The second hurdle - Nichelette v the huge mortgage

Nichelette

Okay, so you need to humour me a bit... 

Doing the SOA got me thinking, as we definitely don't have so much left after a month. I am putting the £500 into vanguard which isn't counted on there, but still.. According to the SOA (before vanguard money) we should have £95.60 remaining a day.

I definitely know I am less likely to spend when I have less in our account, so I've made the table below showing how much we should have left if it is spread equally through the month. We've currently got £2421 left of the £2868 that should be left over, which is £222 over the daily average amount. My plan is to look each day and pay off any amount over what we should have remaining off the mortgage, so today I'm going to pay off £222  and hope I can keep it up. I feel like this will definitely result in higher OP's, but we will see!

Start amount	Days since paid	Amount left	Remaining
2772.4	1
2676.8	2
2581.2	3
2485.6	4
2390	5
2294.4	6
2198.8	7	2421	222.2
2103.2	8
2007.6	9
1912	10
1816.4	11
1720.8	12
1625.2	13
1529.6	14
1434	15
1338.4	16
1242.8	17
1147.2	18
1051.6	19
956	20
860.4	21
764.8	22
669.2	23
573.6	24
478	25
382.4	26
286.8	27
191.2	28
95.6	29
0	30

Sarahwithlove

It may be worth reviewing your bank statements to see what you are spending on that isn't accounted for in your SOA. Either way you're putting a good amount away each month. Have you looked to see what other jobs are about at the moment if redundancy isn't likely to be an option for you. 

Nichelette

I actually did have a look yesterday, but there wasn't really a great deal on there which left me more confused. It was at that point I realised that this is the first month of a smaller nursery bill. It was usually around 1.8-1.9k after tax free childcare was accounted for, so that explains a lot 😂. 

DH also has £50 every Friday for frittering, so that is a chunk (can't do it monthly as he's useless with money). He also vapes unfortunately so there is that too. He actually stopped before our first was born, but I had a very big haemorrhage which made him start again (think was stressful for him seeing so much blood). He does want to stop again so hopefully one day he will, though I dont push it. He also has a membership with boxing gym (he does use) which is just over £40, but I'd put that under entertainment. 

I do look at jobs now and again, not just because of redundancy, but also because I just want to leave. I do the typical female thing of saying I don't meet one criteria so writing it off, and also underselling myself. I actually annoy myself a bit as I know how hard it can be to get decent staff 🙃.  Fortunately I'm in SE and close to London so there are a lot of jobs in the area. I'm sure I could find something to tide me over  absolutely worst case. 

South_coast

Nichelette said:

I do the typical female thing of saying I don't meet one criteria so writing it off

Oh, I can so relate to this! When will we ever learn 🤦‍♀️??? I guess the answer is just apply anyway, and just accept you'll be rejected if you're not what they're looking for - but getting past the imposter syndrome is hard!

Nichelette

South_coast said:

Nichelette said:

I do the typical female thing of saying I don't meet one criteria so writing it off

Oh, I can so relate to this! When will we ever learn 🤦‍♀️??? I guess the answer is just apply anyway, and just accept you'll be rejected if you're not what they're looking for - but getting past the imposter syndrome is hard!

I know right! Where I work they know women do this so they do say in adverts if you don't meet all the criteria but think you can do the job to apply anyway. It's a very male dominated industry, but I have seen more women in operational managerial positions so I guess it must be working somewhat. 

I think if I do end up having to look for jobs I am going to have to approach differently..

Only paid £5 off mortgage yesterday but that was mostly because I spent just over £50 on legoland tickets (being cunning and taking DS right before he starts school as the older ones should mostly be back then). We did the same last September and queues were pretty good. Also spent £10 on a Christmas present for DS but my dad will give me that back. Assume rest was previously pending payments..

Nichelette

Just spent £28 on fireworks now too. This is already failing 🤣. To be fair it's an early access price and it's a bit of a tradition that we take the kids every year so might as well buy them early a bit cheaper.

ladysummerisle

I find myself buying ahead but hopefully that means more excess money later. The mental energy required for me means I book when I see something, pop it in the diary and hope my future self is grateful! There’s far too many things to keep track of.

