The Piano Diary

glass_half_full · 21 November 2018 at 8:04AM

Good morning diary and all,
Today the mortgage payment has gone out taking the balance to £76,149. I like how the payment actually reduces the balance in a noticeable way now. We had a great time at a 50th birthday at the weekend. We stayed over and had a really good laugh and played some silly games and drank too much. Need to do this kind of thing more often. :beer::rotfl: We are both busy at work which is ok but looking forward to a break in a few weeks time. The good side effect of being busy is that we are not really spending much. The budget is broadly on track. I pick up the new to us car at the weekend. I have organised for the home charge point to be fitted at the end of next week. Quite looking forward to seeing how little petrol we can use. I was going to switch to a green electricity tariff with my current energy supplier but it is more expensive and I have a good deal until May 2019 so I will wait until then and try to switch to a sustainable electricity supply then if I can.
Have a great day all!

glass_half_full · 23 November 2018 at 12:16PM

Dear diary and all,
Both OH and I have been paid now so I have been able to update the budget. The budget is settling down and I am getting used to the new levels of everything and finding the balance. There are a lot of things to think about. I’m reviewing the overall situation and thinking through various issues. On the pension front, I have 60 as a target retirement age. I have a spreadsheet I use for this and I think I need to increase my contributions to 20% or even 25% to make this a reality. Then I also want to pay down the mortgage quicker and also pay off the car. When I go through this process I end up coming back to the idea of balance ie don’t go overboard in any one direction. I also want to maintain some fat in the budget since I know what it is like when the budget is too tight. So for the time being, I am keeping the pension contributions at 17% which is an increase on the past (12%) but still affordable. I may increase it in due course and of course when the mortgage is gone I can ramp it up considerably. On the mortgage I have increased the regular monthly overpayment from £80 to £200. This will reduce the term from 6 years 8 months to 5 years 7 months. Slowly edging towards my target of 5 years. This leaves us with a few hundred spare in the budget.
Tomorrow I go to collect the new to us car.
Have a great day all!

glass_half_full · 25 November 2018 at 10:04AM

Dear diary and all,
Collected the car yesterday and dropped off the old one. Must admit so far I love it! Its weird driving it in electric mode as it is so quiet. The dealer I bought it from is 1 ½ hours away so quite a drive. I stopped off at a service station on the way home to charge it, just to see how that works. It took about 45 minutes to charge it to 80% and cost £1.74. My home charger gets fitted next Friday so then I can start charging each day. Hoping to see big reductions in fuel costs overall. I will be tracking that over the next year to see how it goes. There is a lot of technology in this vehicle and I think it will take me a while to figure it all out. The tax is also £0. Going out later with OH so she can test drive it to work!
Have a great day all!

the_cross_rabbit · 25 November 2018 at 11:44AM

We are thinking of getting an electric car in a couple of years (currently saving) so will be interested in how you do with yours.
CRx

System · 26 November 2018 at 1:35AM

Just read your diary , you are making great decisions in your quest to now be mortgage free . Enjoy your car and interested to see how you get on with it.

glass_half_full · 26 November 2018 at 7:53AM

the_cross_rabbit wrote: »

We are thinking of getting an electric car in a couple of years (currently saving) so will be interested in how you do with yours.
CRx

Hi Cross Rabbit,
Yes, I will be updating about it here so hopefully will be useful to you.

I think in two years electric cars will be more common and maybe more reasonably priced.

glass_half_full · 26 November 2018 at 7:57AM

Cumbria_lass wrote: »

Just read your diary , you are making great decisions in your quest to now be mortgage free . Enjoy your car and interested to see how you get on with it.

Hi Cumbria,
Thanks for that. I'm trying to stay the course, mostly use the diary on here to 'think out loud' my decisions.

glass_half_full · 27 November 2018 at 7:54AM

Good morning diary and all,
Some time ago, about 18 months, I was involved in a minor incident in a supermarket car park. I was slowly reversing out of a space when suddenly another car reversed into me. It seemed very strange at the time, the two men in the other car were in a hurry to exchange insurance details and get away. Subsequently, they tried to go for whiplash etc and maintained it was my fault. I’m pretty sure it was a scam. Luckily I had ticked the box for legal cover. When my insurance came up for renewal in February this year, I had to stay with my current insurer since this claim was still outstanding. Anyway, I called the insurer yesterday and this claim has now been taken off my file since the other parties have withdrawn and so my 7 years no claims has been reinstated. So glad I went for legal cover. This should give me a saving this year and then I can switch in February for a better deal.
Have a great day all!

glass_half_full · 30 November 2018 at 8:14AM

Dear diary and all,
The fitting of the home charger has been delayed by a week. It has turned out to be slightly more complicated. Apparently when electrical work of this kind is done everything needs to comply with the latest regulations. This means that one of the boxes cant be modified but would need to be replaced. The company fitting the charger needed to order some other parts for a work around which they have explained to me. Luckily this does not come at an additional charge. So we have replanned for next Friday. Its funny I think of this house as being nearly new because when we moved in in 2000 it was 4 years old. Of course it is now 22 years old! Still young for a house. I guess this may be an issue in many homes if/when this work is done.
Although we are not charging the car at the moment, it still seems to be doing better than the other one for fuel. We used to have to fill up the other car every week and so I know its better already.
On the car insurance front, I have managed to get the insurer to remove the claim from the record, so I have had the no claims bonus reinstated, which has now raised to 8 years. This has had the immediate effect of reducing the last two monthly payments from £80 to £40. It should mean a much lower quote in February when I renew. I will be paying in as an annual fee to get the saving there.
Otherwise budget is ok. Christmas on the horizon but we are not going to go overboard.
Have a great day all!

glass_half_full · 8 December 2018 at 10:18PM

Dear diary and all,
Yesterday we had the home charger fitted. It took a while as the electrician needed to fit a new board on the wall next to the fuse board in the garage. He then had to run wires through the garage to the other side in order to mount the charge unit on the wall outside. It seems to be working fine and we charged the car in about 3 hours. Most of today’s driving was done on the battery. It seems to have got really cold all of a sudden. Today I fitted some draught excluder strips to the bottom of the two outside doors at the front of the house, the one to the outside and the one to the garage. Hoping this will reduce the escaping heat and thus reduce the heating costs a bit.
Have a great weekend all!

The Piano Diary

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