%%USERNAME%%    %%ACCWORDS%% %%ONOFF%% |
 |  is paved with good intentions... |
|
** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** Hi, I'm Elle. I'm based in Auckland, New Zealand. I'm the mother of two young adults, the wife of an entrepreneurial gamer and the Queen of Unfinished Projects. This blog will contain poems, short stories, possibly photos and book reviews if you're lucky, and my thoughts on a variety of topics. Hope you enjoy it. |
| Original version ▼ You burned bright in the early years, with your constant chatter and your passion for dinosaurs. As I tucked you in bed, my whispers of love and hope and dreams gently stoked the flame. But bullying and depression smothered the flame, and so did harsh words and raised voices born of frustration, until it was nothing more than embers, barely warm. But I wrapped that ember in 'I love you's, and kept it safe. My heart warms to see that flame dancing again. |
| So last night we sat down to work out what paying a second mortgage would do to our budget. It's not pretty. I'm in two minds about it. There is definitely part of me that knows that when we're on a tight budget, Steve gets stressed and the whole house becomes tense. It's not fun. But on the flip side, we probably wouldn't have to do it hard for too long, maybe a couple of years, before his salary would increase (and potentially mine) and then we'd have more discretionary spending money. AND we'd have a bach. Basically, if we wait until we can 'afford' it, we'll still be in the same position in twenty years' time, whereas if we just bite the bullet and do it hard for a few years, we'll end up with a bach to show for our efforts. And the bonus is that while we're doing it hard, we'll have a holiday home that we can go and stay in whenever we want. For free, because we own it. So there's that. That might help with the stress and tension, yeah? Because we'll be paying 2 x rates (and weirdly, the rates for the bach would be more than for our primary house), 2 x house insurance and 2 x mortgages, we have to save money elsewhere. Regular payments We worked out we'd have to give up on these regular payments:  Caitie's pocket money. I haven't told her yet, but in return she'd be allowed to use the bach with her friends at no charge. My Ancestry membership. This will mean no working on the family history stuff for a while. My Writing.com membership. I'm not sure how I'll make it work, because I have "The Snail Mail Group"  which I need at least an upgraded membership for, but I'll have to figure something out. Sky TV (as soon as the current contract runs out) Microsoft (the company should be covering this anyway) Steve's WW subscription Regular SPCA donation OneDrive subscription Discord subscriptionsWe've currently budgeted to keep: Netflix My WW subscription Twitch Spotify family membershipSpotify and Twitch might end up going (I'm not even sure what the Twitch payment covers), but we'll likely keep Netflix to help keep sanity in the house.  Groceries We'll also have to reduce our grocery budget. That will mean less luxury items and more homemade stuff. For instance, we currently buy muesli bars and similar snacks, when we could make muffins or bars on the weekends for much cheaper. We do want to continue eating lean meats and fresh fruits and vegetables, which are hugely expensive, but we definitely have room to trim our grocery budget without going hungry. It'll just take more organisation. I'll have to plan meals and shop to the plan, which will help reduce food wastage too (although we've been better on the food wastage side of things since we got the chest freezer). Vehicle costs We will be leaning on the business a little bit. Which we don't feel bad about, because both Steve and his mother acknowledge that they're underpaid. If they went out and got regular jobs, they'd earn a lot more, but then they wouldn't be working for themselves, right? So they get less money in the hand, but they get less stress because they don't work for asshole bosses. But yeah, we'd be getting the business to cover my petrol (I am currently the only person in the family actually paying for my own petrol I think!) and the insurance on Steve's car (which is used as a company car anyway). Books, clothes, gifts, etc. The list of things we're getting rid of doesn't really show the truth of the matter. Currently we have a decent amount of discretionary spending money, which I spend on ebooks, clothes, gifts, etc. To put it in perspective, in January I spent $23.55 on ebooks, $52.16 in February, $83.25 in March and $60.24 in April. I won't be able to do that. I might not be able to buy any more ebooks. The good news is that I have a lot of ebooks in my digital library, so I can start re-reading the ones I enjoyed and that'll see me through for a while. Plus, I have a couple I own but haven't read yet. And then I've got some physical copies of books, including a couple I haven't read yet. Will probably take my physical books up to the bach and read them up there. Not buying stuff will be the hardest thing for me. I have a bit of a spending addiction. I've been aware of it for some time, and I've known it's a problem, but I haven't wanted to do anything about it because I know I'll hate it. I did try at one point last year, but it didn't last long. But yeah, on this new budget, I'd have to rein myself in hard. No spending without consultation with Steve. It'll be really hard. But I also know it will be good for me. Ugh, why are things that are good for you so awful to go through?  I have five books currently pre-ordered. One releasing today (maybe tomorrow with the time difference), one releasing in June, two releasing in July and one releasing in September. There'd be no more bought lunches for Steve (except work-related ones that the company pays for) and no more restaurant dinners. This is probably where Steve will notice the pinch the most. I also have both kids' birthdays coming up, one in June and one in July. I have a few things for Caitie already - a pair of shoes, a couple (two or three, I can't remember) of skirts, and a couple of belts that she has been asking for. I intend to get her a couple of pairs of long socks I know she wants too. It's not a lot, compared to what I normally get, and I know that she actually really wants a new tablet for her digital drawing, but I can't see that being in the cards if we buy the bach. And it's Jayden's 21st birthday this year, which means a big family dinner at a nice restaurant, and we're supposed to be contributing a decent amount of money towards an overseas holiday for him. Like, enough to cover his flights. Which is a few thousand dollars. Which we don't have, because I suck at saving. The good news is that he wouldn't want to go until at least when he finishes his current course at uni, which is the end of the year. The bad news is that we wouldn't be able to save up to give him the money then if we bought the bach. So I have kind of failed Jayden.  But we might be able to make it work with end-of-year bonuses, plus he may well put it off another couple of years to do more studies. But that was the deal we came to. He didn't want a contribution towards a car (which is what I got for my 21st and what my nephew got and Caitie will probably get) or something like a gold necklace (which is what Steve got for his 21st). After much discussion, he wanted to travel overseas, so that's what we're contributing towards. My mum is going to contribute too, so if we can cover his airfares, her contribution will help him with food and accommodation until he finds a job over there to keep himself afloat until he decides to come back. Anyway, that was last night. While it was just a preliminary budget and preliminary talk, I think we came out of it with the agreement that we were prepared to do it hard for a while in order to be able to buy the bach. But we also kind of decided that we needed to get the asking price on the property as low as possible. And we're not sure how realistic that is. But we're pretty sure we're the only buyers interested in the property, so there's a chance. She might decide not to sell it rather than sell if for significantly less than the asking price. I dunno. We'll have to see. The bank might reject our application yet, so it might all be moot. |
The broker requested some additional documents today, including proof of income from the Inland Revenue Department for both the business and Steve. In doing so, we discovered that more than $50k of the business income has been attributed to Steve personally as income.  Glad we figured that out, so Steve doesn't get a big income tax bill in the near future! The broker said that they now have everything they need, and they have submitted our application to the bank. I presume that they anticipate it will be approved, or has a good chance at least. Which is great. They've told us that the bank is taking about five days to respond to applications, so we probably won't hear back until mid next week. Oof. The house we wanted is still available though, so there's that. The other two (cheaper) places that we were eyeing up aren't looking good. The micro house on the large section is under conditional contract, and the property on the beach we were told is 'unlikely to be approved by banks'. So we're back to our original choice. And so we wait. |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
does your family know how many people you know?
