If you are mortgage free, where does your income go?

[Presentxx]

We will be in this position soon and I’m intrigued as to how others spend/utilise their income when the biggest debt has been cleared? Hope this isn’t too invasive, but its not something I find myself comfortable asking those closest to me.

School fees. House upkeep. Teenagers. But mainly school fees.

when i got bored at work, i was able to go down to one day a week and do a degree. before that i just saved and ploughed most spare cash into my pension. have to think if i work more when degree finishes or "retire" at 48

• Savings and private investment accounts
• holidays
• DH's car

Now that we have DD, it will also go on nursery & school fees and related costs

Pension contributions and school fees swallowed most of it.

Quite simply university costs for 3 - two of mine and the one I'm fostering. Fortunately I can afford it.

Being mortgage free means I can live on a part time wage and still save.

Once we finished our mortgage, we re-directed our monthly payment into a savings account.

For the first 3 years I was mortgage free I was trying to work in London and live somewhere else, so the money I didn't spend on the mortgage went on weekly trainfares, renting a room in London, plus catsitter, station car parking and so on. I then became self-employed, and my income since then has been about 10k a year less than when I was employed - probably going to be worse this year with COVID. So, its more the case that I'd be in a degree of difficulty if I still had a mortgage, and am now moderately ok. I'm late 50s, and under no illusion that its all downhill in terms of earning from now on - so I'm incredibly grateful that I don't have to worry about the mortgage and that there's a modest pension which I will hold off drawing down as long as I can.

I'd be interested in knowing how people are mortgage-free.

We are planning to pay off 10% extra this year and next which should knock off a fair few years. We forgo expensive holidays and fancy cars in order to save as much as possible.

@BigSandyBalls2015

Teenagers - food, car etc. Holidays - family and as a couple (before Covid) We eat out a lot more House renovations Bit of saving

Yes.

Then we re-mortgaged.......

Savings mostly. We need work on the house and we only have one wage earner so need a decent bank of funds behind us. Then it will be pension.

You know when you see older couples rolling around in Range Rover Vogues and you can’t figure out how anyone can justify £700 a month on a car? That’s where it’s going. Also notice how many middle aged people have 4 character personal plates that cost a fortune for no reason.

i have got 7 more years to go but i can dream about it lol i will be in my early 50s and my youngest will be 21 , i will probably go back to uni i wont downsize because as the way the economy is going i think i will still have my youngest with me. House has got alot of potential for extending

Neither of us work full time! Savings so that we can retire at the same time (age difference). Holidays and teenager

I'm mortgage free through inheritance. My parents were both dead by the time I was 40.

The downside is I've no family left.

I'd be interested in knowing how people are mortgage-free.

I'd wager most who are will be older so got on the ladder earlier & had much cheaper prices. If young then likely an inheritance.

I don't know anyone with mortgages of a couple of hundred quid!

We started putting the same amount as the mortgage into savings for parental contributions to university maintenance.

@BubblyBarbara that's so true. Whenever I see a brand new nice car it tends to be driven by an older person. My road costs upwards of 1m for a house, we all have 2nd hand cars including myself!

I have been mortgage free on a portfolio of properties for 20 years. I bought a fixer-upper about ten years ago, and a lot of money has gone into putting the property in a habitable condition. I try to save so I can buy another property mortgage-free. I think we have a good life for a single parent household, no personal debt at all, nice food and holidays, a rainy day pool of cash of emergencies. Being mortgage free allowed me to start a part-time business that suits my family/ pays well, and keeps my foot in the door with my career. I don't think I would ever go back to work full-time, unless financial disaster hit.

@ThePluckOfTheCoward

I bought a horse, rebuilt the stables and put in a swimming pool. It's wonderful.

Most mumsnet response ever

I'd be interested in knowing how people are mortgage-free.

Both of us work full time with no DC (so no sacrificing one salary for childcare or SAHP). We were therefore able to double the mortgage amount and never reduced that amount even though the mortgage company did automatically (we just topped it up to the same amount each month). Any salary increases went on the mortgage. Mortgage allowed us to overpay any amount without penalty.

Same amount now transferred to pensions and investments as we got used to not having that money.

We are retired and mortgage was paid off just before so it just enables us to live comfortably.

Our mortgage ended around 8 years ago, but was never big ~£500 month including mortgage protection. This now goes into shares which we get a good deals on from the place I work with (B2G1F or -20% of listed price, tax free if kept for 5 years).

Shares will hopefully help fund slightly earlier retirement or top up pension.

We're 1 phonecall call away from this point. Plan is to pay equivalent of mortgage into savings. We need some work done on the house (too hard to fix sofits with primary aged kids - one up ladder, one footing it, kids ferral) and we've rooms we've not decorated in 13yrs of living here. Once those are done (next 24mo) we'll saving for kids to go to uni. Although we might go skiing as a family. We've not been abroad for 12yrs.

I was mortgage free through inheritance too. Both my parents were dead by the time I was 44. We had about £30k left on the mortgage at the time.
No family either now.
Saving for early retirement at 55.