Singleton, low income - How to be MFW?

icedms

My outstanding mortgage is £11,500 and my mortgage deal is base rate plus .5%

I pay £200 a month which is manageable while I’m in work. If things continue as they are my mortgage will be paid a year or so before I retire.

I live alone and work for a health charity four days a week, which means my income is relatively low.

I have no debts after reading the DFW threads a couple of years ago and deciding to clear all the credit card debt.

I’ve never changed my mortgage provider although at some point it became a Santander mortgage.

I save £100 monthly for Christmas so I don’t have to pay any bills in Nov, Dec & Jan. I save £100 monthly to cover annual bills like house and car insurance along with road tax, MOT and towards any repairs. I also have about £2000 in savings but as my car failed died in December that will be used towards another new to me car.

I was ok about the mortgage until at my previous job the management changed and the new lot were horrendous bullies. I wanted to tell them what I thought and walk but felt under so much pressure because I have bills to pay. The pressure affected my confidence which made it harder to do job applications.

My new employers are good but as many other charity workers we only have two or three year contracts. 

I don’t want to go through that pressure again so I want to focus on becoming a MFW so all advice would be very much appreciated.

Poppycat1

Hi icedms, welcome to the MFWs.

I am single but have a 14 year old at home.  I work in the lowest paid NHS job.  It really is difficult on your own, isn't it?   Although we are able to make all the decisions which is great.

The only thing I can suggest is Populus and Prolific Academy survey sites.  You could make around £25 a month on PA.  Also check all your retirement plans.  ie you have made enough contributions for state pension, you know how much you may get on private pensions and if you haven't got a SIPP, look in to it.  I thought "I'm not the sort of person that has SIPPs, investments etc" and thought I would never understand them but I watched lots of Youtube videos, read blogs and started with small amounts.

Also look at Olio and Too Good to Go in your area.  Frugal queen on Youtube is great at budgeting and frugal meals.  I really enjoy being frugal.

powerspowers

Welcome icedms!

have you looked at any mortgage overpayment calculators to see the difference a regular, small overpayment would make to the length you have to pay for? You could pay small amounts off the balance- I pay off any refunds I get or the couple of £ I sometimes have at the end of the month. It does make a difference, even with a low interest rate. 

An alternative is to aim for mortgage neutral- so you  have as much in savings as left on the mortgage and then you’ve still got cash available but you know that you have that buffer. 

Depending on what else you have going on - could you pick up extra hours in a second job? Even a few a month on zero hours would be something to squirrel away. Do you have a spare room you could rent out? I volunteered with CSV after uni and the woman I lived with got £60 a week to host me, tax free. Just throwing ideas at you, I’ve found MFW supportive for people with massive mortgages overpaying £1000s a year and people just wanting to chip away at the mortgage bit by bit. Set yourself a goal and you’ll soon get the bug! 

jennystarpepper

Apps for taking pics of your shopping receipts, these earn me about £50 a year.

Qme3 pay out for any amount, which is a survey site.  

I send any spare pennies daily as it soon adds up.... providing your mort. company lets you do this, I  do this via my banking app daily, helps as my interest is charged daiy. 

LadyWithAPlan

Hi, I have been on here a week with my MFW diary and learnt loads. I am just trying to increase my deposit before getting a huge mortgage but everyone on here has calmed me down and got me focused on the daily steps.

Few additional ideas
The tilly tidy =- this is where MSE tidy their bank accts to the nearest £ 1 or £10 and move the rest to their OP or savings  account. They do it on a weekly basis or some I think daily.

I have started ebaying again for extra cash

Have you done a SOA so you can see what pots are too big, maybe you can trim down the £100 a month Xmas fund to say £80 and put the excess against the mortgage. Plus you can have the challenge of buying great gifts for a bit less.  This could be temporary.

