The 'We're saving for a deposit' thread

[Deleted User]

Jaybo10 wrote: »

Hello all,

I've updated my total and we've now started viewing houses (VERY exciting!).

I've also finally got around to submitting a PPI claim so I will see what comes of that.

Try not to eat too many choccy eggs!

Jaybo

There's such a thing as too many choccy eggs!!??

Congrats on getting to this point - I hope that you find the right house at the right price that you love.

Keep us all posted!

D9

puppetmaster00

Jaybo10 wrote: »

Hello all,

I've updated my total and we've now started viewing houses (VERY exciting!).

I've also finally got around to submitting a PPI claim so I will see what comes of that.

Try not to eat too many choccy eggs!

Jaybo

Congratulations ! My mum and I are those types that LOVE viewing homes Even when I was renting we loved going round viewing, so I can't wait to reach that point again !!

So my monthly update - saved £650 this month which brings total to £4720. Was really hoping to save more but my wages weren't too good this month with the OH's birthday ! Will defo pass the 5k goal this month. Almost halfway there !

whizzybee

I am aiming to get on the property ladder in the next couple of years, although sooner would be better! The trouble is, I am a first time buyer and this is something I want to do off my own back, no asking for financial help from the parents, it isnt there. So Im only looking at c.60000 for a house and I have about 2500 in savings. So Im doing the £10 a day challenge and beginning ultimate scrimping (Im from Yorkshire, Im ok at it at the moment!) But I would like to put 10% down, plus have money aside to afford the surveys first off. So here goes! Best of luck to everyone else doing it too, I am in awe at how much people are saving!

Supersaver1979

Hi all,
I have been lurking for years and would like to join the forum.
I would like to own my own flat or a 1/2 bedroomed house hopefully by 2015. I am doing this on my own and don't have a OH.
I live in London and would like to get a place in North London but as a lot of people know London is very expensive.
I have saved 11K to date ( in an ISA and 1st home saver account).( Due to being in temporary work and also being made redundant for a number of years I have not been able to save as much as I would have liked.)
I also have a first direct savings account - £75.00
I am currently living with family so don't pay rent but pay the family food bill
I am currently working but it is a temporary ongoing contract, which is due to finish by the summer.
I currently owe £900 on credit cards but hope to pay them off within in a few months
I am doing the following on an ad-hoc basis at the moment:
CEX - selling my old CDs
sealed pot - only just started
amazon - exchanging books for points
My main weaknesses are : clothes,books and beauty products but I am also trying to sell my old clothes, old records, old books, beauty products ( I used to be an avon rep) on ebay and I have been getting cashback from topcashback website.
I am joined to the following points schemes : boots, tesco, nectar
My current expediture is :
Travel p/m £80 ; Food p/m £100 ; Internet p/m £10 ;Gym p/m £30
phone ( pay as you go ) £15 ( t mobile) ;cat insurance and cat food £30 ( the family cat only likes £ brands like whiskas, felix !)
Other miscelleanous questions to members ...
I tried to put in 2 PPI claims a number of years ago but was turned down, then appealed but was turned down again . Any advice anyone??Any recommended threads?
Can anyone recommend any low cost insurance for dentists & opticians?
I may be going to spain this summer by eurostar( money/job permitting) as I have not been abroad for over 5 years, can anyone recommend any cheap websites ?
I am also planning to start driving lessons again ! in the summer ( job permitting) If anyone knows of any good cheap driving schools/instructors in North East London please share!
I will also look at the £10 a day challenge thread . Are their any other threads anyone could recommend?
I apologise for the long post.

smileyrainbow32

Hi everyone

I would like to join this thread as I can't do the saving on my own and have wasted a year spending rather than saving to being a hone owner.

I moved back home with my mum early last year with the intention of saving 12k for the year but unfortunately I focused on spending.

The current situation is my mums agreed to me staying another year and I aim to save 12k this year. I have 1700 in cash isa at present with the intention of saving 1k each month. I will be clawing back as I'm 1300k off the monthly target to reach the 12k target.

