys asthma I can’t risk him getting covid as it would be a hospital admission and we have enough of those without dealing with covid (unfortunately where I work there are covid cases so even though I can do most of my work from home there’s just a few things I physically need to be in the office for)

its not ideal and it’s upsetting as he won’t be back with me for a good few weeks possibly even more depending how things go but he will have a blast at my parents house as he’s been missing their hot tub and the dogs.  He usually spends most of the school holidays with my parents but I generally join them a few nights a week for dinner unless they take him on holiday. Thankfully my parents are not in any risk categories and are relatively young grandparents (they had me in their teens) so can happily keep up with the demands of monkey boy.

to be honest he will have more fun with them than he would here as they have the space for him to go play outside and run round and not see anyone and we don’t have that luxury here.

I know it’s not ideal with him switching households but for us it makes the sense.  ill Have to postpone my costco trip now till after he has gone to stay with them and I’ll just have to leave their shopping by the garage so they can safely get it.  I’ve never not seen him for more than a few days so this is going to be one hell of a roller coaster.  It’s me and the cat as of next week till who knows when.

shoppingobsessed2020

A flip, not a no spend day.  I caved and ordered Chinese!  However it is in mse fashion. a neighbour asked if we wanted anything so as to meet the minimum
delivery spend. I caved and ordered monkey boy sweet and sour chicken and rice.  £7.50 which is much more treatable.  

That’s actually something I’ve noticed all our neighbours doing.  Offering to get things when they are out or getting a delivery however this is the 1st time we’ve had Chinese delivered as a group. Really loving this community that we live in, it’s bringing out the best in everyone.

shoppingobsessed2020

Fail on the mortgage front.  There were technical difficulties.  Now booked for next Friday instead of she can’t get it working on the next 20 mins.

gutted but it won’t make that much difference as wont start till June’s payment.  Just means more delaying and I don’t want to redo my soa without the up to date figures

shoppingobsessed2020

Looked at the contracts.  One is a sim
only plan for £14.40 a month.  Unlimited mins, texts and 12gb data.  We
use 6gb - 9gb of data on this phone so can’t really downgrade.  I can lower it by 40p a month but means committing to a 24 month contract so I’m ok with staying on a rolling contract at that cost.  Annoyingly I can’t get onto dh mobile account as needs a text to his phone with a security code.  I don’t think his is horrific.  Now to go look at the sky mobile contract.  That’s a new one so is the £40 a month cost.  Dh uses the phone and monkey boy has the sim.