Savings Sunday 20/9/20

The exciting news I mentioned last week was we have paid off our mortgage! We had a family dinner of homemade lasagna, garlic bread and chocolate cake (complete with a 30c candle) to celebrate. I don't think it has sunk in yet, this is something we've strived really hard for years to achieve! 

Juiced oranges from our garden, cooked a large lasagna and a big pot of Thai green chicken curry to have a couple of nights off from cooking. 

Mr 19 sorted out his room and gave me a birthday gift bag, bow and shredded paper, he knows I reuse gift wrapping where possible. He also gave Mr 14 some of his "outdated" socks, which were like new. I love when he declutters as we all end up with all kinds of cool stuff! 

I installed the Honey browser extension and saved $7 on some Christmas gifts. I bought makeup from Australis with a 50% off sale on everything and free postage. I needed mascara and Miss 21 and I both needed more foundation. I also got some lipsticks were $3.50 on clearance so I got them for $1.25 each!

Hubby picked up some free crumpets, English muffins, bread, celery, cucumber and a bunch of white roses from the community centre.

A friend gave us a couple of pairs of jeans and a grocery bag full of cat food from one of her clients who had a cat that passed away.

Another friend dropped off a hamper from her church. This had frozen vegetables, milk, bread, apple pies (lots of pies, so we gave some to our neighbours) juice, cakes, sausage rolls and meat pies, potatoes, lettuce and soup pouches which I reheated for dinner with some rice. We were really blessed this week! 

Debt Progress

Our cash envelope system.

I haven't posted an update of our debt reduction in a while. I used to do monthly debt totals on my Instagram account, but found I wanted to focus a bit more on my everyday like my simple living, craft projects, cooking and the fun stuff!

In January this year, our mortgage was $75 537. Currently at just over 7 months later, it is at
$55 000.  It isn't easy at times- we are only human and habit of consumerism can be a hard one to break- but now I can see the total going down and have my eye on the prize!

To anyone who is working towards paying off their debt, it can be done! Set a goal and aim high.
For us we have cut out any unnecessary spending and any extra money made or what is not spent on essential items goes towards reducing the mortgage. That means sticking to a pretty tight budget, buying only basic foods in the grocery shopping and I make all meals and cleaning products from scratch. We have a vegetable garden and fruit trees, buy most items secondhand and give homemade gifts. Even doing one of these things can save hundreds of dollars a year!

Here are our debt totals for the last 7 months:


January

4/1/16- $75 537

31/1/16- $73 166

Total of $2371 PAID

February

1/2/16- $72 976

29/2/16- $68 322

Total of $ 4654 PAID

March

1/3/16- $68 132

31/3/16- $66 215

Total of $1917 PAID

April

4/4/16- $66 025

30/4/16- $63 718

Total of $2307 PAID!

11^th May 2015- $93 381

19^th May 2016- $62 469

 $30 912 paid in 12 months!

May

2/05/16- $63 529

30/05/16- $60 713

Total of $2816 Paid

June

6/6/16- $60 523

27/6/16- $58 754

Total of $1769 Paid

July

4/7/16- $58 564

31/7/16- $56 143

Total of $2421 Paid

Our Debt Reduction and Savings Progress

This is our 4th year of dedicated frugal living and I thought I would share our progress. For the first few years our goal was to build our savings accounts to pay for our home renovations which included our kitchen redo, new carpet and flooring in our kitchen, dining and games room, ceiling and patio repairs and our pool restoration all of which came to around $20 000. The work was all completed last year and this is why you can see our savings have now dropped significantly. At the time we chose to have 2 savings accounts as we were regularly depositing and this way could gain extra interest. We are still debating whether to keep the 2 accounts or roll it into one.

Since May 2015 our focus has been to put every spare dollar towards paying off our only debt-the mortgage. Unfortunately I can't find our financial details for 2013 which was the year we began.

I have put these figure up to inspire and encourage others. There is no quick trick for building savings or getting financially ahead. We have managed to do this by sticking to a budget, not spending money unnecessarily and just saving in lots of little areas. Every dollar really does count.  


Savings Funds

Account 1- which is now referred to as our 'emergency fund'                                                                                                       

2014- $12,000
2015- $14,029
2016- $2,088 and slowly growing.

Account 2

2014- $5,000
2015- $7,000
2016- $3,000


Mortgage

February 2013- $105 846
February 2014- $101, 199
February 2015- $94,713
February 2016- $68,322 and dropping.