Mums Finance

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Well, yesterday was Budget Day in the United Kingdom as Alistair Darling delivered his first budget to the people. As is the norm many are not impressed, but whoever is when a budget is handed down? And despite what the Budget actually outlines, the reality is always different. Scrooge himself has many guises in Government…

Budgets are funny things aren’t they? it’s the day the Chancellor tries to convince the people that he is cutting taxes and raising spending on education and health when in fact he is cutting public expenditure and raising the taxes. In the scheme of things it is likely to affect your pocket by a few pounds in one way or another so don’t expect to be in surplus by the next Budget!  anyway why not take the time to sort out your own budget and the best way to do this is to tackle  your mortgage - why? because you spend so much on it.

In spite of what you may have heard about the credit crunch there are still some pretty fair deals out there - a 3yr fix from the Post Office with a flat £600 fee - and some scary information - a 3yr fix from Alliance & Leicester with a 2% of loan fee (£2,000 per £100,000).  Just who are they aiming conditions like this at…?

Rather than pay lenders for short-term fixed-rate mortgages every two or three years, why not fix a mortgage yourself? This involves taking a flexible mortgage and paying over the maximum amount that you can afford. That way you are immune to any smaller changes in interest rates because you have set your overpayments to the equivalent of, for example, 9%.  It makes good sense.

Here’s an example: £100,000 at 6% over 25 years = £644 / month. Total repayment: £193,000.

But if you can afford £840 a month - equivalent to a 9% interest rate - you can reduce the time it would take to pay it off by 10 years and save you £42,000 in interest. Flexible mortgage rates tend to be more expensive than short-term fixes but it may be worth considering. As your mortgage is the greediest consumer of your income, tighten the belt and make the effort to feed it a bit more than usual and keep it well topped. Be a bit of a Scrooge and aim at keeping your money for yourself and not the banks.

Popularity: 12% [?]

We’ve two fun events coming up - St Patrick’s Day and Easter - so how about an injection of fun for the workplace and make these two particular days a bit more special for everyone at work?

When I worked at Target in Australia staff were encouraged to wear something green for St Patrick’s day; a green t-shirt, funny hat - you get the drift - and the shoppers loved it and it gave the place a real spirit for the day. It was the same over the Easter period - easter bonnets were the thing to wear and some staff went to a lot of effort over their self-made headwear.

This is a great way to lift the spirits around the office and you could even plan a party for staff at lunchtime. You don’t have to go to the extent of planning something to rival the office Xmas party but all the same it can still be made to be fun. Go and get some novel party invitations and hand them  out or leave them on people’s desks. Try and work around a simple theme; get someone to organise some green beer for the occasion or an easter egg hunt around the office/staffroom and have some fun!

Providing some light relief around the usual everyday duties will keep staff morale up and make the workplace a happier place.

Popularity: 7% [?]