A Year to make a Difference

Thrice · 2 January 2019 at 12:41AM

That's me about 90% done with my household stock check, I've just got the rest of the stock cupboard food side and one drawer up the stairs to do. Managed to bag up 3 bin bags of clothes to get rid of, which I'll go through tomorrow to see what I can use up as rags etc.

Filled our big suitcase full of summer clothes and shoes, and cleared out another 7 bags of clothes and shoes and put them into storage. Stuff that I don't want to wear just now, but that I'm not wanting or not ready to get rid of. I will go through them at some point..... ::o

I've made a really good start on the budget, I've used a mix of fixed living costs like my mortgage etc which don't change each month, plus costs that I should have (like a set amount for car maintenance, presents,mclothes etc). I normally just pay this stuff as and when I need to, but I'm planning on saving per month into pots then using as required.

Budget shows that with the additional costs I should have about £3000 per year left over, as it is just now I should have £4500. I don't want to swear, but f!ck me I'm frittering away £4500 a year just now. Pffffff, I need to get my game face on and sort this out!!

I'm off to write my Christmas and birthday list for this year, I'll need to get planning to stay on track!

X

Thrice · 3 January 2019 at 10:46AM

Back to work today :mad: I'm three coffee's in and I only started at 8am :rotfl:

Made some additional payments this morning -

Mortgage - £16.64
Loan - £24.72
Platinum CC2 - £50.00
Halifax CC1 - £150.00 (balance now £112.33!!! It was £957.147 in July!)

I can't believe how close I am to clearing a credit card! I won't pay council tax in Feb and March, so I'm going to use that as additional payments to my CC's when it comes. CC1 will be cleared by the end of January, a month earlier than planned!

Birthday and Christmas list for 2019 is complete as well. I've budgeted £20 per adult birthday, £12 per child birthday, £20 per adult Christmas and £10 per child for Christmas. Which gives me £704 in total, before I buy MrThrice anything :eek: I'll need to check what I actually budgeted for this, I think it was £30 a month

Miles out already!!

Thrice · 4 January 2019 at 5:00PM

Just nipping in to say I've had my calculator out this afternoon, and it's no wonder I don't have any spare money!

I wrote my birthday and Christmas list, and allocated a set amount per adult and per child. Excluding MrT as I spend more on him, I'm over £700 for all presents. But in my budget I done less than a week ago, I put £30 per month giving me £360.00, less than half of what I need!! So either I need to up the budget, cut down on the spends, or find other ways to earn more money. I already do surveys etc which I did use to buy gifts, I'm just not sure I can earn enough to make up that huge shortfall!

Will be going back to the budget drawing board tonight!

Thrice · 7 January 2019 at 11:40AM

Me and MrThrice have had a lovely productive weekend! Got a car load of stuff to the dump, another car load into our storage unit, and moved the living room about a bit to freshen it up.

We've made a plan to do as much of the 'free' jobs about the house. For example, MrT fitted two new radiators yesterday, and replaced a section of the floorboards. We've had the radiators lying for over a year, so we only spend a few pounds on some new fittings. A good job ticked off the list and only a small spend.

We have a LOT of jobs like that to do, the house is needing a whole lot of work. But some of the debt I'm paying off is this stuff, the stuff I bought last year and the year before (and before that!), so we should be using what we've already paid for!

I'm going to set up additional saving accounts on my banking app, and transfer set amounts per month for stuff that I pay for as and when, but I don't save for each month. I need to get into a position where I'm paying the same each month, Can't believe it's the 7th and I'm still not done on this budget :mad:

[Deleted User] · 7 January 2019 at 11:57AM

Morning Mrs!

Sounds like you have had a really productive weekend.

I'm the same with our budget, it still needs the odd tweak.

Have a great day x

Thrice · 8 January 2019 at 5:52PM

Thanks PMo2! I'll need to check in with the January Lunches, I'm on 4/4 so far!

I've opened an additional 4 savings accounts (I had one already for the Save the Change, and I think I can only have 5 max? Halifax/BOS?). Transferred money to each one and renamed for my various catagories (car costs, hair/beauty, insurances and another one I can't remember!), and set up standing orders to transfer the same amount each month. Good TICK off the list for that one!!

Ordered some timber we need to build the interior vestibule at our front door. I've got the gyp rock already, we just needed another few timber lengths to finish it off. Used a local company that I use through my work, managed to avoid the minimum £30 delivery cost as I know them! That will be delivered on Friday, so hopefully by Saturday/Sunday I'll be hoovering up the mess after it's completed! That will be a tick off the house job list, again something we can do without spending too much!

Another NSD as well, apart from the timber costs which I expected to pay. I don't need anything, I only want things. But I want to pay off my CC more!!

JohnJ76 · 8 January 2019 at 7:45PM

Good luck Thrice. Sounds like you have another house that just likes to keep on giving! still it will all be worth it in the end, or at least thats what we say!

You say you have a storage unit - is that just because the house is having work done to it or because you simply don't have the room? We had a storage unit but then we went through everything RUTHLESSLY. It was amazing how much stuff we sold/charity shopped/binned and have not missed in the slightest. We then realised we had been paying to store, quite frankly, a lot of junk. We also sorted a lot of clever storage in the house, especially the loft, although this may not be the best idea if you need a new roof in the short to medium term!

Thrice · 9 January 2019 at 11:55AM

Morning John, thanks for stopping by!

It's a mix of everything TBH! I rent it through my work (it's part of our business), so I'm on the best price possible (half of what everyone else pays). I started storing stuff from the house while we made space to tear down ceilings etc. Stuff I've bought for the house like wood flooring, carpet for upstairs etc is in there now, as the house isn't ready for them.
MrT had a workshop (he makes stringed instruments), the guy he was sharing a space with has moved to another area, so all his tools/machines etc are now in storage with the house stuff, as we have no where else to put them. He's not paying monthly rental now, so it's a saving, but it just means he can't get use of his machinery and tools for the forseeable future :-(

But you are right, there is probably a lot in there I can get rid of. We don't have much storage at home, we are adding in as much as we can as we're going along. But we definitely don't have room for everything in the storage unit to come back to the house, so at some point I'm going to have to thin it out. I will get there at some point, hopefully by the end of this year!

x

Thrice · 9 January 2019 at 5:47PM

I've just realised that I said in post one that I wanted to pay off one of my cards by the end of Feb, but it will be cleared by the end of January!

CC1 - £271.03 - Now £122(ish) - Will pay off at the end of this month!
CC2 - £2544.84
CC3 - £9095.25

CC2 and CC3 have both came down as well as I've made an additional payment this month, plus the minimum is still to come off as a direct debit. If I pay a minimum of £300 from end of Feb to CC2, I'll have this paid off by the end of August at the latest! YES!

JohnJ76 · 9 January 2019 at 7:50PM

That's excellent news, always nice when something goes in your favour as opposed to an unexpected nasty! Great way to start 2019 with one paid off so soon!

A Year to make a Difference

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