Pay off mortgage and start having even more fun 😁

Greying_Pilgrim

newgirly - not too sure if you listen to the radio at all, but Bob Mortimer is a guest on the R2 Breakfast Show tomorrow (Friday) morning.  Scott Mills is filling in for Zoe Ball, at the mo, but main guests are usually on in between 8am and 9am on a Friday.  Naturally if you didn't want to listen to it all, it will be on i-player with the advantage of fast forward/rewind! 😁

Greying X

newgirly

Ooh thank you Greying I will seek that out 😊

Bit of a spendy day today, I bought  some gingerbread g@laxy pods for the coffee machine to take away and ordered some birthday presents for dil, mostly books (second hand where possible)  but also a day pass for two for an animal park she’s not been to before.
 I did  manage to get a really good Lidl waste box too today, we are away Saturday but I thought ds2 and dil could use most of it, there was some good stuff in there this time.

Went to get my warfarin book photocopied at the doctors and requested a repeat, so annoying having to do that every time, it’s either scan it and send over or go in person, what do elderly housebound people do I wonder if they are not so tech savvy? Everything else can be ordered on the nhs app, just not that. 

Another bill has come in for the last phone appointment with the specialist, it was a seven minute call to tell me the results of the heart monitor, £225 😱 the monitor was charged at a higher rate because they ordered it so I’d hoped it included the results conversation too, clearly not. Oh well I can’t complain as it’s peace of mind, well as long as everything stays calm when I come off the last lot of the stuff that forces your heart to behave, I should know in a few weeks but I’m optimistic 🙂

I need a to-do list for tomorrow :


Finish packing - done 

cat litter tray - done 

clean house - done 

do last little bit of washing - done 

collect prescription if at chemists - done 

pay doctors bill - done 

juggle finances and do transfers if dh gets paid (probably not as they moved the date from 24th to whatever the last day is 😡) -done 

update finances on here and mfw thread -done 

sort out balance transfers to new card -done 

i think that’s it! 

newgirly

💙💙💙💙💙💙💙MONTH 23 OF THE 33 CHALLENGE💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙

Balance at start Oct 2022: £61,452.11 

Balance at 30th August 2024: £15,995.83

Total since start: £45,457.08 

Total for August: £2,246.17 



A good month for the mortgage but not such a good month for the new 0% cc 😆 As I mentioned before, to keep the same mortgage end date of March 2025 (knocking three months off the 33 month challenge) I’ve loaded lots of expenses on there. My 50th cruise balance payment, echo scans for all the kids and a couple of medical follow up things for me, it’s looking like with the transfer fee the credit card will be at around £3,700 ish. I shall pay the minimum amount per month until we are mf, then the rest will be split over the nine months from April- Dec next year. 

Although hopefully we will be mortgage free at the end of March, we have so many trips booked for next year and now this cc to pay for that we will be paying out the same per month as the mortgage until the end of 2025, oops! 

CathT

Great v1nted sales and mortgage freedom is so close now! 

newgirly

Thanks Cath, I do feel like I’ve cheated a bit with the 0% cc but we have medical stuff to pay for which couldn’t be helped and it’s also a celebration year of being mf, me being 50 and recovering from surgery 😊

I’m awake far too early today, we are off to York for a week with my parents, they have kindly let us have the bigger room with the en-suite and tv, which means I can slope off early when tired 😆 we have a lot planned as instead of mooching around for a few days like usual (us not my parents as they stay in the flat quite a bit) we are going to visit the Emmerdale tv set, a few dinners out, an overnight stay in Durham, plus probably another trip to the railway museum as the flying Scotsman was out last time we went, then York minster my absolute favourite place ever, for a new exhibition. Hopefully mum and dad will join us this time on lots of these. We will also spend time going for very early morning coffees and watching the world go by 🙂 It sounds a bit sentimental but that was one of things i was looking forward to most when wondering if I would be ok , as well as being back on a cruise ship of course 😆

Budgets for everything are way too low, our grocery/petrol budget is now down to £375 pm 😱 this is to make way for the new minimum payment for the 0% cc until we start to pay it back properly in April. Ds2 and dil now buy all their own food and that’s what’s made this hopefully achievable. It does however seem like it might be a bit of challenge. Xmas food and bits and bobs budget is hefty though, I’ve stuck to my £1 a day savings pot since dec1st so we will have a full years worth in time, plus a £50 new vista survey M&S voucher plus around £20 I started saving in gift cards at the start of the year although that fell by the wayside. So enough for a few bottles of bubbly and some fancy food as we are entertaining this year. I’ll still let my dad/brother supply the cheese board as they buy green puffs of mouldy smoke that cost a fortune 😂 we will have the money for real tree too, but voting this year seems to still be swaying towards our old retro huge one, which looks like it’s been decorated by a child in the 70’s 🌲 

Anyway, time to get up and check the bags once last time, we are off early, wish me luck trying for oasis tickets, out of over 30 of ds1’s friends trying plus our family nobody got presale codes, so it’s very unlikely anyone will get tickets, there’s apparently around 14 million trying to get them  ☹️

LadyWithAPlan

Glad you are healing and feeling better. 

