Right at the start of my journey.... 2 August 2020 at 7:57PM in Mortgage-free wannabe 8 replies 241 views

sam121285

I’ve decided to start this diary to hopefully motivate myself to become mortgage free. 

My little boy is 2 and a half and I got into quite a bit of debt preparing to have him and then taking a year off on maternity. Husband is in the army and was posted 400 miles away from us so we went and lived there for my maternity leave however we travelled back up every other weekend to see his 3 children (my step children) as per his (long and expensive to get) court order. 

Finally feel like things are back on track. I’ve paid off most of my debts and we are (hopefully) about to move into our new home... my two bed semi became very crowded over lockdown when there was six of us there! 

Determined to finish paying off the last of my debts and to not get into any more while being able to do more things as a family like holidays and days out. 

It’s worth saying that me and my husband have generally kept our finances separate. My house was bought long before I met him and most of our 4 year relationship he has lived away so I generally pay for all the house bills and we split childcare costs and food etc when he is home. Husband has quite large child maintenance payment each month and a lot of traveling costs coming home to see us as often as he can. I also earn considerably more than him so I don’t have issues with paying for more things. When we move things will be largely the same - I will pay the mortgage, Which will be larger and he is going to pay most of the bills but he will still be living away so has the costs associated with this to pay for. 

Current situation. 

Halifax CC - £1150 (0%)

Next - £40 (29%)

Very £750 (0% for now) 

Tescos CC - £20 (19%)

Virgin CC - £40 (0%)

We are buying a new how together and I really want to focus on paying this mortgage off as quickly as possible. How amazing would it be to be able to say we are mortgage free! Current house situation is that we are about to exchange with the aim to move in 4 weeks(ish). Fingers crossed! 

Once we move I really want to start overpaying the mortgage. It will be £640 a month (writing that down makes me realise what a big step up it is for the £300 I pay now! Eeeek!) I reckon I can comfortably overpay £200 a month, which keeps me well below the 10% allowed each year and then top up as and when, for example in the summer I do extra work which usually gets me around £2000 after tax. 

I’m hoping to detail my house buying / decorating / paying of mortgage / doing fun things with my blended family journey here. 

Thanks for reading!  

Jessy103

Welcome and good luck with your journey 😀

sam121285

So the family (we have the step children for two weeks for the holidays) are watching aqua man so I’m house planning. I saw a post on here called “one brick at a time” and wondered exactly how many bricks it takes to build a house and how much each brick would cost. 

A bit of googling says this;

A one brick wide wall requires 120 bricks per square metre. So the first stage is just to measure the height and length of the wall in metres, multiply them together to give the area in square metres, and then multiply this by 120

Now my maths may be completely rubbish but based on and my mortgage I’m looking at £6.80 a brick.  I quite like the idea of keeping track of my payments by how many bricks I have bought 

South_coast

Don't forget most reasonably modern places will have cavity walls, so two thicknesses of brickwork = half the cost per brick 😀  

Good luck with your planning 😀

sam121285

South_coast said:

Don't forget most reasonably modern places will have cavity walls, so two thicknesses of brickwork = half the cost per brick 😀  

Good luck with your planning 😀

Yes that’s a good thought!

sam121285

Debt paying off is on hold at the moment as we have lots to sort out and buy moving from a small two bed to 4/5 bed house. Luckily I have saved up to do this so it shouldn’t put us into anymore debt, but now not tackling it as aggressively as I was. 

Bought or ordered today:
1 x cabin bed and mattress for stepson 

1 x double bunk bed and mattresses For step daughters. 

Ikea storage for playroom 

Trip to ikea with the four children was awful. 3 older ones where fantastic, as always but my two year old was a nightmare but unfortunately these things need doing so we have no choice but to take him. 

I have my eye on a gorgeous DFS sofa but it will be nearly £3,000 for the two sofas we need and that’s a lot of money so we are “having a think about it”. Suspect we will order them but perhaps once we are in the house to make sure they will fit the room

settled down for the night now to watch Forrest Gump- which I much prefer to Aquaman! 

longway2go

I saw a post on here called “one brick at a time” and wondered exactly how many bricks it takes to build a house and how much each brick would cost. 

A bit of googling says this;

A one brick wide wall requires 120 bricks per square metre. So the first stage is just to measure the height and length of the wall in metres, multiply them together to give the area in square metres, and then multiply this by 120

Now my maths may be completely rubbish but based on and my mortgage I’m looking at £6.80 a brick.  I quite like the idea of keeping track of my payments by how many bricks I have bought 

Ohhhh that's my thread :-) glad to hear you like the idea, I haven't ever done the maths but might be an interesting exercise.
Just wanted to wish you lots of luck with your new house and mortgage reduction plans. 

sam121285

A few days since I’ve wrote and lots has been going on while not much at the same time! We have been on loads of days out to the beach and parks with the kids and watched more films - stepDaugher 1 choice tonight- will most likely be Harry Potter! House wise - we had  been told searches would be back Wednesday, it’s not Saturday and still not back. Spoke to solicitor on Friday (who I think has been pretty rubbish so far) And it’s just a case of waiting unfortunately - I guess things are slower at the moment. We had been hoping to complete on 21st August as potentially husband goes away on 1st September and I’m also back at work so we really want to get sorted before then. Everything just seems to be going sooooo slowly! 

Debt wise it’s still steady. We have sold some old clothes and also my little boys pram which will cover the paperwork extra costs since we have had the step kids come to stay. 4 children = very expensive, they all needed new pairs of shoes too and my step son seems to have hollow legs and is eating me out of house and home! I think I’m going to do a SOA tonight. Becuase I have nothing put away for things like Xmas or emergency funds so it will be good to get an idea of where to start with this. 

Hoping to hear something over the next week re house. 21st seems super unlikely but hopefully it will not be too far off that! 

bit_by_bit

Hi Sam121285. Well done for think anout all this now instead of waiting. It's hard in the business of life to stop and take time to consider the future. I was 45 before I had a moment. I expect you are a lot younger.
Your finances and that of my DH and I are similar. He is husband No2. 
A SOA is a great idea to beigin with but also look at what you want for the future. This may include holdidays and obviously you have already mentioned Christmas etc. Don't forget your own treats in all of this. These all need to be take into account.
I would also say that you need an emergency fund. Two in fact. One for yourself for personal things and one for you and your DH who should really be contributing in a more meaningful way. Even if he puts a £20, 30 or 50 into a savings account every month and you match it it will build up so if the boiler breaks or the kids need shoes, the cash is there without you having to go to credit cards. 
I like the idea of the bricks, good one Longway2go; especially the cavity wall idea by South_coast. So each brick costs £3.40. When you look at your spending think of those bricks.  
For ways to save money and manage debt I have also looked at the Debt Free Wannabee boardss and the Old style moneysaving boards. Thses people are masters at squeezing every penny out of a pound. Finally, every penny helps so keep your change, pick up pennies and clear you purse at the end of the week. A jar with a tenner in it will clear 3 bricks or so.
All the best with your journey.