Advice Please

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op could you boyfriend move in and pay rent? I don't know if there are legal implications with this if you split up? but it removes the problem of a stranger as a lodger.
 
007007

that budget doesn't look realistic.
There doesn't seem to be money factored in for doctors, dentists, hairdressers, clothing, gifts etc (close friends and family will marry and you will realistically have to go to them) repairs of car, depreciation of car and macinery.

It's all well and good putting figures down on a page and making them fit a budget but in real life you often need a decent cushion.

I live frugally and save money but this month for example, my car tax and insurance had to be paid, i had to buy medicine and my car needed repair, on top of that my kitchen kettle broke as well!. It's those kind of months you need the extra per month to cover. Cause the mortgage still needs to get paid. These should be the years of your life where you can travel and enjoy yourself. It seems mad to be a slave to a mortgage.

And it's rubbish when people say well everyone always struggled to get their house. My parents struggled, but they never signed up for 45 year mortgages. And they stuck through it cause it was a house they could stay in forever, with a garden and spaces for their children.
 
Keep a spending diary for a few months. Log EVERY item of expenditure, get receipts and keep them. (Pretend you are on expenses - because you are - just that you, rathre than an employer, are paying!). Obviously you may not encounter all annual expenditure items in that time but it will be a reality check on which to base and sanity check any budget that you have prepared separately.
 
Can I ask the OP a relevant question ? Was Christmas a big struggle ? How did you manage with presents ? Did you have to pay for them on the credit card ?
 
"- Misc (weddings, gifts, family occasions, etc) 100"

Moondance,

I think you may have hit on the critical point. If you ONLY buy the minimum amount of food, ONLY use the minimum amount of electricity, ONLY socialise with the minimum amount of friends, etc you may be able to live on 900pm (unfortunately the OP doesn't have 900pm - that was the figure metioned my momomo).

What you won't be able to afford is those "Misc" items. Now it's true that you can get by without these. But it's also true that you can survive without toilet paper. It's just that going without either is guaranteed to make your life less enjoyable.

OP, I applaud your determination - there's nothing wrong with making a stab at budgeting. But do yourself a favour : Set yourself a definite financial target, say 4 or 5 months from now, and if you find that you are slipping below that financial waterline, then you need to make changes. You may not want to take in a lodger, but at that stage you'll have tried the alternative. Agree now what those drop-dead figures are, and write them down where you can see them every day. It's very easy in four or five months to start convincing yourself that it's okay to move the goalposts. Don't.

At the moment your situation is serious but not critical. But for your own sake, don't be back here in two years time, 40k in debt and in real desperation...
 
hi 007007,

first of well done on having your own house

I would strongly encourage you to heed the advice of people on the site, most of it is from their own experience. I must say that when I started using this site I was having problems budgeting and the advice here has been very helpful.

Like you I have a mortgage of 1100 pm.It's a 3 bed house and I rent out the other two rooms giving me 550 pm. I could coast along like you are but I would end up eating into my savings for the extra things that come up - and something always does. I'm lucky in that I can save 500 euro additionally but you only have to read the papers about job losses and rising interest rates to see that it's mad not to save a bit where you can. You only need to read the stories here on the site to see that things can go badly wrong very quickly for people - sensible ones at that.

Best of luck. You wouldn't have asked for the advice if you weren't worried so make use of it. I wouldn't wait six months and see how things were then. If you have a tenent for six months and things are grand, then you can ask them to leave.
 
I agree with other posters, its time to face facts.You will have to seriously curtail your lifestyle, if you wish to hold on to the property.I would be interested to know based on your mortgage to salary ratio, if you got your mortgage from a sub prime lender.IF so my advise is don't fall behind on repayments whatever you do.Those guys don't mess about in getting their money back, especially in the current financial conditions.
 
boyfriend wont be moving in, he is saving for his own place....

christmast wasnt a struggle, i went on hols for a week abroad the week before christmas.

dont have much family so i didnt have to buy lots of presents, 4 presents in total.

all your 'negativity' about me not going to manage is only making me more determined that i will!!!
 

007007

There's no point in asking for advice if your not going to listen to what the majority of people on here are saying i.e. you need to make changes to your current set up.
 
OP,

There would be no point if all this site did was to provide encouragement with no basis in fact - your friends and family can do that for you. What you get here is honest opinions from people who have more experience in this than you or me.

Take the advice or don't take the advice, that's your call. But what you won't get are people trying to make you feel better - instead you get different opinions on how to make your finances add up better.

Sorry if that sounds harsh, but it's very easy to slide slowly into debt while convincing yourself that everything is okay....
 

Why did you post this topic? Do you just want people to say well done, you're great, you'll be grand?

I find it really sad that you've chosen to waste probably the best years of your life struggling with borderline unmanageable debt.
 
A lot of people have a lot to say on this one. Can we at least try and be polite on here, after all, we all started somewhere as first time buyers

I would have concerns for the OP, especially as it is a starter home, possibly is now in negative equity if she were to sell and is really going to struggle if interest rates go up. No real margin here for error

some suggestions, check that your tax affairs are as efficient as they should be, budget like crazy and stick to it. Also I'd seriously consider getting another part time job for a couple of years, even if it was stacking shelves in Tesco's for 2 evenings a week, it would help take the sting out of things and might even help you put a little bit of rainy day money away

Good luck
 
some suggestions
Click to expand...

Hi there, Mpsox many people have taken the time and effort to assist 007007 with her bugeting, in her previous posts I dont really think she took the advice seriously enough. So really there is no point making suggestions as the OP does not appear to want to heed the advice...
 
Mpsox said:
A lot of people have a lot to say on this one. Can we at least try and be polite on here
Click to expand...
Who hasn't been? Calling a spade a spade is not necessarily being impolite in case that's what you're referring to.

With apologies to Noor77 for singling her out - I seem to recall being some people (including myself) being accused of this before in the epic Noor77 threads (search them out) but in the end I believe that Noor77 benefited from some useful advice and seems to have radically turned around her financial situation by taking some of it on board and acting on it. Not every piece of advice will necessarily be 100% accurate or appropriate but the nature of a discussion forum such as this is that among all the suggestions there should be a lot of useful an applicable advice.
 
If you understandably don't want to take in a lodger, what about a part-time job, even like every second Sat or Sunday in a shop. Or babysitting in the local neighbourhood. I know it's only a little extra cash but it'd mean a few less trips to the ATM.
 
It beggars belief that nowadays, banks and financial instituations are lending such huge amounts of money to young people, when I was in my early twenties and living in England the most I or my partner could borrow to purchase a house was 3 and a half times our annual salary. I now have a twenty something daughter that's on the same salary as the OP who is currently renting paying approx 400 euro per month, and even she can't manage without the occassional top up from mum. There isn't a hope in hell that she could cope with a 200,000 euro mortgage on her own..
 
I've an issue with the very high five year fixed interest rate...who recommended that?! There's something about this that doesn't quite add up.
 
There is some seriously weighty and valid advice on this thread, mine is more trivial. Weekend jobs do not have to be shelf stacking in supermarkets. You said you enjoy keeping up with fashion, what about a p/t job in Oasis / New Look etc for the money and the staff discount.
 
At a guess I would say this loan offer was issued prior to the change regarding stress testing of interest rates. Up til about October or thereabouts much higher multiples were being advanced by banks based on the fact that if you took a 5 yr fixed then the loan did not have to be stress tested. This combined with allowance for 'room rental' would get that amount of money. However it is obvious the TRS hasnt kicked in yet which will at least help and again I do think renting the other room is essential, needs must! Selling is probably not an option especially with the breakage penalty on the fixed rate.
 
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