SLLM (Single Lady Large Mortgage)

Sistergold

Dear Ladies
I am quite glad that this week is coming to an end as it has been a bit more stressful than normal. Mr Ex played up with regards to picking up the children and as always he communicated with the children to give an impression that it was me refusing that he picks them up. Well I guess that’s why we are divorced we probably just easily rub each other the wrong way? 

Well when we were having the argument I kind of came to the conclusion that something else was stressing him and he was just thinking he can take it out on me? I think there is trouble in paradise as last year he married another wife(who is living in another country🧐) well we will be watching that space! 🤫. We had agreed he will pick up the children end of week and suddenly he wanted to pick them up midweek giving me 1 to 2 days notice to which I said no. Already when he asked to pick them up for the weekend as he said he missed them as he has not seen them for weeks since beginning of lockdown I offered that in-fact he could have them for one week to a month as long as he made sure they did their school work. Now for him to turn around to say I was not cooperating was quite surprising. Anyway he has always been a funny one that one so I will not bother with him. 

On the mortgage front everything is going well. I got a call from The WestBrom to say since I am making frequent overpayments I need to call them once I go over £999 as that will mean they need to discus with me so as to recalculate my mortgage as to either reduce term or reduce monthly payment. So I then concluded that I will make OPs which don’t exceed the £999 so that I don’t need to make a call each month. So have now set up payment of £85 per week and also payment of £300 per month making an average of £668 per month which will cover the daily interest of about £600 without exceeding the £999 per month. I can then mortgage sweep whenever without going over this limit. 

Going over the £999 will not incur penalties but it will need a call for recalculation. I prefer to make a call for recalculations once or twice a year when I pay a bigger lump sum OP. 

I feel very happy to have joined the OP bandwagon. It’s difficult to start but it gets easier with time as the excitement builds up. I feel really challenged when I read other people’s MFW journeys and what they have done to attain their goals. One thing I will need to do that I have never done in my life is budget a bit. I can not say I am reckless with money but I have never really bothered to sit down and budget! I have never really sat down to see exactly where money goes to as such all I check is that no one is spending on my account. I kind of work on a needs basis, so like when I needed to save for deposit I focussed on that and I did go through some kind of no spends in areas which are not critical. Since buying the house I have just cut down spend in certain areas like eating out but not by allocating a budget, but it was to do with the number of times we ate out. 

I don’t really have a figure of what I need to spend on food I kind of just buy what I want. I don’t even know how much I do spend on food? 🤔 with wanting to OP I am now a bit more aware that I should save more. All my working life I just spend according to what I have, I do save but I guess I could have saved more. I have never had debt I could not or have struggled to pay. I have always worked more so as to spend what I thought I needed to spend for how I have lived. 

I have now matured a bit more since I joined MFW and have now really worked on increasing my OPs and also increasing my savings. I have not started to allocate monthly allowance for different things but at least I am doing certain things first before I can spend and so if I then don’t have the money left I just go on a no spend in certain areas. At present when I get paid for past two months I have straight away sent certain amounts to savings thereby making less available to spend. I have then made sure if money is finished in my current account I just don’t move money from savings without thinking. The money I am saving I have put it in a different account which I don’t look at regularly so as to create an impression of not having money! This I hope will help me save more? 

With time I am sure one day I will sit down and do a budget. ✍🏼

For now I will continue reading other peoples stories for motivation and see how I can spend less. 

Xx

Sistergold

Reflections for today
I just love viewing properties on Rightmove but I also like checking out house prices on Zoopla. I like to see what is stated on there as current house price for my house and for my street.
When I made my offer on my house the estimation on Zoopla was quite within reason and as a single woman that’s all I could rely on to even gauge if the property I was wanting to buy was not overpriced. I know many comment are that Zoopla is not reliable but hey a lady has to use something just to check? In my street there is under 10 and the houses hardly go on sale so I could not really use previous sales to check trend. 

After offer and during conveyancing process for some reason Zoopla started showing a downward trend in their estimation for my house and that was a bit worrying. I guess it was all the brexit issues and whatnot but hey I don’t know. I have not been on it much but I do check once in a while and there has again been an upward trend which was pleasing. At present the price estimates are holding up on Zoopla which is pleasing(false comfort but comforting all the same don’t you think?). 

So as of now the value of my house has gone up an average estimate of £60k! The lower estimate is £23k above my purchase price and upper estimate is £93k above my purchase price and thus giving the £60k average 👏🏾 . 

I am just keeping an eye just hoping that maybe I can be on a better LTV next year in May when my discounted product runs out. I have read where people talk about negative equity and so on and I am just keeping my fingers crossed that it will not come to that for me at remortgage time as this affects interest rate band. I am hoping that between some appreciation(hopefully), plus overpayments I can be in a better LTV band thus getting me a better deal? With this appreciation amount I am also hoping that worst case will be that at remortgage my house is valued at my purchase price so that at least my OPs will then still cause a better LTV. Will see. 

