Cutting it Fine - the challenge is on!

SandyShores

Thanks both.  We had some ppi repayments and then I cashed out one of my old pensions, which really speeded up the debt free journey.  Really great to go from a minus figure and every month we are taking £1k off the capital.  Really looking forward to getting the house finished and being able to make some more serious ops.

Kittenkirst, that's nice of you to think about your new owners.  

savingholmes

Hope your week is going well.

SandyShores

Hi SH, feels like we've had a busy week, lots of spending on things for the house.  Its been quite productive but exhausting.  Used up most of the nectar points on the garden building spend, but we're still on track and its good not to dip into savings.  DH also had some private work and he put the proceeds into the building pot too.  I'll never get tired of saying how much better it feels to spend money you've already earned.   We went through a few years of eating mostly veggie food, and surviving on about £40 a week of groceries from Lidl mainly, to get there.  All spending was scrutinised and double checked, twice!  We still think about our spending, but I'm not quite so iron fist about it, and its nice not having to buy the cheapest of everything.  

Cooked a roast tonight and amazingly everything went to plan.  Lots of leftovers for the next day or two and everyone really enjoyed it - one of my better ones tonight, despite a few little hiccups.  The garden is starting to bloom, lovely to see things starting to grown.  That's reminded me that its nearly time to plant the sunflower seeds

SandyShores

Lovely sunny day today, hope everyone enjoyed a bit of the sunshine.  Did the shopping early this morning and also managed to grab the Tesco gift cards from my mobile provider's app, to the tune of £4.50 for all of us.  

Just logged into the mortgage account and had a very nice surprise to see that the balance is well under the 000s, I think I've paid off an extra day's interest .  I've noted down today's balance and will log in again tomorrow to see the latest balance and work out the current daily interest so I can pay off April's interest in advance.

Salad tonight.  Its lovely that spring is springing   Working hard on looking ahead, rather than the rear view mirror.  Did a little bit in the garden today - straightened up a couple of stakes and trimmed dead leaves.  Definitely made a difference.

SandyShores

Great news in the Shore's family that sports clubs are back on this week.  Not sure how we survived without them, but we've made it.  I finally booked onto an online pilates class and really enjoyed it, so will be doing that at least once a week going forward.  If I was truly MSE I would get a DVD, but I like the fact that its live with real people - plus having to turn up on time makes me do it (and it is cheaper than the in person classes).  I just need to get the walking and strength training sorted now as I've seen two jobs to apply for and studying is going well.  

Kittenkirst

All sounding super positive SS Ive always been tempted to try Pilates but a friend made me panic that it was super intense! How do you find it?

SandyShores

Hi Kittenkirst, I'm really enjoying it so far thank you.  Joining online is great as you don't have someone turning up at your shoulder correcting you all the time - I find that really off putting when you are quite new.  I've opted not to have my camera on, so I feel much more relaxed about it and you can stop and really look at how the teacher is doing it - which you don't feel you can do in a in-person class - that's if you're even in a position to see the teacher when you have about 20 others in front of you   It suits me for now, so we'll see how it goes.  The MSEr in me says £5 a class is a lot, but I'm enjoying it and the teacher is really well qualified and makes it a really pleasant class.

I've just logged in to the mortgage account and calculated last night's interest, which was £11.88.  For some reason I decided to multiply that by 365 - over £4,000 interest per year!  Would have had to sit down if I wasn't sitting already   That's more motivation to reduce the mortgage - that's a holiday or a small car!

Anyway, back in the real world, I've just made the monthly overpayment to make sure that by the end of April we are on the zeros.  This time it will be £300k and that has very nicely raised our equity a whole 1%, so we now own 8% of this lovely home  - a gain of 3% in just 9 months.  We will be up to 10% by Oct/Nov when we are planning to really up the overpayments.  We didn't plan that the first year would involve spending on the house, but its good to get it exactly as we want it early on and then we will focus on enjoying it and getting rid of that £4,000 per year interest.

Kittenkirst

£5 a class sounds reasonable; but if you are finding it beneficial then I’d say it’s any investment in your health & wellbeing. Great that you can do it with the camera off too; I know exactly what you mean about stopping to see what the teacher is doing, I wished I could do that in my hot yoga classes (pre pandemic) as sometimes when you are all twisted up and sweaty its hard to work out what goes where- like a giant game of twister

Congratulations on owning that 8% of your house! That’s a nice chunk and growing rapidly thanks to your efforts.

savingholmes

I agree - investing in health is essential.

SandyShores

Thanks Kittenkirst, 8% feels like a good start.  I'm definitely going to keep going with the sessions.  Agree SH, spending on your health is a good investment.

Xmas Saver is up to £150, so very nearly half-way.   I've also made some progress towards my other targets.  I'm really learning a lot at the moment - who said they can't teach an old dog