Go back? No good at all! Go sideways? Impossible! Go forward? Only thing to do! On we go...

Rach273

Hello MSE chums, although I have been lurking about reading others diaries to keep me motivated, I last posted on my own way back in Feb 2021 so I thought it better to start afresh with a shiny new thread.

In my defence, it has been a very busy two years, and I now own a husband, a new house and a small child!

When I last posted, we were still in the process of selling both of our houses to buy together and we finally moved to into our family home in November 2021. Unfortunately, this was at the peak of the post Covid-19 house prices bubble, so it came with an eye-wateringly high mortgage of £363k. More fortunately, we fixed for 5 years at 2.02% and a monthly payment of £1,210.

As of today, the outstanding balance is £346,300 and my target is to get the balance to £313k by the end our 5yr fix, so £50k in 5 years which equates to around £11k in overpayments.

I know this is not a huge amount compared to some, but I have been guilty in the past of setting unrealistic goals and then giving up, so I am trying to balance my obsessive desire to be mortgage free with a mindful goal of enjoying the here and now (without spending all of my money on plants for the garden!).

Husband has been self-employed for nearly a year and as of December I will be officially part-time working three days a week, so it is even more important to make our money work as hard as it can for us, particularly if we want to add to our family in the future. 

I have tracked my income and outgoings on various excel spreadsheets for over a decade now, so I am as confident as I can be in the figures for day to day (This is a trait I apparently have inherited from my grandmother who religiously ticks off all of her collated receipts against the monthly bank statement before filing everything in a large collection of ring binders spanning the years. At least mine is stored electronically!). 
But I do not have confidence that I know enough about pensions and investments and the suchlike to be able to forecast what the future might look like for us. 35 is fast approaching and I know I do not want to still be working at 68...

So I am making a pledge to post here at least once a month, keep reading all your inspiring diaries, brave the pensions board to see what I can learn and remembering to keep the balance between paying off the future and living here and now

LeighofMar

Sounds like a sensible plan and achievable goals. That's the name of the game. Congratulations on the husband, house, and child.

beanielou

Happy shiny new diary 

Rach273

A week flown by already. It's been a bit of a spendy one; £34 spent on tickets to a local agricultural show, and £50 spent on fb marketplace for a travel cot and child's bike seat ready for our upcoming trip to France to visit the Irish cousins. I cannot wait for 5 nights of sunshine and cheese with nothing to do but swim in the river, cycle along the canal tow path and stay up late playing scrabble - bliss! 
I have managed to cash out £11.18 on Prolific this week which is good going for me, and I remembered to order my contact lenses through a cashback site.
I have also opened a savings account at 4.12% - not the highest on offer I know, but with my current bank so saves the hassle of switching about. Jus need to decide whether to divert mortgage the overpayments here or not. I know in theory it's better to earn more interest, but if it's paid off the mortgage I can't spend it on anything else!
 

Rach273

I love the start of the start of the month as it's when I get to do my money shuffling;

Mortgage overpayment of £193.19 made, balance now stands at £345,500. There is something very satisfying about seeing a nice round balance every time I log into the baking app.

£26.16 made from Prolific in August shunted across to my shiny new savings account. 

Nothing doing on the premium bonds this draw. This is where we keep our emergency fund, and thank goodness we have one, because our boiler now has a shiny but alarming 'do not use' sticker on the front after it was found to be corroded and leaking fumes during it's annual service. It is 23 years old, so it wasn't entirely unexpected, but does mean the chances of finding replacement parts are slim to none. Thankfully, as it is in the old coal shed it is not leaking fumes into the house and we can continue to use it at our own risk.

Car insurance renewal came through at £364. It was £214 last year. Managed to move elsewhere for £212 less £40 cashback. Insurance premium renewals are criminal.

Non MSE news I have lost 6lb since returning from France. I'm sure most of this was holiday cheese weight, but I have set myself the target of another stone by Christmas to get back to my pre pregnancy weight and hopefully back into most of my wardrobe.

savingholmes

Good luck on your journey and congrats on the weight loss and recent OP.

Rach273

Another month has flown by!

Mortgage overpayment sent £272.39, a bit of a stretch but if its gone out of the account I can't spend it.
£50 premium bond win reinvested in the emergency fund.

Shiny new boiler installed wiped out our non-emergency savings pots and some, so the goal is to get these re-filled ASAP so that i don't have to withdraw the from premium bonds.

Managed to open the Nationwide 8% fixed saver, but made the mistake of opening a joint one rather than one each. Guess it doesn't matter too much as we can't afford to send £400 a month there yet.

£25.97 on Prolific for September squirrelled away. 

Need to get a handle on the grocery shopping - costs have gone up hugely despite meal planning. I know there is three of us that need feeding now, but there's been too many top up shops and not enough making do with what's in the cupboard for my liking.

Am another 6lb down on the scale this month and starting to fit into my clothes again, another 8lb before Christmas would be great, but fully expecting the rate of loss to slow soon

savingholmes

Sounds a fantastic month. Well done on the weightloss and the saver.