I just started Prolific today and earned £10.52 already

I always have budgeted and have lots of different pots so grocery, restaurants, entertainment, home, clothing, hair , toiletries, future tech so for new phones etc but it has been suggested that in my monthly pots where I don't use all my pot such as my monthly grocery - rather than leave it there for next month instead look and move that excess over to your savings or OP account. This means you can try and not spend all your grocery budget for the month  and get a quick thrill at the end by saving the difference.
I just started this last week - moving excess over at month end and it has definitely tightened up my grocery spending and I caught the bus instead of the tube yesterday to save £1  



Looking at mortgage calculators and OP are very inspiring. I found one on here where you can add regular on one offs.  - cant see link at moment but its great as you can play with the extra payments s £50 this month £20 next or much more.

The No spend day = NSD - people set targets say 8 per month but I notice some people as they get nearer to the end of the mortgage often go super focused and do 24 25 days NSD!

The focus of diarising is great. I read through a lot of the linked diaries on the Mortgage Free roll of honour - all had advice but you can often see a real focus, then a break then back to a real focus at the end. Some people with a year less go super frugal, others with a few years left allow themselves to stop the OP to do home renovations.

Do look at a SIPP or if your work pension is matched. It si so important as a single lady - as I am also to have enough to live off. 

Good luck and I will be along for the ride.

icedms

LadyWithAPlan lots of great suggestions there thank you 😊 
I've signed up with prolific and I've set up one of those apps that round up your spend and save it, I've also set up a weekly direct debit to go in there and that will be my mortgage overpayment savings. I think I can make one overpayment a year at roundabout Christmas or New Year of £1000.
I don't have a pension, bringing up kids so in and out of work and short term contracts meant the money was more needed in my pocket.
I'll look through the roll honor and through the rest of the forums for tips.

Jennystarpepper
I used one of those photograph your receipt apps a couple of years ago and didn't get anything - not sure if I was doing something wrong or had the wrong app!

Powerspowers
Thanks for the welcome ☺ I really don't feel able to take on extra hours work, in fact I'm aiming for less in the future.
I've seen a couple of opportunities where sharing your home could bring in extra income but I still have grandchildren staying on a regular basis but definitely something to think about in the future.
I think I will set an achievable goal though but aim to do better 👍

icedms

Just spoken to the bank there is no limit on overpayments and I can do them whenever I want.
I was a bit confused when he explained how they work though. 
It's a minium payment of £500 if I want to reduce the term but I can pay any amount to reduce my payment. I don't really understand how it reduces my payment. He said I could pay as little as I want.
《I wonder if that means if I pay £20 then instead of paying a £200 that month I would pay £180 - any ideas? 》I might ring back actually and ask when my mortgage ends too.
I rang back and checked it just comes off the balance not the monthly payment. And I have got four years and eight months left on the mortgage.

jennystarpepper

Storewards app pays the most for me, next is Shoppix, both are eay to use.  The odd few ££ , it all adds up, 

South_coast

Agreed, Storewards is the most consistent, then Shoppix, then there's Huyu as well (but that's only for supermarkets)

Poppycat1

Something else that may help is Shopmium and GreenJinn.  GreenJinn is good for free products, shopmium is for money off.

theoretica

icedms said:

I don't have a pension, bringing up kids so in and out of work and short term contracts meant the money was more needed in my pocket.

If your employer offers a pension and you have opted out it would be worth looking again at this - because any contribution from your employer is free money you wouldn't get otherwise, so worth maximising - even if it is money for the future and not right now.

icedms said:

Just spoken to the bank there is no limit on overpayments and I can do them whenever I want.
I was a bit confused when he explained how they work though. 
It's a minium payment of £500 if I want to reduce the term but I can pay any amount to reduce my payment. I don't really understand how it reduces my payment. He said I could pay as little as I want.
《I wonder if that means if I pay £20 then instead of paying a £200 that month I would pay £180 - any ideas? 》I might ring back actually and ask when my mortgage ends too.
I rang back and checked it just comes off the balance not the monthly payment. And I have got four years and eight months left on the mortgage.

It's just which bit of maths the bank do.  If you pay £100 off the bank chooses to calculate that that reduces the minimum payments from £200 to £199.55 or something than say the payment is still £200 but the mortgage will finish 2 weeks earlier.  But so long as you pay "£200" each month rather than "the minimum payment" you will finish paying it sooner.  Reducing the minimum payment gives you the flexibility to either pay slightly less each month or get rid of it sooner.