£30k in 2019

[Jazzybeats]

I’ve set myself the bold goal of overpaying my mortgage by 30k next year and looking for ideas for generating a bit of cash to do that.

So far I am:

• eBaying everything and anything
• starting an Amazon Merch business
• cutting any die t debits
• switching bank accts for the sign on bonus
• banking any “savings” I make day to day (eg buying a cheaper brand or on deal and bank the difference v full price)

Any other ideas? Ideally I am looking for passive income streams so something like matched betting is too involved.

Hello some more updates. The meal planning and veg eating is going well - we are spending now about a third less on groceries than we used to pre-challenge. We’ve traded down on groceries, started eating meat much less (probably 2 dinners a week) and the kids now eat cheaper fruit - they had a love of blueberries and straw berries which right now are £2 a box, they now get bananas and oranges at half the price and more filling :)

The Merch thing is going slowly. I haven’t been able to spend any time to promote my T shirts as work has cotton away from me but I intend to spend an hour this Friday eve purely on Instagram posts and setting up a Facebook page.

I’m not sure I’ll hit the January goal of £2.5k to stay on track - so far I’ve saved about £500 (but it will be clearer at the end of the month!)

How's it going OP?

Ack slowly. January was good, all in saved about £900? Short of my target but was good. Feb has gone badly though just saved an extra £200 so far....

I’ve just been made redundant at work tho (thanks Brexit) so that’s a bit of a stickler. If I get another job the redundancy money will make a serious dent in my target. If I don’t... well bugger.

I have set up 2 regular saver accounts though for a total of £550 a month. So that’s going to force some changes.

The easiest way we found to bring in some extra cash is renting out our loft apartment. It’s bringing in an extra 1200/month and we don’t really notice they’re there!

Look at swapping down everything - Centreparks is expensive - you can get a Haven holiday through break free for probably a quarter or less of what you are paying Centreparks even off peak and if you have little kids they probably wont even notice the difference.

Since reading this we have tried match betting. We only place small bets and had no clue what we are doing but have made a small profit of £14 (that's removing the initial deposit of cash to get started) on win to nil bets. We would like to try and save a deposit for a house this will be a slow burner but it's a profit and money we didn't have before.

Jazzy... been following your thread. I'm sorry to hear about the redundancy :( At least you started to reduce your outgoings before that.

Do you have a plan?

Wow op amazed at all you have done, very impressed.
Perhaps you could set up a business like inspired leadership. I certainly felt inspired after reading your post.

Snog has it, sell your car & save the money

*Jazzy... been following your thread. I'm sorry to hear about the redundancy sad At least you started to reduce your outgoings before that.

Do you have a plan?*

Plan is interview like crazy. 2 this week one next week. The redundancy money is not bad so best case scenario and I walk into a job it will make a good dent in my target.

For now I’m keep going with my plan. In Feb ended up overpaying the mortgage by £350 and banking £950 in savings... so making very solid progress!

And just got £70 cash back on my car insurance and at least £200 saving on renewal after following moneysavjng expert tips... whoop!

@Jazzybeats just seeing if there was any update on your job situation or savings plan so far? I remember seeing this earlier in the year and being very impressed by your motivation!

Ahhhhh I had forgotten about this thread!

So the redundancy happened but I got a very good job elsewhere. I used the redundancy money to make a £10k dent in the target, and have made several other tweaks and changes.

Unfortunately have had a few unexpected bills like a new bathroom floor and other stuff so it’s not been smooth sailing - but I think il going to end the year having done about £20k of the £30k target.... so pretty amazing!

I’ve sold a few more bits on eBay and now eldest is out of Nursery just started school so that is going right into savings too.

That's fantastic news, well done! They do say that setting huge ambitious goals is the best approach - even if you only get halfway there you're still much better off than if you'd done nothing. Very pleased for you, hope you can keep it going in 2020!

I've enjoyed reading your thread. Keep us updated!

Very inspiring. I'm trying to make some extra to pay off credit card debt. I'm selling on Facebook marketplace, going to sell some cakes, cutting back on all spending & groceries.

It gets addictive once you start. The best tip I’ve found sounds silly but it’s literally to add up the pennies when grocery shopping.

Eg if I save 20p buying a cheaper pack of onions or whatever - that can just get “lost” in rounding but I make a point to transfer the pennies into savings and before you know it those pennies are pounds.

I’ve also had to claim insurance for a couple of things (eldest caught pox on holiday for example) and that’s gone right into savings (logic being the costs of the dr were incurred Regardless and paid so the insurance was a bonus)