When all is said and done I am just hoping that nothing drastic happens in the area of house prices dropping due to COVID-19 but if come remortgage time if my LTV has gone down I will have deal with it at the time. For now to give myself a better chance of a better LTV I guess OPs are the way to go. 

Conclusion 
I know Zoopla can not be relied on but for my house it has been reasonable at giving a fair indication of house price. I just use it to give a hint but I am not putting all my hopes on it. 

Questions 

How is Zoopla estimation for you? 

Is it out or has it been able to give you a fair estimate so far if compared to properties selling in your area? 

Does anyone else like checking out house prices from time to estimate what their house might be worth? 

Xx

Sistergold

Living in the “Dark Ages”
Morning laddies 
I hope you are enjoying your weekend so far? In my parts of London today it is overcast so far and I am not sure if I will get even a glimpse of the sun today? 

As I mentioned the other day I registered with the WestBrom for their automated service. This is supposed to be a 24hour service which you can use to check on your mortgage stats. Well as it is they don’t have a proper online facility for me to monitor my mortgage but with this I am at least supposed to be able to check current monthly payment, current interest rate, and mortgage balance. 

One thing I have found though is most of the time this service does not work and it will tell me that their offices are closed if it’s after hours and if it in hours you then have to talk to an adviser? I am like what’s the point of an automated system if you then need to talk to an adviser and it can not work after hours? I can already tell I am going to be living in the dark ages with the WestBrom. They really don’t want me to be on top of my mortgage! The automated service when it works it does not even give you an option to make a payment for that you have to call another number! That number sometimes does not work outside their opening hours too? 

Ladies is there anyone else who is banking with a bank which is stuck in the “dark ages” with no online facility to talk about? Have you been frustrated about it or it does not bother you? Is it me just being fussy? 

Anyway after talking to an adviser today my balance is £472432.80

Sistergold

Evening reflections 
Today has been a good day spending wise. This is because any other time with the way I was just feeling lazy to do anything I would have gone on and ordered take aways or eat out. But hey I didn’t do all that instead I went to Sainsburys and bought some McCain chips, sweet potato chips, mr Kipling’s angel slices, lettuce, cucumber, spinach, strawberries, bananas, bread and crisps etc.

Spent about £30 went home and grilled some pork chops and we all had our dinner with chips and salad. So money saved I guess as the shopping had extras which will last over a few days. 
If I carry on like this the rest of the month I hope to have some good money left over for savings! 

XX 

Sandyra

Hi SG 👋🏾

I hope you managed to get it sorted with your ex. WestBrom sounds like a nightmare , I can't fault Santander. In fact I only recently been going online to do my OP, as I did via the app (oh actually what is annoying as you don't have the same capability on the app as the website). You click OP, one-off or regular, I do one-off so they don't change my monthly payments, they give you the option to reduce term/ monthy payment side by side with the interest savings. I love going in and put in a tentative value to see which amount will knock of a month.

I never really budget, I guess I'm just cash conscious, just like you, if I need to do something I save for it. My expenses all go on my Amex card, so I know if I have a cheap month or an expensive month. Talking about credit score, mine has gone down due to a. opening a few accounts - TSB, NatWest for cashback, N&SI and Marcus fixed for savings and b. for not spending much on my credit card, which is obvious in the current climate. I get my frugality from my mum and my expensive taste from my dad 😬. I have been very very naughty 🤦🏾 and bought a designer handbag, my first purchase to myself since lockdown. I have literally only spent my money on savings, bills, mortgage and OP. But I have given myself a goal to be get my LTV down to 75% approx £230,000 and have £20,000 in savings by the end of the year.

Going off Zoopla, makes me weary, they have my nextdoor's neighbour flat on at £10k more than mine, even though my flat sqm is larger, I saw them all before purchasing. But if I do, that.s £25k! great but a tad optismistic. I spend most of my days checking on Rightmove for dream houses  I'm finding in regards to lockdown, is it is saving me tons of money. Cooking at home, no meals out, has seen my costs come down loads. I had never shopped in Aldi before, it has cut my food shopping bill in half. 

Sandyra

HelloB

I happened on this thread by chance. Boy am I glad I did!

I read through 8 pages worth and impatiently I just want to chime in to say how incredibly strong and resilient you all are. It gives me inspiration that single women (whether by choice or otherwise) are actively taking control of financial independence.

And to the OP, this diary style musing is fab during lock down. Keep it up and power to you on keeping it all together with 4 kids.

