The Last Leg; 6 years later, debt free in 2021

greensalad

Yep I agree!

Honestly, I'm putting it down to a blip/adjustment to the new ways of things. I think he's just got to get into the habit of actually budgeting his money out. For me, I'm a similar type person who finds it very easy to spend now worry later (which is how I got into this mess) so now I use Monzo pots to my advantage and really divide up my cash. I've told him to do the same. If I have, for example as I do right now, £380 budgeted for a CC bill that has yet to be drawn up, I don't let it sit in my balance. I put it in a pot and I know the DD will come out of that pot. Whereas he would keep things in the main balance and then forget what they were for. Grr! 

I just divvied up our money for the month. £200 each, £380 on my CC and £300 odd sent to him and told him to PUT IT IN THE POT. Same for the money I sent him to pay into his own LISA (we have one each). Just put it in the damn pot and set the DD to pay from it then it's none of your concern! 

We'll see how this month goes. I don't think we'll need to take more drastic action.

Baileys_Babe

Thankfully we are all different. I have no idea how I would spend £200 a month on myself. A family member cuts my hair so that is a big saving. I guess more of my spending comes under various pots in our main budget, but I will be honest I am curious what you spend your personal money on in case I have missed something or I decide it would work better if we had personal money.

greensalad

Haha I cut my own hair! That'll be one thing I'd like to spend some money on again one day.
My money goes on hobby items, books, gifts for friends and family and socialising. In August we visited friends who have just bought a house so we both put money in from our pocket money to buy them a houseplant and card. I went to my friend's baby shower where I bought a gift and decorated cakes which came out of my own money. Bought myself a new pair of pyjamas. Went for a day out to local gardens with a friend and had lunch in the cafe. Got a movie I wanted to watch on Amazon Prime (though usually I use money from survey rewards to buy movies). Bought a nice glass jar for tomato chutney I liked the look of. Bought some slinky black fabric for a dress I'm making. Got a new book that I'm desperate to read that isn't available from the library. I could probably go lower than £200 but I definitely don't find it hard to spend either. 

Baileys_Babe

Thanks, @greensalad for taking time to reply, everything you have listed has been allocated in our main budget, so far it doesn't appear I have forgotten anything. Neither of us has expensive hobbies but if one of us did we may have different views on personal spending money.

greensalad

I just like the freedom to buy fabric and books without OH noticing...

Similarly he spends more than I care to know on video games and hot sauce.

Baileys_Babe

My OH wouldn't notice or care if I say we have money in the budget for such things we do. He is quite restrained with regard to computer games these days and asks for them as presents.

greensalad

Got a £6.50 payout from Prolific, so popped it straight into the emergency fund to refill it. It'll take a while but every little helps!
Got another chunk of change in the Prolific account but seeing as it probably won't process over the weekend I'll wait until Tuesday in case I complete anything else.

enthusiasticsaver

Baileys_Babe said:

Thankfully we are all different. I have no idea how I would spend £200 a month on myself. A family member cuts my hair so that is a big saving. I guess more of my spending comes under various pots in our main budget, but I will be honest I am curious what you spend your personal money on in case I have missed something or I decide it would work better if we had personal money.

Out of our personal money of £200 each DH spends probably all of his on his hobby so that is £200 a month but if he had access to the main current account there would be less curbs and he may well spend more so this way I know he will not dip into the current account.  I get £200 a month and spend some on hair, clothes, nail appointments sometimes or books or days or meals out with friends.  It is looking healthy at the moment but it is nice to know I have access to a chunk of personal money should I want a new phone or ipad or walking shoes or whatever. 

greensalad

My Mum sent me a tenner because I gave her all the cat bits plus two boxes of Iams pouches, so that was nice of her. Still seems really weird not having a pet around. We have been talking a lot and I think once we do buy a house, whenever that may be, we will look into getting a dog. We have always wanted a dog, I have always wanted a whippet specifically but have worried about having a sighthound with a cat. Well, now we no longer have a cat it seems that might be able to happen. So it's adding to the excitement of buying a new house that we would be able to get a dog too.

Of course the housing market isn't looking too rosey right now and I'm hoping that 90% LTV will still be an option for FTB next year. Currently our forecast for savings looks like we'll have £42,500 which would be for a £425k house, but houses where we are looking often come up for less so we might be able to buy next Autumn. If not, we'll have enough by December so would start looking in January 2022.

Considering maybe speaking to a broker come next January even though we won't have a full deposit saved, just to find out if there's anything we need to do or could do to make ourselves better candidates. I know for example that they look at 3 months of statements. We go on our quite expensive holiday in June next year and I'm worried it would skew our affordability if they see us spending several thousand on holidays (we're going to the US, and haven't paid in advance for any hotels for our 2 week stay, hence the high cost). I don't know if they're "clever" enough to assess that we saved that money up and spent it in one go vs it showing as a "normal" spend for us.

Even so I guess as long as we only present July/August/September statements it'd be cleared off by then. But I know some banks want 12 month statements.

Anyway, just musing here. I don't really know a whole lot about mortgage applications having never gone through this before! 

Baileys_Babe

Sorry, @greensalad I can't help you regarding the affordability test as a FTB as they did not do them when we first took out a mortgage.