julicorn's journey 3 - The House on the Hill

debtfreewannabe321

Your trip to Lyon sounded amazing 😍!
And all those other breaks....I look forward to hearing about them all, I think lots of little breaks in amongst real life and spreadsheets sounds a great way to live 😁.

julicorn

debtfreewannabe321 said:

Your trip to Lyon sounded amazing 😍!
And all those other breaks....I look forward to hearing about them all, I think lots of little breaks in amongst real life and spreadsheets sounds a great way to live 😁.

Thank you - it was honestly so fantastic, we keep talking about how glad we are we did it! It felt like such a silly spur of the moment thing when I booked it, but we just had the best time. 
And the holiday-spreadsheet combo really is living the dream I started on my allotment spreadsheet too although that one is a bit of a monster and I'm never really happy with it. I need an app like YNAB, but for gardening. Any app developers around?  

seventh88

Just catching up a bit. Lovely to hear what a wonderful time you had - those are the best spends aren’t they? The ones that just make your heart sing, that you’ll remember forever. Well done on your financial goals lately, seems like things are really progressing. 

julicorn

seventh88 said:

Just catching up a bit. Lovely to hear what a wonderful time you had - those are the best spends aren’t they? The ones that just make your heart sing, that you’ll remember forever. Well done on your financial goals lately, seems like things are really progressing. 

Thank you so much for checking in, you're absolutely right! 

We've actually just booked another similar short trip for 2026: We'll be away when Rosalia is playing in London, but we managed to get tickets for Barcelona in April instead, which is very exciting - she's from Barcelona too so it's quite cool being able to see her on home turf, so to speak (We've also slightly adjusted our Interrail plans so we won't be in Barcelona twice.)

Only 6 days until the start of the Hurtigruten! We bought 3 bottles of Aldi red wine to take with us, really making that holiday budget work for us  

Chili81

De-luking to say Rosalia in barcelona sounds great!  Im chuffed me and friends got london tickets.
All your trips sound great. 

julicorn

Chili81 said:

De-luking to say Rosalia in barcelona sounds great!  Im chuffed me and friends got london tickets.
All your trips sound great. 

That's awesome, I hope you have the best time seeing her in London! I tried for Paris and Lisbon first and didn't get tickets for either, and had very low hopes for Barcelona, but then really lucked out - I was only around 6,000th in the queue, and saw some people online who had like 100,000 people in front of them.  I hate ticket buying, it's so unnecessarily stressful. 

seventh88

We've actually just booked another similar short trip for 2026: We'll be away when Rosalia is playing in London, but we managed to get tickets for Barcelona in April instead, which is very exciting - she's from Barcelona too so it's quite cool being able to see her on home turf, so to speak (We've also slightly adjusted our Interrail plans so we won't be in Barcelona twice.)

Only 6 days until the start of the Hurtigruten! We bought 3 bottles of Aldi red wine to take with us, really making that holiday budget work for us  

Ahh brilliant have an amazing time! Ha ha, and well done on sticking to that holiday budget!

julicorn

We're back from the Hurtigruten and had an absolutely amazing time! 
Here's a photo I took of the Northern Lights a few days into the voyage. 

It's hard to summarise, to be honest. The ship was fabulous, the crew were super lovely, the food delicious, and we really enjoyed seeing all those little port towns along the way. 
It wasn't as cold as we expected, I think we didn't even get any temperatures below 0, but we still saw plenty of snow. 
I found the polar night quite relaxing, and it wasn't dark all the time - we got some beautiful blue light and saw some amazing landscapes along the way, although we definitely want to go on another journey in the summer now (maybe a port-to-port version, staying in Lofoten for a bit... the planning has already begun!). 

We made some friends as well, who've invited us over to North Essex around the time we're going to Center Parcs, let's see if we can firm up that plan  

Mr julicorn was expectedly quite sea sick at times (we also hit a maximum windspeed of 187km/h (or 116 miles per hour), so he wasn't the only one!) and has been a bit land sick since we came back home, but he seems to be feeling better today. He also still thinks it was completely worth it, and is up for a repeat - quite the trooper!