Sistergold

@Sandyra 👋🏾
You know I do envy you being with Santander!? You are so lucky and oh well when you talk about it it’s like you are taking me back to the good old days! Santander online facility truly is a marvel and girl you are so lucky just make sure at remortgage time you don’t wonder around and find yourself joining some of us who are living in the woods of “who knows what is happening to my mortgage “? Truly I am in the dark with it all and anything I do seems “illegal” as it seems to need to pass through the headmistress(advisor) well you can tell I feel like a school child again when I should really feel like a mature lady in full control of her finances 24/7? Maybe this will be what will spur me on to pay it all off sooner, this constant annoyance?! Lol this will still take some time to pay off though so 🤔? 

All along I have also not been an Aldi or Lidl person myself. Living with ex I know he used to shop there a lot but for me every time I went there I used to be put off by queues. Well when I started reading diaries on here and saw that most comment about the reasonable prices I had to start looking at committing to shopping at either Lidl or Aldi. With the Aldi I have been to once and just could not get on with their range. Maybe the branch I went to is not as big as I could not quite do a complete shop? I then started shopping at Lidl during lockdown and it seemed a more complete shopping experience. I have been shopping mostly at Lidl now but the problem is I have a local Sainsbury and I end up going there for unplanned shopping this is like “oh let me hurry before shop closes” and I end up spending quite a bit to buy milk, potatoes, bread, rice to be honest by the end of the month I would have spent a lot from this short notice shopping! I need to be more organised and disciplined I guess but I am better than before lockdown for sure. The lucky thing is for me both Lidl and Aldi are are no further than Tesco, big Sainsburys, and Morrison’s. Only thing is I have a local Sainsburys(small Sainsburys) just so close to me I end up not going to the big shops! 

Yes you are right about Zoopla it’s a hit and miss for sure even in my road all our house have such a wide price range and price differences with mine being the lowest range but then of all houses my own has not been extended. I also think some people are good with registering improvements which I think boosts up their property value thus creating discrepancies? Even with the price differences in my road I have found that I think the value will be somewhat in that estimated range? I also feel that the other houses which are all more expensive according to Zoopla estimation are fairly so as they have extensions which I don’t? 

75% LTV is a good target for sure! I was hoping to get to 60% before remortgage time (May 2021) but the calculator told me that will not be possible (need to OP by about £40k) but at next remortgage I should have passed that if I am lucky I hope to be approaching 50% LTV? 

With regard to Mr Ex well he is still being himself relying on the fact that he can get away with bad behaviour as I will have to budge for the sake of the children. I had insisted that he will need to apologise before any further discussion but he is refusing as he knows the children will be upset if I don’t allow them to see him. Last night I could hear my son cry in his bed and I think it’s because we have not confirmed their visit. My problem is my Ex is so disrespectful and has a very short temper and I avoid talking to him but I have to talk to him as there are children. I have tried to insist on communication only by email but he insists on phone calls at which point our interactions easily get out of control? On the phone he can be abusive as there is no record. This time I insisted that he will not get away with upsetting me without regard but I now might just let it go so that the children go and see him. The Children just think he is a great dad and I guess he is to them? 🗣 Well I just give up on men for now! 

Sistergold

HelloB said:

I happened on this thread by chance. Boy am I glad I did!

I read through 8 pages worth and impatiently I just want to chime in to say how incredibly strong and resilient you all are. It gives me inspiration that single women (whether by choice or otherwise) are actively taking control of financial independence.

And to the OP, this diary style musing is fab during lock down. Keep it up and power to you on keeping it all together with 4 kids.

@HelloB
Hey there! Thanks for saying hello. Power to all woman 💪🏾🦾
xx 

Sandyra

You at right about registering their improvements on Zoopla. I did mine about 2/3 years ago and perhaps I should re look at it. That will be amazing to get to 60% LTV, definitely a better pick of rates at that bracket, which will be a while, one can only hope and OP. 

Could you not remortgage to a new lender in May, if the rates are more favourable of cost effective from WestBrom? 

HelloB

I've found Zoopla hit and miss, especially in areas with little market movement or a major variation of property types. My street has studios to 5 bed detached houses. Based on the Zoopla estimates vs what the properties actually sell for can be £50k difference.

I've fixed my mortgage which started Jan this year for 5 years. Taking advantage of the low interest rates, then covid 19 hit and the rates have dropped even more! 75% LTV is definitely a sweet spot (2 year fixed TSB 1.14%), since even at 60% LTV the MSE mortgage best buy is coming back with marginally better rate of 1.09%.

SG, sorry your ex is being unreasonable. I hope he will see sense and start behaving more collaboratively. 

One thing to add as a single lady is that I can now be in control of my own finances. Overpay or not overpay on the mortgage. Decide what type of holidays I want (when lock down is over). Not have to worry about bailing out my ex and family who perpetually seem to be in financial crisis.