Time to stop (over)thinking and time to start doing!!

QueenJess · 6 September 2020 at 8:24AM

Some places give you a flexible ISA so you can replace the amount you’ve taken out as long as it’s in the same tax year and it doesn’t count as part of your 20k. Probably not a concern for you given you said you can’t reach 20k anyway, but just thought I’d raise it.

I did it on mine a few years ago to “borrow” money from myself to pay down the mortgage and replace it later through salary as I wanted to make a last ditch attempt to overpay within my 10% allowance before the end of my mortgage year.

Throwaway1 · 12 September 2020 at 12:00PM

QueenJess said:

Some places give you a flexible ISA so you can replace the amount you’ve taken out as long as it’s in the same tax year and it doesn’t count as part of your 20k. Probably not a concern for you given you said you can’t reach 20k anyway, but just thought I’d raise it.

I did it on mine a few years ago to “borrow” money from myself to pay down the mortgage and replace it later through salary as I wanted to make a last ditch attempt to overpay within my 10% allowance before the end of my mortgage year.

Our last ISA was a flexible one but when the rate dropped it wasn't worth stopping with it. We briefly looked for a flexible one but the best one that offered that capability was the one we were leaving

Throwaway1 · 12 September 2020 at 12:06PM

It looks pretty certain (as certain as you can ever be) that both our jobs are safe so we decided to pay off another chunk to get that interest rate down. £4000 sent across with £4000 left to pay before the beginning of November and then the mortgage year starts again.

If we were to make no more OPs that's 6 years 7 months off the term and £21,212.09 saved! When I told a friend about our plan last year she scoffed and said that she'd rather live life now than OP. That's her choice of course but it's been 1 year 10 months so far and even if that's the only time we ever spent living frugally and OPing (it won't be!) then I would say it has definitely been worth it and our quality of life hasn't been any less for it.

South_coast · 12 September 2020 at 12:12PM

Great work 😀 You will be the ones scoffing when you are MF and living a fabulous life while your friend is still toiling away to service her mortgage, so focus on that 😀😀😀!

Throwaway1 · 27 September 2020 at 5:17PM

Another £2000 made today with the last £2000 for the year to go in tomorrow. After this, we probably won't pay anymore for a while as no deal Brexit begins to rear its head again. We're definitely not planning on making anymore until January is out of the way, and depending on how that goes, it may be a while longer than that too. There's no rush anyway as we'll have until Nov 2021 to pay the next £12,000 or so (not sure what the exact figure will be yet).

So, after tomorrow, if we were to make no more OPs that's 7 years 7 month off the term and £28,592.15* saved!

*This number is higher than expected as we realised we had been calculating it slightly wrong all this time to give a lower figure.

Throwaway1 · 28 December 2020 at 10:32AM

I know I said no more overpayments but we have snuck two more in. On 5th December, we paid £333.62 as we worked out the 10% for the year was 12,333.62 and it was just too tempting to round it down to the nearest thousand. Today, we have paid £3000 as husband's auntie unexpectedly passed away recently and he was given some inheritance money. Her passing wasn't Covid related but the restrictions did mean that we were unable to attend the funeral which was very rubbish.

We are still scraping by with my old car. I came close to replacing it recently as the front tyres kept losing pressure constantly due to two buckled alloys but we have bought second hand replacements instead and they are doing the job so we're going to hold off a while longer. Having to put the mucky guide dogs we board in the boot after free runs is putting me off wanting to get a nice new(ish) car as it will become filthy and dog-haired very quickly. We'll see how it does in its MOT at the end of March.

Standard last line: If we were to make no more OPs, that's 8 years 4 months off the term and £30,923.07 in interest saved. (Oh, and we've cracked a 10k barrier, our mortgage is now £119,XXX.XX - I can't remember the exact pounds and pence).

powerspowers · 28 December 2020 at 12:00PM

Well done on your overpayments throwaway, even if one was due to a sad event x

I read your opening post and can definitely identify with not knowing what to do for best and then doing nothing. It’s nice to see you’re making progress

Throwaway1 · 28 December 2020 at 1:49PM

powerspowers said:

Well done on your overpayments throwaway, even if one was due to a sad event x
I read your opening post and can definitely identify with not knowing what to do for best and then doing nothing. It’s nice to see you’re making progress

Thanks powerspowers. The eye opening moment for me was when someone pointed out that staying still can also be just as bad (if not worse) than just picking a strategy and going for it. I thought doing nothing meant not having to make a choice but it turns out that doing nothing is still a choice and not always the best one.

jenni_fer · 28 December 2020 at 3:01PM

Throwaway1 said:

I know I said no more overpayments but we have snuck two more in.

Addictive isn't it!
Have just read your diary from the start, as part of distracting myself from debating the 'right' thing to do for us so overthinking resonates hugely

Sounds like you are making great progress. It's so satisfying to see that figure coming down.

Cheery_Daff · 28 December 2020 at 5:49PM

So sorry to hear about oH's auntie, and that you couldn't attend the funeral

hope you manage to mourn in your own way xx

Great news on the mortgage though, you're making excellent progress

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Time to stop (over)thinking and time to start doing!!

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