Mortgage free in Forever Home :-)

KajiKita

Bit of a post payday update from me 😊

I have no idea what was payrise, what was bonus, what was second bonus (long story!) etc. but the net result was that, after making sure I have enough for my standard outgoings before next payday, I had c. £4K to play with. I have divvied this up between savings (now at 4.7 months of absolute minimums emergency fund over and above my YNAB pots), treat money and an OP of £1,096.85 😊 That OP along with other small payments I have made this month means I have OP’d in total £1,130.32 this month - I am DELIGHTED! 😊

Even without adding any more OPs this month, I have got the target OP per month to meet, down to £95.79 (this is to get us to below 50% LTV before remortgaging in mid to late 2024). With a decent lump in savings now and my pay rise I see this as completely achievable! 😊

The first thing I am going to treat myself to from my 25% of the excess from this month are more copper rings to protect my plants (both edibles and ornamentals) from slugs! 😊 The rest I will sit and think about for a while.

Mr KK is selling things …. (such as a Jeep engine and a trailer).  But rather than giving me funds to use for OPs he is funding the works on the house that we are doing atm, so I can carry on doing OPs 😊

KK

Merlin's_Beard

Congratulations! That's a huge amount and well done to get there while having good EFs and treat money too. It will take the load off  future months as well.

KajiKita

Merlin's_Beard said:

Congratulations! That's a huge amount and well done to get there while having good EFs and treat money too. It will take the load off  future months as well.

Load off future months - this!!! 😊

KK

SandyShores

That is a very nice payday!   Congrats on the overpayments and being close to your 50% LTV - great position to be in.  Paydays like these make all the hard work feel worth it too.

KajiKita

I keep losing posts here! Grrrr …. I know I did one yesterday morning ….
Anyway ….
Concreting of the deck / patio happened yesterday. Mr KK started at 8.30am and stopped at 4.30pm after doing all the tidying. We need to take the ramp down today and I have a tip run booked this afternoon to get rid of all the gravel dumpy and cement bags. We are hoping to be able to inaugurate it tomorrow morning with chairs and cuppa …. 😊
I learned how to screed and use a float trowel - go me! 💪😊 Apparently I am an acceptable apprentice! 😂

Around all this, I dealt with two loads of washing and got them line dried, got my second earlies in after clearing the bed of weeds (it wasn’t too bad as I had been over it before) and beat back a LOT of bindweed. There is more of the latter to do, but that might have to wait for tomorrow as it keeps raining heavily here this morning. 

I am aiming to pot on my tomatoes today as I won’t put them out in the greenhouse until end of May and start sowing things like runner beans, cucumbers etc 😊 Greenhouse washing will also have to wait until Monday. I would have done it yesterday as it was properly warm in the sun but Mr KK had commandeered the hose pipe for the concreting operation! 😉

KK

KajiKita

Photo of before …..

KajiKita

Photo of completed concrete ….

Only one traditional mishap of Catness 🐈 …. Lord Percy of Poshpaws from next door galloped through it when it was half done (we tried but just couldn’t stop him!) … and then wiped his feet all over his dad’s pride and joy sports car! Whoops!! 😂

KajiKita

It’s been a mildly frustrating day as we kept getting heavy, random showers. Did manage to get the tip run done and found some healthier cosmos seedlings in the local plant centre. I am going to copy the way they have sown their pea seeds with two, diagonally opposite in a six chamber tray. Three of those trays from the plant centre would be £10.50, whereas if I do that I should only spend c. £2 or so on compost, get good germination and no mouse seed eating happening! 

I have decluttered a plastic bag of random ‘stuff’ in the living room that has been ‘looking at me’ for months. This is part of the tidying, planning etc that needs to happen to swop the living room around. Some of the contents have been recycled, the rest of it has been more effectively stored. I found a posh little speaker thing that I think I bought for use with my laptop / Spotify back when I was living away during the week …. Never really managed to get it to work (Spotify rather than the speaker) - not sure whether to try selling it or try again with it ‘playing’ a radio station through my laptop (would that work?) in my office so I can have music in there. Need to have a fiddle with this at some point. 

I have also done some calculations based on my new pay rate. Taking into consideration my YNAB pot savings, and the 4.5 months of EF I have now, it appears that I *might* be able to OP £1050 pcm! This seems wildly unlikely so i will watch happens when my pay lands next month without embellishment from bonus etc, actually find out properly what my take home pay will be and track what impacts / reduces that £1050 number ….

KK

Baileys_Babe

Fingers crossed your overpayment figures are correct. Make sure you know what the maximum you can overpay per mortgage year as it varies wildly from mortgage to mortgage, you don't want to be charged for the pleasure of clearing your mortgage early.
When we were in a position to overpay a lot as soon as we had paid in the maximum for that year we saved the excess (gaining interest to add to our overpayments) and when the new mortgage year started we could overpay a lump sum and then continue as before. Also when our mortgage product ended and before the next product we were able to pay off a lump sum without penalty.

KajiKita

Baileys_Babe said:

Fingers crossed your overpayment figures are correct. Make sure you know what the maximum you can overpay per mortgage year as it varies wildly from mortgage to mortgage, you don't want to be charged for the pleasure of clearing your mortgage early.
When we were in a position to overpay a lot as soon as we had paid in the maximum for that year we saved the excess (gaining interest to add to our overpayments) and when the new mortgage year started we could overpay a lump sum and then continue as before. Also when our mortgage product ended and before the next product we were able to pay off a lump sum without penalty.

Thanks for the advice 😊 
We are miiiiiiiles off being anywhere near OPing enough to trigger the penalty clause 😉 - ours is a 10% OP allowed per year. As and when we get to it though, I will do as you say and sling the OP allocated funds into a high interest account and then OP the max at the beginning of the calendar year to minimise the interest we pay for the rest of that year. In the meantime I track carefully what OPs we have made (I do them all which simplifies things) and will make sure that when we hit that ceiling we stop! 😉

KK