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Ding! Ding! All change, please... (now replaced with new diary on MFW)
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It's all looking good on the housing front! 🤞
The Primani oval cotton pads sound very good value - I wasn't aware they sold these. I will have to investigate next time I'm in our big town. Thanks for the tip - I get through loads!😀Finally Debt Free! - July 2016 🌟
Finished Emergency Fund- £10,000 April 2017
🌟
RETIRED: MAY 2021!!!!😀🎆
My diary: “Seasidegal's Scrimpy Retirement Diary!”4 -
All sounding great EHJust to mention while I remember, do check out wood burners carefully if/ when you get to that decision. You need good filtering to avoid the health risks from their output and I suspect legal requirements will come in.Debt free May 2016... DFW#2 in progress
Campervan paid off summer '21... MFW progress tbc4 -
A 3 link chain is great. How lovely to be going on holiday with your sale and purchase well underway - good timing.
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Good news on the short chain for your home move.Achieve FIRE/Mortgage Neutrality in 2030
1) MFW Nov 21 £202K now £169.8K Equity 37.1%
2) £1.3K Net savings after CCs 16/1/26 (but owed £1.1K) so £2.4K
3) Mortgage neutral by 06/30 (AVC £34.8K + Lump Sums DB £4.6K + (25% of SIPP 1.3K) = 40.6/£127.5K target 31.8% 16/11/25
(If took bigger lump sum = 62.7K or 49.2%)
4) FI Age 60 income target £17.1/30K 57% (if mortgage and debts repaid - need more otherwise) (If bigger lump sum £15.8/30K 52.67%)
5) SIPP £5.2K updated 16/1/262 -
Just caught up after our mid-April holiday - in light of bee season I am very much behind.
Very happy for you on the house front. The house we like is under offer after they reduced the price by £45k :'( and no sign of a buyer for ours. Should agent million call next week I would go as far as offering the full asking price as cash, and we could rent this place outSave £12k in 2025 #2 I saved £14,660.97 of £6000 or 244.35% of my target. The 2026 Save £12k in 2026 thread is here
OS Grocery Challenge in 2025 I finished the year at £2880.99/£3000 or 96.03% of my annual spend so I am sticking with a £3000 annual budget for 2026
I also Reverse Meal Plan on that thread and grow much of our own premium price fruit and veg, joining in on the grow your own in 2026 discussion thread
My keep within our budget diary is here4 -
That's some reduction in price SL...Achieve FIRE/Mortgage Neutrality in 2030
1) MFW Nov 21 £202K now £169.8K Equity 37.1%
2) £1.3K Net savings after CCs 16/1/26 (but owed £1.1K) so £2.4K
3) Mortgage neutral by 06/30 (AVC £34.8K + Lump Sums DB £4.6K + (25% of SIPP 1.3K) = 40.6/£127.5K target 31.8% 16/11/25
(If took bigger lump sum = 62.7K or 49.2%)
4) FI Age 60 income target £17.1/30K 57% (if mortgage and debts repaid - need more otherwise) (If bigger lump sum £15.8/30K 52.67%)
5) SIPP £5.2K updated 16/1/263 -
The EA where I live seem to be asking ridiculous prices for the houses and then having to reduce.savingholmes said:That's some reduction in price SL...I Believe.....
That it isn't always enough, to be forgiven by others.
Sometimes, you have to learn to forgive yourself.
Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery
Today is a gift. That's why it is called the present.
happiness isn't achieved by getting extra things,
but by getting rid of the things that make you unhappy3 -
Most stuff is going on and then reducing round here too it seems Chrystal - although I think that is partly that the market is dropping round here as places mostly don’t seem to feel particularly overpriced to start with. Sorry to hear that the place you liked has gone under offer SL - although hopefully that is because it’s not “your house” and the real one for you is still out there…
We have been Achieving Stuff here this weekend. Voluntary role stuff has been moving on apace - we’re now waiting for our first phase orders to go out, but in the meantime we’ve got stuff to be going on with - contact to be made with some of our third party bars for the event, we’ve worked out some more layout stuff, found a glitch in the database which would have resulted in one brewery not getting their order at all, and plenty more odds and ends to be sorted too.Our trip to the beer festival on Friday evening was good fun - met up with a few pals up there too which was lovely. Cracking fish and chips for tea, the beers of course - although I only had a couple of pints (all drunk in thirds so a few different beers tried) and the bus each way from/ back to the station - but very impressively the bus was only £1 each way. We ended up on the last train back which would have meant a 35 minute wait at the next town up the line - but when we got there the barriers were open so we headed out to see if we could get a bus instead, handily we have buses running through from Stansted all night. And it turned out that we could, and in less than the 35 minutes, and it only took 20 minutes to reach the stop at the end of our road which was wonderful - far better than a nearly 2 mile walk back from the station for sure! Of course at the moment only £2 each as well so a complete bargain!Today has mostly been about holiday stuff - we finished getting the hamper that we use for all sorts of odds and ends packed up - that carries everything from maps and books through to various odd bits of food stuffs and all sorts of other bits too. Clothes also are all packed now aside from the stuff we’ll use in the first few days. Washing is up to date, and joy of joys this morning I managed to get the contents of freezer 2 into freezer 1, so freezer 2 is now switched off and has been gently defrosting itself all day.The other main win today is that we have applied for our mortgage. 1st D1rect - a 5 year fix but with unlimited overpayments allowed and a rate at 4.03% which is by far the best we’d see. In fact the product generally was by far the best we have seen - it’s got a low application fee too (under £500) so fingers crossed the application will all go smoothly. The unlimited overpayments thing is incredibly unusual in a fixed rate so we were delighted to find that!🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25
Balance as at 31/08/25 = £ 95,450.00. Balance as at 31/12/25 = £ 91,100.00
SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her10 -
Ooh, sounds like an ideal mortgage! Well done! Hope it comes through quickly 😊😊4
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Agree with @Cheery_Daff - sounds a great mortgage. Didn't get a mortgage like that until the last couple years before we paid it off.5
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