A ‘smart financial moves’ thread

[crabsaremisunderstood]

A space to share anything and everything, big or small, that has helped your finances in some way recently. You never know - it might help another person on this thread!

My smart move was opening a Lifetime ISA 3 years ago. The government gives you 25% on top of everything you put in, on funds up to £4k a year. If you put in £1k, you get £250 extra! I bought my first house this year and wouldn’t have become a homeowner if it hadn’t been for this. For those that have already bought a first home, you can also use it to give yourself a retirement fund.

Oh and I should have added that my LISA was with Moneybox. Fab company with excellent customer service and a really comprehensive app.

Following

Following too. Mine is to really think carefully about top up shops. In the winter I keep milk outside the backdoor and freeze bread. Saves the excuse of top up shopping.

Following.

My smartest move was to buy a house at auction. So much cheaper than via the normal process. Would recommend.

Following too.

Started paying into a pension at 25. It means I'll be able to retire 10 years early.

It’s a small thing and I am in awe of people on this thread already, but after years of being in denial I now check my bank account daily. I feel in so much more control as a result. I’m still in debt and that’s not going to change for a while but at least I don’t have the blind panic of not knowing how bad it’s going to be when I log on and it’s been a few weeks since I last checked.

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Yes to pension earlier so can retire earlier (hopefully)

Get shopping delivered every 5-6 days. Usually just enough to qualify for home delivery.

Works for meal planning, always have fresh healthy food in, no top up shops, no milkman (sorry), no unplanned supermarket purchases. I can easily compare prices of things by weight/volume. No petrol used to drive to the supermarket. Saves me about 1.5 hours a week in time too.

Vastly outweighs the monthly cost of the pre-paid delivery plan.

I thought LISAs were just for first time buyers so I'd ignored them. So my smartest financial move might be opening this thread if they can operate in a pension way too!
Big picture my smartest move was buying my flat. It was pretty much the cheapest on the market and the deposit was still a stretch, but from day 1 I was paying less than I'd paid in rent and so my finances have improved year on year.
Smaller picture it's making sure I save something each month, even if it's just a fiver.

Using pots within a bank account (like Monzo) to allocate money for different reasons (holiday, Christmas etc).

Started a pension in my 20's too.
Bought a house then overpaid it and invested.
Always put my savings away like a bill that had to be paid.
Also put money aside for holidays so we always had the money to pay for them a year in advance. If you book early, it seems like ages away then suddenly the balance is due.

I’m on a 10 month council tax direct debit. For the two months I don’t pay I put half in a sinking fund for emergencies (tyre puncture, boiler service, whatever) and the other half I spend on non-perishable stuff - loo roll, toothpaste, laundry and cleaning products, tinned tomatoes, kidney beans, large bottles of shampoo from TK Maxx etc. keeps my grocery bills a bit lower for the rest of the year.

LISA was a great move for me too. Going to use it for a house deposit and then keep it going for a pension when I’m 60 (Moneybox have confirmed I can keep it going in this way even if I empty it).

I joined Airtime Rewards and now I get rewards for shopping in some places like Boots. Every time it adds up to £10 I can cash it out as credit off my phone bill.

I finally but the bullet and am trying You Need A Budget. It’s my first month but really illuminating to see exactly what we are spending and I do think it is making us think about what we spend.

Other than that, overpaying our mortgage was the best financial thing we ever did.

I like Chip for automatic savings, you don’t always miss the money but it mounts up.

What kind of pencil lets you do that?! I've had a contributory workplace pension since 22, I will certainly not be retiring early.

• pension of course!

No large savings here but things that have helped me stop worrying so much about money are putting away Money each month for fun stuff,so I don't feel guilty having nice stuff.
Putting money away for xmas, it's wonderful to have a few £100 saved up for xmas and off course if a real emergency happened then we have that Xmas money.

Spending money for holiday is cash divided into separate day's so can't over spend.
Small overpayment on mortgage ( £20 a month for 5 year's, now £100 a month adds up). .

Learning about the stock market and stocks and shares ISA.
Unfortunately the market is so down at the moment,I'm still paying into it so I hope it pays off one day.

I also opened a sipp. Unfortunately there isn't enough in it at all for any type of retirement at all but I've still got 20 year's and I hope it's enough to buy a car at least or something like that. But with a sipp, I put 80 in and I think the government adds 25?

What I must do is open up DC. Sipp each and get them to put £ into it when they start to work.

Instead of putting all of our ‘savings’ into a instant accessible account I’ve set up a standing order to put £500 into premium bonds each month - it isn’t as easy to dip into as there isn’t an app! Hopefully this will help save

Interest-only mortgage (currently on a 0.99% five year fix) and have invested the money for the capital repayment in stocks and shares ISAs.

I've made a lot more than the amount I'll have to repay on my mortgage. Although they've tightened up the lending criteria significantly in recent years.

I cancelled my gym membership as I just wasnt getting there!
Have set up the same amount into premium bonds every month.... will use as an 'emergency' emergency(!!) fund... or might win a million!!
Fingers crossed

Never had a credit card.
Overpaid mortgage on first flat pre children which helped us get our current house (still large mortgage though).
Bought somewhere which needed doing up / had potential.

Like a PP my DH bulk buys non perishable items if he sees they're on special offer.

Bought an electric heater for the children's bedroom to reduce putting on central heating for the whole house. We don't mind watching TV in the evening in dressing gowns and blankets.

Always take snacks and water with us when going out with the children, quite often sandwiches as well.

Overpaying mortgage by the full 10% every year. It’s incredible what a difference it makes over the term. Even if you can’t pay the full 10%, any overpayment is worth it. Martin Lewis says make it your priority to pay off any debt that attracts compound interest first.

Not having a credit card - happened originally because I moved country and couldn’t get one, but it trained me to never spend beyond income.

putting half of any ‘extra’ income into savings/ investment account - as soon as I get any pay rise, bonus or gift I set up the debit to my investment account. Lifestyle creep has been slower as a result.

investing in stocks globally- I put a lot into the us markets (as well as Europe and Asia in lower percentages)for diversification. Home and job are uk, so feel like I need to counter against risks to uk economy. My portfolio has done massively well despite brexit, slow uk economy and recent currency issues. I invest in tracker funds, so low fees and no knowledge really required.