It's the final countdown...£10k to go

mark55man

good work t2rry.  I'm struggling with winter spending blues as well.  Although I am now in significant credit with the energy company so they have reduced my DD so hopefully can keep a lid on budgets.

my youngest and partner are doing up their new bedroom following another young one fleeing the nest.  that is costing a little extra as they need some replacement furniture, but we did most of it ourselves apart from the vinyl flooring which a friend did for £50 

t2rry

November Spends:

£718.88 food - over budget 
  £83.90 petrol - under budget
£325.33 social - over budget
  £74.00 kids - under budget
  £138.24 clothes - under budget
£143.51 other - over budget
  £295.38 birthdays - under budget

More under than over, that's a surprise because it didn't feel like that through the month, just felt like we were constantly spending, even knowing how spendy a time it is, still feels uncomfortable!

Pretty much achieved the last 2 rooms targeted for this year, that's been quite spendy too but worth it and manageable without taking from savings.  I would pretend that it means next year we can save much more as the house has cost so much but realistically we will have other things to do like upgrading furniture that we have been managing with to now.  We can take that slowly though and prioritise what we're saving for.  

t2rry

Well!!!!

As usual, the last couple of weeks have just flown and I've not looked at the budgets much - partly necessary, otherwise I know the gifts OH gets for me as we both use the same CC for all spending (for the cashback)

I'm happy with what we achieved during 2023, signature ended like this:

Debt Free I £5k Emergency Fund I £10k Fixed Savings I 2023 Plan:

1. House - Rooms Complete 10/10
2. Savings £14,800/£15,000
3. Replenish EF used for Student Loan £3,600/£5,000

The savings slightly missed as whilst I started saving for Christmas at the beginning of the year, it was one pot too many for juggling so I scrapped it a few months in, which means I have had to take from Peter (current savings) to pay Paul (Christmas expenses)

I'm happy with this, we've more than doubled our savings in the space of a year, I've also paid a lump sum into my personal pension and paid off my student loan on top of that so a tiny blow out at the end of the year doesn't feel too disastrous.

We also finished all the rooms in the house we had planned to do, absolutely achieved by a photo finish a couple of days before Xmas but very happy with that as there were some additional expenses included that I hadn't foreseen at the start of the year.

So...plans for 2024...honestly I'm not going to review December spending, I think I'd end up beating myself up with it and it's done now so I want to start afresh.

We do have more house stuff to do, but I'm going to take some time off that now and just enjoy what we've done so far, just do the smaller improvements as and when we want and can afford to with cashflow.  I say that....we are hoping to extend this year but we'll figure that out later!

As for savings - it's a big question and one I don't know the plan for yet.  I'm maintaining our automated savings, which equals £1,300 per month, I may re-jig where some of it goes throughout the year though as some is to time limited (12 month) regular savings accounts so when they come to an end I may move those pots to fixed savings/ISA and re-start the regular savings from cashflow.

Lots to think about so I'm going to have a play with the signature and create what I'll call my rough draft for 2024m plans.

HNY (soon)!

t2rry

Right, rough draft for 2024:

1. Slush/Tax Fund - £5,000

I have a side income, mentioned infrequently on here, but growing - I have a tax bill to pay at the end of Jan and a payment on account to make in June, plus I'm tracking what my tax is looking like this year - so first target is to pay 2022/23 and have enough set aside for 2023/24 too - £5k should certainly leave me enough to cover next Jan as per my current forecast, though it may be slightly short of the POAs for 2024/25 - I can always extend this once I am sure.  

So far I have not been saving it separately, kind of kicking the can down the road and accepting that I'll need to dip into savings to meet January's payment, but then those are savings we wouldn't have without the additional income. 

I'm calling it a Slush/Tax fund as I'd like to build this to a point where it always remains around £5k so it can be both for tax payments and for a general slush fund ... another reason this is the one most likely to be revised through the year as I get to understand how best to manage it and what level I want it to be at. 

2. Additional Pension Contributions - £5,000

With the additional income, I want to start throwing a decent chunk at my pension over and above my employer pension, I made a contribution last year but somewhat conservative - I will benefit from tax savings by doing so now AND I was late in life starting a decent pension due to rubbish income and rubbish auto enrollment.  I'm 5 years into a decent employer scheme now so I'm happy with that, just want to make up for the earlier 'lost' years.

3. Regular Savings - £15,000

I've put this third as 1 & 2 are, at least partly, time sensitive, so it may be that I divert some regular savings for a few months to ensure I'm meeting those as I need to, but in a few months time I can start to hammer this, especially since we're done with most of the house stuff now.  We should hopefully start to feel like we have some disposable funds over and above expenses and regular savings once 1 & 2 are solidly in progress ... a snowball method for saving, if you will.

This totals £25,000, way more than the £18,600 we managed to save in 2023, this is because of the realistic fact that some money for the tax fund may have to come from current savings given the January due date but this is the best way I can think to track it because even if some savings are retrospective, these are the reasons for said savings.  

t2rry

A month passed, a lot going on but a small update:

I have joined a savings challenge to keep me accountable beyond my own little diary here, which I forego more often these days as I feel like I'm such an inbetweener, beyond debt free wannabe but not yet at mortgage free wannabe while we continue building our forever home.  Hopefully this time next year I can start to be that person, or at least start saving under the title of building a mortgage neutral pot.

Savings going nicely for one month in (actually 2 paydays in but who's counting!)

Tax paid, most of which I managed to take from January's payday by reducing the regular savings temporarily.  I've only counted NEW savings in my signature, not those I already had that I may have had (or will in future) to dip into.

We're also going ahead with extension planning so whilst I only mentioned 2 comments ago that I was going to ease up and enjoy what we've done for a while, we're gearing up to go again.  We're not getting any younger and it turns out I'm not great at sitting still, so we plough on to try and get it all done asap to take the hit now, while we have the energy, with a view to getting to that mortgage free diary within a year!

mark55man

I know what you mean about in betweener.  Really I've been debt free for 2 years but still like the comfort of my DFW diary

But as you may have seen I also have a MFW as I've juggled through different stages of readiness. Why not do both keep this one on, but start a MFW diary talking about your plans and getting some friends and followers

t2rry

mark55man said:

I know what you mean about in betweener.  Really I've been debt free for 2 years but still like the comfort of my DFW diary

But as you may have seen I also have a MFW as I've juggled through different stages of readiness. Why not do both keep this one on, but start a MFW diary talking about your plans and getting some friends and followers

Thanks Mark, that's actually a great idea, it is relatively close now I guess, and I have been tracking daily interest/balance reducing/loan to value improvements for a while now because it's progress however slow!

t2rry

I have gone for it and opened a mortgage free wannabe diary:

The Long and Winding Road — MoneySavingExpert Forum

No idea what I'm really posting about at the moment, it's a month to month monitoring as here whilst keeping a closer eye on the mortgage, hopefully in the coming year or two I can start to really make moves to reducing it quicker whilst still putting money aside to invest and top up our pensions

mark55man

Yay to the new diary - the mortgage board are used to long and winding paths.  with titles such as £99 over until 2099  (joking) but definitively looking at the long term there