Hello and welcome back to Mortgage Advisor on F.I.R.E. This week I will talk about my return to work and a mistake I made with my daily meds. I also look at my BTL now that a tenancy has been signed.
Quote of the Week
Another quote that hits home. Life does not have a plan laid out for you. There is no grand plan, or destiny. If you want to get something out of life, you have to grab life and bend it to your will. There are times when you are left with no choice but to react to what happens to you, but there is also a lot of time and opportunity for you to be proactive.
There are three phases in life; childhood, adulthood and old age. The key is to maximise the middle part and stretch it out as far as possible. I am not saying there is no quality of life in old age, but the fact is there are many elderly people who struggle financially because sufficient provision was not made during the adult phase of life. The earlier in the adult phase you make your plans and put them into action, the better chance you have of a higher quality of life in later years.
Life is not just about quantity, it is also about quality. The earlier you plan, the more of both you will probably have.
Weekly Update
I have not felt quite right for a few days this week and it is because I am an idiot. I take a number of different medications each day and I have a weekly planner for them. This means each day I simply have to open the box for that day and take the meds in one go. This saves me opening up lots of packets each day as I just organise the meds once a week. It works great, when one remembers to actually include all the meds. I forgot one of them, which meant I went into sharp withdrawal. I was spaced out, tired, light headed and nauseous. It was not a fun time.
I had thought that my symptoms were the result of my getting used to working again. I have completed three weeks of my phased return and I will be ramping up my working hours over the next two weeks. The plan is to be back to normal by the end of the month.
A few weeks ago my girlfriend and I started using Hello Fresh, which is one of the food subscription services that have cropped up in recent years. I thought we should give it a try based on a number of my friends raving about it on Facebook. The way it works is you sign up for a weekly delivery and select how many meals you want. Then, you choose the meals from a weekly menu. The meals come in a well packaged box with all the chilled items together with a number of ice packs. Then, all the non-chilled items are wrapped up in numbered bags. Included in the box are the recipe cards.
We used the service for three weeks and the meals were, for the most part, great. The food was tasty and the portion sizes good. Each meal left us full. We had three issues though, that have resulted in us cancelling the subscription. The first issue is one of mess. Many of the recipes require the use of a lot of different utensils, bowls, cups and chopping boards. This is fine once in a while, but when you get halfway through your working week and you have had to cook like this for the last couple of nights, it gets a bit tiring. There are recipes that are designed to be “quick” and “easy”, which to be fair they are. Even then, it is still a bit too stressful in a small kitchen when you have both been working.
The second issue, which is more of an annoyance for me than it would be for some people, is that the billing seemed overly complicated. There was a glitch on the website when I signed up which resulted in two accounts being created and multiple transactions coming off my credit card. It took two calls and a web chat to resolve. This was before we had received any boxes. Then, the billing each week was confusing with multiple transactions instead of just one, simple, bill. For someone who tracks their finances as obsessively as me, it was a little annoying. The final issue was that we received an incorrect order where the ingredients were for a completely different meal. It is difficult to make roasted cauliflower with penne and mushrooms. In fairness again, we did receive an account credit.
2021 Goals – to be achieved by 31/12/2021
1 – Reduce weight to 92.8kg.
2 – Finish 104 new books.
3 – Complete RO3 for my DipFA.
4 – Complete RO4 for my DipFA.
5 – Complete RO5 for my DipFA.
6 – Complete RO6 for my DipFA.
I have now finished eight books on my route to completing 104 new books by the end of 2021. The last book I finished, The Remaining, was the first book in a series of post-apocalyptic fiction. It sucked. I was bored and disinterested and could not wait for the book to be over. I was also disappointed that the first book seemed like half a story. It is not often that I start a series and do not finish it. It was that bad.
My progress with my weight loss has stalled a little, but I put that down to the mistake I made with my meds. As I was feeling tired and spaced out, I resorted to snacking again. I have not gained any serious weight, but the losses stopped. Hopefully I will be back on the weight loss journey from next week.
I would love to announce that I have made some progress on studying for the remaining modules of DipFA, but the truth is I am only able to spread my mental energy so much at this time. I will get there though.
Financial Update
Assets
Premium Bonds: £4,000.00 (no change from last update).
Stocks and Shares ISA: £17,162.02 (up £1,651.79 from last update).
Fuck It Fund: £550.00 (no change from last update).
Residential Property Value: £194,909.00 (no change from last update).
Buy-to-Let Property Value: £125,775.00 (no change from last update).
Total Assets: £342,396.02 (up £1,651.79 from last update).
Debts
Credit Card: £1,698.97 (down £58.55 from last update).
Residential Mortgage: £141,026.49 (down £357.27 from last update).
Buy-to-Let Mortgage: £93,199.07 (up £149.40 from last update).
Total Debts: £235,924.53 (down £266.42 from last update).
Total Wealth Figure: £106,471.49 (up £1,918.21 from last update).
Investment Income in 2021: £0.00 (target £5,000).
The stock market moved in the right direction for me this week with my stocks increasing in value. Although I am perfectly happy with low prices, from a pound-cost-averaging perspective, I am now in the position where I need values to increase. This is because I hope to use the sale of those funds to help fund the next BTLs I purchase. The BTL mortgage increased slightly as the initial interest balances out with our initial payments, but this will stabilise with the next interest and mortgage payment adjustments.
The Gamestop story seems to have faded into the background, but I do not think we have seen the last of Redditors banding together to take on the hedge funds. I have mixed feelings about this, because I want to believe that the markets are efficient. However, Gamestop’s shares were pumped to roughly $400 per share, and just a week later they are now under $70 a share. A lot of people made a lot of money, but for every person that made money there will be a lot of uninformed, or amateur investors who lost a lot.
I am something of a hypocrite though, because had I noticed this story early enough I would have jumped on the stock as it shot up. If it happens again and I think there is money to be made, I will jump on it. The real concern with this is that the hedge funds have enough highly intelligent people working for them so that they could infiltrate the social media groups and orchestrate a pump-and-dump campaign to suit their own needs, and this could cause even more financial heartache for the amateur investors.
BTL Update
I received confirmation today that the tenancy has been signed by the new tenant and it will start towards the end of this month. The gross rent is £595pcm. Once agent fees, tax, contingency fund contributions and insurance are all deducted it does not leave a life changing amount for spending or reinvesting; that comes through having multiple properties. For now, the plan is to roll up some of the net rent back into the mortgage to bring the balance down and increase the equity. This will help speed up the timeline for releasing that equity and will also serve as a buffer with the lender in case anything goes wrong in the future.
The process of buying the second BTL will start in the next few weeks but it is a good idea for a little breather, I think. I doubt anything will complete before the end of quarter two of 2021 as it will take that long to accumulate the necessary deposit. Also, it will then have been six months since the purchase of the first property completed which means if there have been further increases in the property’s value it will be possible to release that equity. Most lenders have a six month rule preventing further advances until the mortgage has been open for a minimum of six months.
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Mortgage Advisor on FIRE. 