Climbing the Mortgage Mountain step by step

savingholmes

Improving your home in a budget friendly way sounds fab.

Me_v_The_Mortgage_Mountain

Hi All

Well for some reason we got paid last night, even though it's not due until Monday, so I have updated my signature, as predicted my loan is now below the £4k mark and my 0% credit card below £5k, my savings dropped by about £150 but we have done a lot this last month, overall I feel it's heading in the right direction.  Current fixed rate expires in Dec 2025 and I want to make sure I am in the best possible position, paydown as much as I can in the meantime, no additional debts (or at least if there are it's for something tangible like a replacement car) and decent sized emergency fund, its scary how the rates are going at the moment and there is no guarantee that they will improve hugely in the next 2 years.

Have a great weekend

MvTMM

savingholmes

Great news on getting paid early and clearing some of your debt.

I think we're all praying mortgage rates improve before we need to change again.

Me_v_The_Mortgage_Mountain

Hi All

Hope you have had a good weekend.  Ours was fairly chilled and yet productive. 

Friday night DH cut both of our large lawns and we had a take away dinner as our treat for the weekend.  Saturday DH and I barrowed the huge bag of chippings bit by bit from the drive to the back garden and backfilled along the new path , it looks fab, I'm so pleased.  I also trimmed back the plants on the pergola for the gazillionth time this year, they grow like mad!  DH tidied the utility area of the garden behind the green house, looks much better now. We emptied our 4 bags of pink fir apple potatoes, really disappointing crop, won't grow those again. 

Sunday was wet so we had a lazy morning and a lovely brunch before taking a car full to the skip (things DH had cleared from behind the greenhouse).  We then tackled the conservatory wall, the wallpaper just peeled off, there was little or no adhesion and underneath was quite a lot of black mould which I removed and we have left it to dry thoroughly.  We are in 2 minds what to do now, the wall is plaster boarded but not in great condition, so we thought about removing it but then we would have to remove and refit the radiator and wall light and switch, plus the wall underneath is the old outside rendered wall, would that look odd?  I think we are just going to lightly sand the wall, seal it and then paint with some paint we already have to match the lounge (leaving the intact wallpaper on the other walls as I really like it), we'll see how that fares over the winter, ie if the leak returns, and then decided if we are going to re-wallpaper.

Next job after this will be our bedroom but we are going to wait until DD has gone back to Uni as we will need her bedroom to move our stuff into!

Apart from our takeaway on Friday night (just 3 doner wraps so not too extravagent!), we have eaten out of our stocks all weekend, we are going to go shopping tonight as we wanted to wait until payday.  Saturday we had cooked breakfast and then steak and stilton pies, chips and mixed veg, Sunday was smashed avo and poached eggs for brunch and butternut squash and spinach curry from the freezer with brown rice.  I was tempted to pop to a lovely little Polish bakery for cakes on the way home from the skip but there were no parking spaces and I couldn't be bothered to find somewhere and walk in the drizzle so we went without, my waistline probably thanked me for that!!

So a fairly frugal weekend, got a few jobs done and enjoyed some quality time with DH, it's not often we get the house to ourselves these days.

Back to the grind stone now, happy Monday!

MvTMM

savingholmes

Eeek to the black mould. As a minimum you should coat with damp stop type paint.

Me_v_The_Mortgage_Mountain

Hi All

savingholmes said:

Eeek to the black mould. As a minimum you should coat with damp stop type paint.

@savingholmes We think the mould is due to the leak we had, which has now been rectified.  We do have some Damp Stop paint in the garage so were planning to seal the wall with that and then emulsion over the top.  I've already cleaned the wall with some mould and mildew remover and we are letting it all dry thoroughly before doing anything else, fingers crossed that will be the end of the problem.

No updates of any significance today, wet and miserable here again and looking to be like this for some while, we've got a week off soon and I just hope the weather brightens up for that!

have a good day

MvTMM

savingholmes

Sounds like you have a good plan in place. 

Aimingforthegoodlife

Hi MvTMM, its been a while since I last popped by, you have continued to do an amazing job, the cooking you do is inspirational! Keep up the amazing work!

Me_v_The_Mortgage_Mountain

Hi All

@Aimingforthegoodlife thank you so much for your kind comments and taking the time to read my waffle!  I've always been able to make a meal from nothing, I think I got it from my grandparents, very much the 'waste not want not generation', although I don't do anything like the cooking I used to do when the children were younger.

We had a productive weekend, both lawns cut and garden tidied.  DH and I tackled the conservatory on Saturday, did some filling and gave it a gentle sanding to even out some lumps and bumps as we wanted to smooth the surface for painting but not damage the plasterboard too much.  We gave it 2 coats of the matt paint we have in the adjoining lounge and it actually came up quite well, not perfect but a huge improvement and looks bright and fresh.  I took some inspiration from your house staging @savingholmes and repurposed and re-arranged some furniture and decorative pieces and it looks so different, bigger and more welcoming .  Best part is it didn't cost a penny!

I've been giving our bedroom some thought now.  We are limited on layout due to a doorshaped window that looks into the conservatory (we are in a bungalow), it doesn't function as a door and I'm not sure it ever did, think it's purely for light but we have a blind on it that is permanently down for privacy.  I'm wondering if we could make a faux wall to cover this, I really like the faux panelling effect and we could then put our headboard on this wall and change the layout and flow of the room, I think it would make a big difference.  We have loads of battoning in the garage so could utilise that with some mdf panels maybe?  I need to have a brain storm session with DH, I have the ideas and he makes them reality, as with the garden!  But before we can even think about the bedroom refurb I need to give it a good sort out and declutter.

I have sold a couple more items on V!nted, slowly but surely.  DD has sold some more too.  I do need to do a charity shop run as well as there is a bag of items that I could list for £1 per item but that then means keeping them hanging around until someone potentially buys them and quite honestly I need them cleared and space made.

Have a great day all

MvTMM

savingholmes

Well done on the home staging and decluttering.

My biggest current regret on the decluttering - is that I didn't do it much earlier in life so that the kids got to enjoy a clutter-free home.