Monthly Archives: February 2018

Good news week

Posted on by
3

Yesterday I had some good news!  I was contacted about doing some contract work, gave them a quote and they have set up a meeting with me in a few weeks. I’m excited about it as its work I enjoy and find challenging. It’s in an area I want to get more experience in. If its goes to plan I’ll be able to pay a full extra mortgage payment every month which will really speed up our payoff. It also opens up more opportunities for me.

I also found out yesterday who our new manager will be at work and its someone I really respect and have worked with in the past, so that was more good news. She’s a manager that really listens and is very supportive of team members. The next few months are going to be filled with change as people get laid off and new jobs and changing duties  all start up. It will be a lot easier to handle it under this manager.

Today is payday and the mortgage is now down to  $163,315 and the redraw is down to $5,592.


I’ve been eating out of the pantry and freezer and staying away from the corner shop. All in all its been a good week so far.

This weeks Grocery Shopping

Posted on by
Reply

This weeks offer from Coles was $50 worth of points if I spend $60 a week for four weeks – finally a good offer! So heres a roundup of this weeks shopping:

Bakers Delight: $9.70 6 cheese & bacon rolls, 6 bread rolls + 1 free loaf of bread

Butcher: $22.03 – 12 thin sausages, 10 rissoles – both $10/kg

Coles: $111.09  savings $35.46 + $10 off -total shop value was $156.55

18 rolls toilet paper  $8
1.5kg sweet potato  $3.09
750 ml vegetable oil $3
1kg carrots $1.50
1.7kg Kent pumpkin  $3.09
1kg baby potatos  $2.62
1 avocado $3.90
1kg block cheese $11
250g parmesan cheese  $6.10
250 mls rice wine vinegar  $2.35
400g tomato paste  $4.80
1 BBQ chicken $8
6 pack cat food $4.80
3 punnets perino tomatos $9
6 bananas 4.03
4 gala apples $2.05
100 Green teabags $5.49
80 Camomile teabags $5.49
80 Peppermint teabags $5.49
150g rice cakes
1.68kg pears $1.68
1 pkt scotch finger biscuits $2
1 pkt orange cream biscuits $2
500g capsicums $3.35
4 x 250g punnets strawberries $10
125g raspberries $4

Good buys this week were pears $1/kg and teabags half price – I refuse to pay $11 for 80 herbal teabags, so when its half price I stock up.  The 1kg block of cheese on special cost the same price as a 500g block.

We had less trips to the corner shop this week. Once to get milk, bread, bacon, capsicum, tomatos & cheese to make pizzas and a second time to buy some junk food after a very stressful day at work – a habit I need to break!

Corner shop spending: $50.47


Total spend this week:$193.29


We ate a 1kg minced meat, an apple pie and two packets of frozen veggies from the freezer this week and two packets of soup from the pantry.

I cooked the apples from last week into applesauce and froze them and we also froze 6 meals of Bolognese sauce after making spag bol with the mince.

This weeks plan – eat more out of the freezer & pantry & reduce food waste.

Rates time!

Posted on by
5

Its that time of the year when council rates and strata fees bills arrive. So I’ve just paid them for each of our investment properties:

IP #1 rates- $377  strata- $491
IP #2 rates -$283  strata – $523

We have separate offset bank accounts for each property so that any money in that account helps to reduce the amount of interest we pay on the loans. All the rent is paid into the specific account and all the deductions for that property come out of it. It makes it very easy at tax time.

The rates for our house are paid automatically each week. I pay $60 and that will get us a bit ahead in payments. I’d like to start next year with a nice buffer of savings on all my bills. The annual bill for our rates is $1532 paid quarterly ($383 per quarter). We also pay for water here and I noticed our water bill has gone up – so I’ll have to look into that more closely on the weekend.

We’ve had a few days now to try out the outdoor blinds in really hot weather. They have definitely made a difference to the heat inside. Most days we’ve only put the air conditioning on for a few hours in the late afternoon and just used a fan during the day. We’ve still got the big awning to go up out the back this weekend and a few more windows I need to buy blinds for.

Its a bit cooler here today which is good and the fire in the town half an hour away that has been going since the weekend is back under control but theres still smoke in the air.

I’m interested to know how much council rates are in other countries, how much are your rates?