Buying a little piece of Middle England; Manifesting my way to mortgage free.

ladybird1106

Good luck, cheering you on from the side lines. 
Love 🐞

killerpeaty

How are the kids holding up? It's so hard to go through a loss.

Sounds like you are finding your right level of frugality, there's no point in setting yourself up for fail as long as you aren't getting yourselves into debt.

Parents evening sounds bonkers honestly!

South_coast

Maybe the teachers just fancied a bit of the thrill of speed dating!

debtfreewannabe321

Morning all, thanks for stopping by everyone   
The kids, well, DS never came back from his dad's house after christmas and DD came back exhausted, emotionally and physically I think having not slept well. She's had a few tears in front of me but more behind closed doors. I encouraged it and told her not to bottle it up and it isn't what her step-mum would have wanted. DS i think has probably been shouldering his dad's emotional ups and downs. Their dad already drank too much before it happened so I am dreading to think what has happened since. I am hoping he pulled his socks up for the two kids he has in the house (our DS and also he is now looking after an emotional teen who has just lost her mum and she has been split up from her brother because he opted to live with his dad). Blended families are such a mess at times like this it makes me sad  I get DS & DD both back next week together though so I am looking forward to it, not that either want to talk to me about it which upsets me further. DD French teacher stopped me at work yesterday to talk to me about it and I could feel myself welling up. It's so hard to support someone when they reject you from helping.

The parent's evening was just like speed dating!!! Well from what I have heard of it, I haven't ever done it but I have friends who have done it and they said it's manic...like parent's evening then by all accounts 

DP is down to his last few £s in his bank account (we started on an overdraft so at least he is still in the black) we have 13 days till pay day  unsure if we can pull this one in the bag to be honest. I have around £78 left in my bank account after payday as I had to pay the catalogue, half the electric bill and some DDs are still coming out for mobiles, N0W Tv subscriptions etc. So I can't pay the rest of the electric & gas comfortably so I will leave it for now. I get paid next around the same time as DP and we will be starting our new month then so we are a tiny bit b^ggered up here 

DP does however have a refund due and he said it should come next week! So that will pay for food if it comes in time. We had a flat tyre and he had to pay for it to be changed, we do get a refund from his work but it has to be processed. That will be over a hundred £ so fingers crossed it comes early.

I keep looking over my budget and it keeps telling me we have excess money and I just cannot see it?! Where on earth has it gone?! I think this morning's job is to sit and look at bank accounts and see just where we have spent out money. Mind you if I was to look at it like  a usual month we are almost three weeks in, and if I hadn't bought the water filter and DP hadn't got a flat tyre then we would be ok...still no excess though hmmm. ALL the more reason to get my emergency fund up and running for things like this. 

I sent another payment over to the mortgage. I have decided to do a PAD to it. Even if it is just £1. That way I pay off almost two months of interest in a year alone if I don't manage bigger payments in any one month. 

Early to work today so next pay cheque should be nice and healthy as I have started early all this week that will be 5 extra hours. Hopefully the same next week and I think these extra hours will, from next month, be sent straight to the emergency fund rather than the OP pot. 

Okay I might be back after having looked at the bank accounts....depends on whether I find anything 

Dinner is HM naan pizza & wedges. I will prep it all before work and DD can probably just cook her own in the air fryer. 

debtfreewannabe321

OH dear, oh dear, OH DEARY me 
I have just been through the bank accounts with a fine tooth comb.
THIS is why I have no money left... THIS is awareness dripping back in 
THIS month since pay day,
I have spent £329.05 on food not £160 
I have spent £99.59 on toiletries not £88.86 (slightly closer to the truth than the deluded spends on food budget though haha).
We have also spent £100 on a new computer screen and computer parts. £113 on the new tyre. £65 on theatre tickets. £100 on the catalogue. £50 on odds and sods just before Christmas (DP got paid early so this is an EVEN longer month than ever!!!) 
Ahhhhhh, so that is where all our money went!
Found it!
 

The food spends...tut tut....dropping into tescos, waitrose, co-op etc for a couple of bits here and there. We also had another big ish shop at the beginning of the pay period which I mistakenly thought was in last pay period so two big shops and lots of small ones. MUST DO BETTER. Will amend my signature.
I have spent a lot of money on toiletries but I have a lot on subscribe and save so every few months I will receive a large order and won't need any more for the foreseeable. I also include in this budget the laundry stuff as it is on subscribe and save with things like my face moisturiser. This probably should go in the food budget and I may do that later on but for now I find it easier to lump it all together. Keeping my sense of humour about it for now though lol

debtfreewannabe321

Oh my goshhhh I am so ditzy. I was trying to make DP new bank account a joint one, I had to scan in digital documents to prove who we were (which is stupid as we both have a current account with this bank). I got my email with his name and my number, and his picture and then his email with my name, his number again and no pictures. TOTALLY messed it up...I don't like technology. URGH. Anyway I was trying to set the joint account up as I thought it high time we had one. And I wanted all our bills moved to that account. So I am trying to get around this without me being added for the meantime as I messed up the digital thing 

I have got on to my water bill account this morning, they sent me a letter telling me I would have a huge bill this year and so therefore they were taking the steps to put it up from £51 to £61....my account is in credit by nearly £100!!!! They omitted to tell me this when sending the scaremongering letter. So I have cancelled my Direct Debit from my account. Put it in DP name and to the new bills account and changed the amount to £52 (It wouldn't let me choose £51 for some reason which was my old amount?). SO win there.

