How much to live on

Humboldt

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81983574#Comment_81983574

Morning @Nebulous2, thank you for your informative and inspiring post. It's amazing how quickly time flies and how easily you can fill your days doing what you choose now that you are retired. You have set yourself a good walking aim and it would be interesting to know how you get on with the vegetable growing. Great that you managed to find a fairly local spot for your mini-break. DH and I have been pleasantly surprised with the amount of places to visit and things to do in our local area. Either we didn't have the time, or felt that we needed to get away when we were working.

Hope everyone is enjoying the long weekend.

Humboldt

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81983953#Comment_81983953

Happy holidays @louby40. I still pinch myself that I no longer have to endure the long commute to the office on a Monday, dreading the week ahead. Anyway, enjoy your time away, we have rain here today and it is forecast for most of next week.

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81985403#Comment_81985403

I must confess that not having that dread must be a very nice feeling.

I've been tidying up my spreadsheet today. With a lot of spending of late I wanted to make sure I'd covered everything. Pleasantly surprised to find the car fuel savings will cover most of the outlay on the doors and windows come state pension age.

My stoozing is projected to hit £46,000 this year. I'm wondering how sustainable this will be once I take an income drop in September. The monthly payments are affordable to be honest. It's more a case of wondering if I'll still be able to find cards to balance transfer. If I can I should be able to pocket another £10k in total over the next few years.

My overall gross come September will be approx £38k so fingers crossed the stoozing will continue. I'm out of any bank switching offers again but hopefully the Nationwide Fairer Sharer payout will happen again.

As for car finance. Personally I wish people would take the view that either.

A) They're not interested

B) They will accept the FCA proposal

Or

C) They will pursue their claim in court.

It's getting to be such a mess!

Just had my first week on the EV tariff. Happy to report I might have to redo my estimates. I thought our usage might rise to £175/month. It's looking more like £155.

Nebulous2

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81985638#Comment_81985638

On car finance - the FCA tried to pick a middle route, to please everybody, and as a measure of how well they have done people on both sides of the argument seem unhappy.

There is a consumer group launching legal action, and several of the bigger lenders doing the same.

I'm not sure that there is anything stopping the lenders who decided to accept the deal and move on simply going ahead on their own anyway?

I haven't been following it closely, but the freeze on dealing with existing complaints needs to be lifted at some point as well.

I'm of the view that any more money on the table, and possibly some of that already there, will simply be eaten up in legal fees now.

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81986157#Comment_81986157

Well my only loan was with Black Horse. Hopefully they'll offer people the chance to settle.

Humboldt

Morning @Organgrinder

My stoozing is projected to hit £46,000 this year. I'm wondering how sustainable this will be once I take an income drop in September. The monthly payments are affordable to be honest. It's more a case of wondering if I'll still be able to find cards to balance transfer. If I can I should be able to pocket another £10k in total over the next few years.

I am in total awe of your projected stoozing amount for this year. You certaininly put your mathmatical skills to good use.

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81986300#Comment_81986300

I keep track of everything in my trusty spreadsheet. Dates when the 0% rate expires, the monthly payments etc. I have some back up cards to hand in the event I cannot get a new card. At the moment my NatWest card has a 0% offer for example.

My chase 0% purchase card deal runs out in December so that's the next one to transfer. I'll start looking for a new purchase card around October with a view to getting the stooze up to £54,000 or so.

My last deal runs out in September 2028. Ideally I'll transfer again to take me through to around 2031. I might call it a day then. I think that will be around 9 years of snoozing in total.

It has been very profitable overall. I know not everyone likes it and I recall one poster detesting what he saw as my money grabbing vulgarity. For me, it's added a fair bit to my pot and increased what I have to live on allowing me a few more luxuries. For that I'm grateful to the people on here who've helped me learn from their ideas. I hope in some small way I've inspired others to do likewise.

Nebulous2

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81986514#Comment_81986514

I'm running just under £20,000 for my stooze pot. I'm probably on shorter deals than you, but I go mainly for low or no fees. I've been building up spend on a zero fee NatWest purchase card, for instance.

I've several credit cards that give me offers on a regular basis. Barclaycard has been very impressive recently for an existing card, rather than a new offer, but I've resisted using it so far.

Meeting the monthly minimums on the credit cards is quite straightforward, but feeding all the regular savers often requires a bit of juggling. Unfortunately they aren't evenly spread, with more maturing in the later half of the year than in the first half. If I'd planned it well enough - when I switched to a new bank account I should have held back on opening the RS until I was in a gap between my existing ones, instead I just fired in and opened it as soon as the new bank account allowed.

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81986830#Comment_81986830

All sounds very good. Impressive.

My EV charging continues to surprise me. I just received an email telling me I get £5/month credit for allowing my charger to stop charging if the grid needs energy. Seeing as I only charge overnight it's not something I've seen happen yet but hey, if they want to give me £5 for doing nothing who am I to complain.

Since moving to an EV tariff last Monday I've used approx £3.90 of electricity. So basically it's been free so far!

daz378

Starting 6th month after ankle surgery...as been a good dry run…for future retirement… think this is my last month at full pay(for which I'm truly grateful for)…Another sicknote till 2nd of june... offered in sicknote to doctor..that could go in to do any work admin…or a desk based training day…just wrote me a standard sick note…just started walking without stick…and start hydrotherapy Monday…hopefully back in for June ...will lose 1k a month…but will hopefully get criminal injuries..just before xmas…have been experiencing occasional memory fog…could be just getting older…but do need to mention to doctor…guy who attacked me gets out early 2027