Anyway, happy new year you all! I hope you had a good start to 2026. 

Finance update to follow shortly. I should say, we managed to stay on budget for the holiday, so that's something for sure

julicorn

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

julicorn said:

End of November update:

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £74,454.31

Mortgage: £213,005.57

% towards being mortgage neutral: 35.0%

Total retirement pot: £201,061.05

% of early retirement savings: 21.6%

End of December update:

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £77,493.45

Mortgage: £212,517.37

% towards being mortgage neutral: 36.5%

Total retirement pot: £205,494.55

% of early retirement savings: 22.1%

End of January update. Also worth noting that the overall goal has increased with inflation to £949,500.00, so the percentage of early retirement savings is based on a different overall target. 

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £84,246.03

Mortgage: £211,503.04

% towards being mortgage neutral: 39.8%

Total retirement pot: £217,487.16

% of early retirement savings: 22.9%


My book currently stands at around 14,000 words, for what it's worth

Stopping by for an end of Feb update with the figures only for now - struggling with a few things at the moment and trying to work out what I want to do about work mainly, so things might either get shaken up quite dramatically or not, who knows. Will post a proper update when I have the mental bandwidth. 

The stock market has not been doing great this month, let's put it like that, but we made some half decent contributions (to the ISA especially) which have at least made up for the reduction in value. 

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £86,191.96

Mortgage: £211,010.18

% towards being mortgage neutral: 40.8%

Total retirement pot: £217,309.29

% of early retirement savings: 22.9%

I'll stop by for a more in depth update next few days, but here is one with just the figures. Investments have not been great as we probably all know, and we're officially no longer half-millionaires when it comes to our total net worth - I guess that means we can open another bottle of bubbly as and when we hit that milestone again!

Current figures are as follows:

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £84,779.86

Mortgage: £210,515.79

% towards being mortgage neutral: 40.3%

Total retirement pot: £211,012.58

% of early retirement savings: 22.2%

My income will be much lower from April so I guess the heady days of the really high investments are over for the moment, although I will try and see what side hustles I can fire up or reignite. 

Stopping by for an end-of-April update! The stock market has further declined, so even with additional contributions it's been a step backwards rather than forwards. The part time work is going well so far though, so that's definitely a massive positive!

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £83,417.55

Mortgage: £210,019.87

% towards being mortgage neutral: 39.7%

Total retirement pot: £205,050.93

% of early retirement savings: 21.7%

Time for an end-of-May update Things have definitely gone up this month which was nice to see. I also went to a Rebel Finance Group meet-up, which is broadly about early retirement, but people were so supportive about me cutting down my hours that it made me look at it in a whole new light (not taking a step back from early retirement, but rather taking some of it even earlier). 
Anyway, here are the figures:

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £88,986.80

Mortgage: £209,522.41

% towards being mortgage neutral: 42.4%

Total retirement pot: £215,725.58

% of early retirement savings: 22.7%

I just noticed that the mortgage is now under £210k as well, that's a nice little milestone  
Oh, and we're half-millionaires again, so had some bubbly to celebrate that (again) the other week
I hope you're all doing well  

I know my updates are pretty much non existent right now, but I should at least give some numbers updates!

End of June:
Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £92,611.87

Mortgage: £209,023.41

% towards being mortgage neutral: 44.3%

Total retirement pot: £223,058.73
% of early retirement savings: 23.5%

My own retirement account has just gone above £100k again as well. 😊

My main next hurdle was going to be £225k, let's see when we get there. 🤞

Here I am with another numbers update Good market movements this month, so although we've contributed a little less, it's all going in the right direction at the moment. 

End of July:
Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £99,024.34
Mortgage: £208,522.86
% towards being mortgage neutral: 47.5%

Total retirement pot: £236,219.24
% of early retirement savings: 24.9%

We hit the £225k retirement savings milestone this month, which is quite exciting! The next milestone to aim for will be having 25% of our retirement savings goal. As you can see, we're not far off that at the moment, although we all know things can go up and down. 