Loss on the banking atm I have no idea how to fix that as all the info is befuddled. I might actually make a face to face appointment in the big town as I hate doing all this over phones and internet.

Council Tax I will cancel after payday (just make sure there wasn't an extra payment for Feb & March) and make a new DD for the new account. 

DP said he will deal with the mortgage and other ones in his name cos at this point I feel like I am gonna throw my laptop with all the passwords, documents and whatever else. I am off for lunch and a lie down before work now. Today and yesterday were both NSD aside from usual DD and SO due out.

killerpeaty

It's good that you found out where the money went. Do you have a method of keeping track throughout the month?

Is it wise to make  a pad if you're scraping for cash right now?

beanielou

I wouls stop the PAD's for now.
Better to concentrate on not going into OD as it is so expensive.
Would it be better to do online shopping for food? 
Avoids these impulse buys & you can keep track of budget?

debtfreewannabe321

killerpeaty said:

It's good that you found out where the money went. Do you have a method of keeping track throughout the month?

Is it wise to make  a pad if you're scraping for cash right now?

beanielou said:

I wouls stop the PAD's for now.
Better to concentrate on not going into OD as it is so expensive.
Would it be better to do online shopping for food? 
Avoids these impulse buys & you can keep track of budget?

Killerpeaty, this is what comes from falling off the MSE wagon I guess. I used to be so obsessive about money I knew where every penny went and then, relationship break ups,  DIY came along and house renovations and divorces and yikes where did the money go...time to get back to tracking it. 
Beanielou I didn't make one yesterday! Thought the same thing lol. I will send DP to the shops he doesn't understand how to shop away from a list anyway so he never ever comes back with extras 

SO yesterday felt like one of those " the longest days" type day. I went to work after finding where all our money had leaked to, and had the worst shift, ended up having an argument with a woman I work with. She has spent the entire time she has worked there moaning at me, shouting at me and arguing with everything I was trying to teach her. I kinda snapped back yesterday and then got screamed at some more as I shouldn't be shouting at her because I was her supervisor. Oh the irony. I had taken it for months on end and she was being particularly rude about someone with a learning disability whilst they were in the room. Sigh. Long story short I spent my evening recounting my version of events in a statement before she went to management above me to complain. I wouldn't mind so much but I am paid perhaps only 50p more an hour than she is but expected to take verbal abuse for months on end. I had enough yesterday and well, she's gone, she walked out. And good riddance she made the work place toxic with her volatility. 

Yesterday before work I did a tarot reading for a friend, she was naughty and paid me when I told her not to. And she paid me way too much!! I also had a refund come through from Am@zon this morning (I have cancelled a subscribe and save we didn't need yet) and DP tyre has been refunded! AND he managed to sell a laptop (an old one we had) and a computer (one he had refurbed so that went into a different pot) all in one day! SO we are back in the black enough to get to payday!! When you put it out to the universe that you are determined to get debt free and you will do anything to stay in the black sometimes the universe lends a hand to help. Very grateful :h

Thankfully it is Friday today because I am ready to see the back of this week Tomorrow I am dropping DD off to ex (well we meet half way) and then we are travelling to Nottingham, then onto just outside Manchester for some more bits DP has agreed to buy off marketplace. Money is cash out of the pot we have of money we have made from his new business venture so not budget money. So a road trip day by all accounts. We might stop at West Bridgford as we enjoy the walks around there. We will see how the weather is and how energetic we are feeling.

Today I will make a small PAD again of £1 and make a meal plan for next week so that I have a shopping list to work with. Fri/Sat/Sun/Mon will be just DP & myself so I think I will do some freezer shopping here to see what I have to make the week's shop cheap. We can do this and I will get to next month in the black I am determined. Oh, did I say we were in actual fact £300 overdrawn last pay period because of Christmas not £200 however I am grateful I had no credit card debt and the catalogue is already paid off! So it isn't any wonder we are limping along with nearly two weeks to go until pay day! We can do this though. I have enough for food now, I have child benefits due Monday and the Monday after so £78 ish there, and all bills are now paid just food expenses to account for. I am quite glad at times like this that DP has a fuel card! I have asked him to work out how much he is spending on miles though this month picking up bits for his side business and to pay that back into the account by payday so we are not docked lots of fuel miles. 

Okay I will update signature and be off to do the meal plan and prep dinner for tonight. 

debtfreewannabe321

I have just received a message from my bank (mortgage)
Good morning, your overpayment allowance for 2024 for sub account 01 is £9,953.11.
You can make unlimited payments during the year! So I can carry on with the PAD (budget allowing of course).