The mf date is so close - I get why you are using the cc - whilst effectively it’s the same cash it’s good to gameify this huge goal 

what happened to the PIL dog? 

Go you on the Vinted ! I have now sold 2 things I think treating the money separately (or just holding for OPs) is a good motivator to get more listed 

Jessy103

Have a lovely time in York! X

P.S I went to see my mum yesterday and I mentioned Bob Mortimer and turns out she has he's autobiography, so I nabbed it! 🤣

newgirly

Hi Lady, well done on the vinted selling it really does get addictive! 

Hi jessy, what a result, enjoy! 

Yesterday we went to the Emmerdale set, which was interesting, we met a cast member (dr. Liam if anyone does happen to watch 😂) I think mum enjoyed it, then we went for a massive roast dinner in York afterwards. I’m finding all this so tiring though and we are only a couple of days in, today we are going to Durham overnight. It was poor dh’s birthday yesterday and he spent half the day waiting at a hotel with dad while mum and I went on the tour - it was the only day available. I shall try to make it up to him today and get him in a couple of pubs 😆

newgirly

Awake far too early today, even with a suitcase of extra pillows I’m still a bit uncomfortable 😳 Durham was a great choice to visit, with some stunning views of the river wear. We arrived fairly late as dads had a bad back, so will visit the cathedral today before we go back to York. 

Last nights dinner was in the hotel restaurant and was £££ 😱 we have spent far too much already as we are out with my parents for meals mostly, we tend to go for offers on at chain restaurants or spoons if we are away, but they don’t 😆 we still have a very expensive one planned for Thursday that we are paying for to say thanks for everything they have done this year. Our budget was £500 for the week, perhaps I was a bit naive and that’s nowhere near enough in this circumstance, it does add to the stress a bit, I find it hard to splurge on things that don’t bother me like posh dinners that cost a lot, luckily we will all be eating in the flat the next couple of days. If I need to i will dip into the vinted money, but hopefully it won’t come to that 😩 This is why I like cruises so much, no food bills 😬

There’s been some interesting conversations while we have been away, trying to debate how much harder it is for the younger generation to be able to buy without having to move a really long way from home. I’m not sure that my parents can see how vast the disparity is 😆 Using our home as an example, what was worth six times our wage when we bought (big deposit from previous house sale as this was our third home!) is now seventeen times - and that’s on a wage that has risen slightly as dhs now in his 50’s. For ds2 say it would be twenty three times his wages and he’s now a similar age to me when we bought. 

We had a three bed terrace in a nice London suburb with me as a sahm and three children at 25. Dh was on what would probably be called minimum wage now or close to, I didn’t work as I had two babies and a toddler. We bought our first flat with no deposit,  neither of us had input from family money wise and yet I was still in my own first home at 20 in london while working in a local clothes shop. 

Compared today we have had it so much easier, my parents generation even more so house price wise and although they had a period of higher interest they managed to pay it. It’s a worry and I do feel guilty that it was so much easier for us. 

Don’t get me wrong we ended up with a way bigger mortgage than when we bought the house, due to low wages and bad management 😂 but at least we got a home in the first place, even if we are still paying off the mortgage when we should be mf! 

They could of course move much further away, but I think that sad that you have to really. More expensive towns and cities still need lower paid workers to keep running, it can’t all be high earners. 

Anyway, moan over 😁 

newgirly

Yesterday was a a good day, Dad and I went to York minster which is one of my favourite places to be 🥰 although it used to be £10 and now it’s £18 😱 although  the tickets last a year. Then for a coffee with dh followed by a posh wine and cheese lunch out (or lemonade and cheese for me 😆) so another spendy day. Today we are off to Whitby and possibly Robin Hoods bay, then it’s a meal in town tonight, I’ve no idea how I’ll stay awake for that.

Dh has been chipping in financially while we have been here so we may well scrape by , even with the extra meals we ended up having fingers crossed. In the scheme of things it’s not too bad as it’s our only holiday this year and travel and accommodation was free, so I can’t complain about food really 😆

I’m really putting on weight at the moment, probably a stone since the operation ☹️ so something needs to be done about that when I get home, diet changes can affect medication though so I’ll have to be more mindful. I’m certainly not buying a new wardrobe and I’ve not many clothes that fit, never mind the health implications the clothes are the important bit hey 😂 This year has been full of challenges one way or another so this should hopefully be one of the easier ones to achieve, I need to start the 50’s off as best I can which gives me until March!