This 12k will not be my 10% on a flat in London but it will be closer
Than I am at the moment.

I can see from reading this thread that there is no easy way to save other than to just do it! Onwards and upwards and I'm excited at exposing my progress making me accountable

budgetglamourpuss

hey home savers, im robinlacey 24 mum of 1almost 2 lovely expensive children and im attempting to save for our first house.
Feeling a bit scared as atm we have no savings but what can I say two suprise babys did bassically take out mine and my partners savings. Currently a stay at home mum I earn nothing but my lovely hard working man earns a medium (well good for this area) 36k a year. We have alot of debt and he's a bit useless with money. I've recently taken over the familys finaces as things wetnt being paid. But managed to fix and pay off a fair few things. Due to having one lovely child and another on the way saving is going to be very tight and im a bit of a product consumer (make up, hair care ect ) so ive cut back and am now allowing myself £10 a week for myself and £10 for my partner. I aim to be saving only £100 a month from now until July and with debts being paid off savings can then go up to £350 a month. This isn't alot really but I must also state that due to a !!!! up on our side our credit score is rather bad. so I aim to save slowly but surely, throwing money at debt, building a credit score back up but still leaving us with a nice amount of money to not get into a situation again.

I'm so happy for those of you who are doing really well on savings its inspirational and I hope me be james (my partner) can stop our silly spending habbits. Well ive taken hold of all credit cards and bank cards so ive taken full responsibity for household money :S

Also do appologyse for my bad spelling and gramer I've done this on my mobile
Robinlacey x

Odette

Nearly halfway now, fingers crossed to be putting away 2k+ for the next 6-8 months and be on track to start looking November time. Its all getting a bit real, all scary and exciting.

Quick question, at what point do I head to the broker/bank. Do I have to have my whole deposit or could I go a couple of months before when I have 95% of the amount I want saved and get an AIP?

lou_mango

Hi happy savers

Some big updates for me - OH got a new job that we were waiting on to move!! And I'm £360 off my £30k target!! Very exciting time at the moment. We've been to visit 3 properties so far to see what our money can buy us. Hopefully when I next update I'll have even better news :-)

For all you newbies who are astounded at some of the amounts people have saved let me point out that I've been saving for 3 years! It's hard work but will be well worth the wait :-)

X

nat21luv

Congratulations lou, see you on the MFW thread one day

Malices

Grats to everyone who's reaching their goals! ..and good luck to new starters

Just started reading the first page of this board & nearly fell over (lucky I'm sitting down!) 10% interest savings accounts! And here's me being smug at having my 3.1% easy access ISA -crazy!

About me - the blurb - skip forward for finer details
I made a pledge to myself at the beginning of this year to own a home by the end of this year. ...I get demotivated if the deadline's too far away. OH & I were away travelling for 13 months from May 2011 and had saved a pretty meaty chunk for that after moving back in with my parents, and when we got back last year in June we had nothing. (I say nothing - there's £2k in an account that was totally off limits in case of disaster #sensible) We moved back in with my parents, I started working for my mum 2 days later and OH started temping about 3 months later.

Long & short of it - we were still spending like we were on holiday and although I'm never ridiculous with money, I wasn't being very good, so following Christmas I had a revelation that we NEEDED to move out & that rather than throwing money at rent, I'd give myself 1 year to buy a house. ...so here I am.

The finer details
We're not on large salaries, I'm an office administrator & OH is Asda Home Shopping Driver (just got made full time, yay!). But pay my mum £200 a month all in for rent so we're lucky really.

Aiming for a 2-3 bed house under £125k (screw stamp duty!) either End terrace or semi detached.
(Detached would be ideal but prob not possible - OH very into metal & plays his guitar/music LOUD - don't think I could handle the stress of more than one attached neighbour _pale_)

Saving minimum £900 a month, but often more & now OH has more hours at work I'll up it a bit.