In other news, I broke my ankle three weeks ago! So I've been a little trapped at home picking up old craft projects. At least the weather has been pretty variable, making me not quite as jealous of the people wandering around outside - and I'm getting a lot more mobile now again as well. We're off to a holiday in Cornwall beginning of September and I hope I'll be properly back on my feet again by then, fingers crossed.  

Thank you both!  

As it's the last weekend of August and investment amounts won't change any more, it's time for another numbers update. 

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £101,127.09
Mortgage: £208,020.76
% towards being mortgage neutral: 48.6%

Total retirement pot: £239,945.07
% of early retirement savings: 25.3%, target date: February '36
% of early retirement savings - lower goal: 29.1%, target date: October '34

The credit card has taken a bit of a hit this month because the Hurtigruten balance is due, so I'll need to take some money out of a savings account to cover that next month, but it's all saved and accounted for in YNAB.  

It's time for another monthly update, and this time we've hit a really big milestone - quarter of a million in retirement savings! I'm really excited, definitely gotta celebrate this weekend (in style, at the Lady Gage concert - I cannot wait! )

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £106,621.01
Mortgage: £207,517.10
% towards being mortgage neutral: 51.4%

Total retirement pot: £250,324.20
% of early retirement savings: 26.4%, target date: January '36
% of early retirement savings - lower goal: 30.3%, target date: September '34

Writing these down also made me realise there's a couple of other milestones we've hit this month: Over 50% towards being mortgage neutral, and over 30% of our lower goal of retirement savings. It's been a good month! 

In non-money news, the holiday in Cornwall was absolutely wonderful, we had such a great time. We're actually off to Corfu with my mum in a few weeks as well, over my birthday, so it's definitely quite a holiday-heavy tail end of the year. Feeling like a lucky duck right now  

Another new month, another numbers update!

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £113,112.89
Mortgage: £207,011.88
% towards being mortgage neutral: 54.6%

Total retirement pot: £263,313.69
% of early retirement savings: 27.7%, target date: October '35
% of early retirement savings - lower goal: 31.9%, target date: June '34

Corfu was absolutely lovely as well, we had a really nice week there. I got quite ill after we came back home, but am finally feeling like a human again. We might go and see some fireworks tonight if the weather holds up, which I'm really looking forward to  

It's the end of November, and time for another update  

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £114,521.80
Mortgage: £206,505.10
% towards being mortgage neutral: 55.5%

Total retirement pot: £264,400.93
% of early retirement savings: 27.8%, target date: November '35
% of early retirement savings - lower goal: 32.0%, target date: July '34

A small increase, mainly based on the contributions we made this month (which have actually been pretty healthy - Prolific has been kind to me, and a couple of regular savers matured as well). Investment values have actually decreased a little, but I can't really complain after some strong months. 

End of 2025 update time!

Current figures:

Investment ISAs: £117,432.68
Mortgage: £205,996.75
% towards being mortgage neutral: 57.0%

Total retirement pot: £267,665.47
% of early retirement savings: 28.2%, target date: November '35
% of early retirement savings - lower goal: 32.4%, target date: July '34

Our investments were pretty flat this month, but we made some good contributions, so that's all good. In total, our retirement pot has increased by £62,170.92 this year, which is pretty great especially given I cut back my hours so drastically in April. 
For 2026, I'd really like to increase my income again a bit, maybe adding another day to my work week again. It's just tricky for the business to support that at the moment. There's also still uncertainty over whether we'll be able to keep going at all, as mentioned before, so I'll have to take things as they come for the moment and just put my efforts where I can. And really, I can be grateful for the progress we've made already. 

debtfreewannabe321

That holiday sounded amazing, seeing the northern lights is on my bucket list! Fab pic.
Great figures to end the year on too! Well done!