Nichelette

ladysummerisle said:

I find myself buying ahead but hopefully that means more excess money later. The mental energy required for me means I book when I see something, pop it in the diary and hope my future self is grateful! There’s far too many things to keep track of.

Very good point! 

So in August we made OP's of £1163.05 (somewhat skewed by the £521 from our backpay). I'm continuing to make payments throughout the month now. I will admit I'm not necessarily keeping up with every day, but I'm still using my spreadsheet to work out what the figure should be at a certain date and OP'ing the difference. I wish we were paid on the 1st to line up with mortgage but we're not.. Current balance is £191,061. Am tempted to OP £70 to move into next thousand. 

DS1 had his last day of nursery last Wednesday which was a bit emotional. To be honest I'd have left him a bit longer if I'd known when I gave notice that they have 3 full days of home visits where he's still not in school. Logistically the whole thing is a nightmare tbh. Went a bit funny last week because the thought of everything that is going to change in the next year got on top of me a bit. Am on more of an even keel now, trying not to think about it until I have to deal with it really... DS2 was sent home with a temperature yesterday so am off today as couldn't work with both kids. My mum has kindly offered to come tomorrow to look after DS1 and is going to stay overnight so she'll probably help a bit on Thursday too. She'd help more if she was closer, but it's a bit of a trek so nice of her to offer. 

Also remembered law around maternity and redundancy changed recently. I'd not given it much attention as I was already either out of or nearly out of that period, but looking now it means that anyone who is pregnant to 18 months PP gets priority if there is only one job. There are only two of us of the same grade, so that would be me gone in that situation. It's ironic as my boss has said he'd always choose me out of the two of us if he had to. Don't even know if it's a good thing or not tbh. 

Oh, finally PB's have come through again with another £100 this month. Woop. 

Nichelette

DS1 had his first day (2 hours) at school yesterday. I was fine until I came home and he wasn't here. I think I'd got used to him being here for the last couple of weeks albeit it has been a bit stressful. I think it hit me then that he was 'gone' so to speak, and I'd spent a lot of his little years working. I think with nursery because it's not compulsory it feels slightly different. He loves it and didn't want to leave.

This morning the other bit of the business were told about the 19 redundancies we'd heard rumoured. Although it's not my side, I think it will come eventually. Apparently it's voluntary and then compulsory (with less money) if they don't get enough people. This has planted a new worry in my head as in all honesty our work has declined and I could easily absorb the work of the other person of my grade. As there are only the two of us and she's protected from redundancy, I'm now anxious that I'd be compulsory rather than voluntary if it came to it and for that reason they'd give me less redundancy pay. 

I feel like everything is falling apart at the moment. Literally all the major stuff in my life is going to change in the next year or so and for someone who likes to plan it's hard. I'm trying to only worry about each thing as it comes, but it is hard with so much uncertainty. The only thing I can think right now is that absolutely worst case, voluntary redundancy is around 20k, we've got nearly 10k in premium bonds and kids have nearly 11k. Obviously I wouldn't want to touch that, but absolute worst case it's there. Compared to most we're not in a bad position. I keep seeing in the news about the job market being awful which is quite worrying as I'm concerned about losing DS2 nursery hours and TFC if I can't find another job as if we lose his place I'm highly unlikely to be able to find another one due to pressures with nursery places. 

Anyway, paid on Monday. Am going to go back into my hole as lunch is over soon and I had to drop DS1 off so I need to eat quickly. 

ladysummerisle

I’m just going to say it: is there any chance hormones have you feeling it’s all a catastrophe? I know sometimes we can all feel like that. Even if not, just take a step back. There’s a lot going on yes but jobs-wise, it’s not imminent.

Your pregnant colleague may well decide she wants to take voluntary redundancy so spares your job. Companies always have a way of keeping who they want anyway. 

We’ve just had a round of voluntary severance at my work and certainly I’ve seen it before and will undoubtedly see it again. Things will work out though. Only one person I know who took it hasn’t gone straight into another job and she’s heading for a year in Japan instead.

As for school, I understand. My daughter h has just started last week and it’s tough. It’s all new and they’re emotional. It’ll all settle down soon. Teachers do like to hand a gift on the first day with a poem to tug on the heart strings. (I declined mine! 😂)