Current total (after credit card balances deducted): £7251.34 (including £2.5k earmarked for fees)

My local council is soon to start a Local Authority Mortgage Scheme which allows you to buy a house with 5% deposit and they guarantee it up to 25%, so you get a 95% mortgage with a rate in line with a 75% mortgage. I'm going to apply as soon as it starts (hopefully this month/next month). I've not heard of anyone who's done it before but I know other councils do it already so here must be people.

How I'm minimising outgoings & maximising income:
- my car was written off by a lorry in January & I get a lift to work most days so have decided to try without one for first time in 7yrs! Going well so far - OH has a bike which he's just finished doing up & is much cheaper than the car for insurance/tax etc - I borrow my mum's car if needed.
- we both have good phone contracts for under £10 a month (cashback -woop!)
- asked for cineworld vouchers for Christmas so we do that for entertainment, going on cheap nights for maximum benefit & got free trial of NowTV for nights in instead at the mo
- given myself £10 limit on all present purchases - trying to give home made presents
- Stoozing with 2x 0% cards (Natwest & Clubcard) - both give points too, have had £30 sainsburys vouchers just for using natwest card & lots of clubcard points I haven't spent yet - prob save for christmas.
- Have a 3.1% ISA each - mine was full +aforementioned £2k safety net as of end of year yesterday, OH's about £2k in there
- Both have 4% N&P regular savers - put £250 a month into each
- I have a principality savings account at around 2.6% for overflow (but can start putting it all in my ISA again now, yaaay!)
- Have halifax reward account giving £5 a month
- Use cashback sites for everything possible (I'm up to £400 over last 3 years, OH's account up to £40)
- I do some mystery shopping every now and then (doing one later today that's paying £18! record fee!) which I'm earmarking as paying for my best friend's quite expensive hen party in June (so inconsiderate! lol)
- Have just opened Nationwide's new 5% in credit interest account for savings (Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this is better than my ISA even after tax, and since I intend to spend my savings this year I don't need to protect my money from future tax so much)
- Considering opening the first direct account as well for the £125 once I figure out if I can do both at the same time or not
- OH keeps getting 100% when he's mystery shopped at work & gets £5 a time, plus he's just got employee of the month (£40), personal thanks from regional manager for going above and beyond during the snow (£25) and exceeded customer expectations on another mystery shop (£40) #proud
- Have tried selling some stuff on ebay but noone really wants it! so saving it all up for a bootfair when it's warmer - did one last year and made about £50-£60 (although £40 of that was a pair of posh earrings worth £60 that my old housemate was chucking out because an ex gave them to her!)
- Making my friend's wedding invitations as her wedding present (thought this would save me money but I've gone a little all out & fabulous so this was possibly a wrong move, but it could have worked!)
- planning way ahead for future events (OH's birthday in October - have diarised the date 12 weeks before to look for cheap train tickets for London where we're going to see Book of Mormon [-not money saving, but very exciting, I had a week moment last week ]
- Check current accounts every 2-3 days to make sure no unexpected fees push us into overdrafts
- Put as much as I'll let myself into savings each month, leaving around £200 in current accounts for direct debits/cash withdrawals/emergency - everything else goes on 0% cards (see stoozing above)
- don't go shopping, like ever, except food shopping where I use snap&save and shopitize, and any coupons/vouchers i can rustle up
- babysit / do odd jobs where we can for parents/friends/neighbours - sometimes get money, sometimes get pizza or beer/wine
- sealed pot challenge - all loose change & OH puts his tips in when he hasn't spent them on McDonalds (grr!), I always check his pockets when I do the washing and often find some loot...sometimes melted chocolate
- go out to friends houses rather than to the pub, take own alcohol (recent tip I've found out - don't take a full bottle of spirits to a house party full of poor people/students/young men- it will end up empty whether you drank any or not - buy it in advance & decant into a smaller, unidentified bottle with enough for you & maybe a couple of other people who you're happy to share it with, stick it in a cupboard or in your bag so it's out of sight, and check on it once every hour #RIPMorgansSpiced1ltr)

Ummmm, that's all I can think of for now...

Thanks for letting me join the board, not that I gave you any choice!

Happy saving everyone!