Bangforbuck
Registered User
- Messages
- 8
Age: 35
Spouse’s/Partner's age: 34
Annual gross income from employment or profession: 42500
Annual gross income of spouse: 74000
Monthly take-home pay: 6050
Type of employment: both private
In general are you:
(a) spending more than you earn, or
(b) saving?
(b) Saving.
Rough estimate of value of home: 280000
Amount outstanding on your mortgage: 102000
What interest rate are you paying? 3.9% variable PTSB
Type of Mortgage: Variable. 27 years left. Paying back 517 a month.
Other borrowings – car loans/personal loans etc: 395 a month on car loan (5.9% interest for next 3 years Cost of credit in total is only about 1000) 120 a month on personal loan. (8500 left to pay over 9 years Interest rate of 7.250%. We know this needs to go and was a bad idea to take out.)
Do you pay off your full credit card balance each month?
If not, what is the balance on your credit card? No CC
Savings and investments: 16000 savings. 1200 in company shares scheme. (Paying in 125 a month salary foregone)
Do you have a pension scheme? Employer 10% of salary + contributions of 6% salary. Spouse employer 5% salary + contributions of 5%
Do you own any investment or other property? No
Ages of children: 4 and 1
Life insurance: We both have. I also have 10 times my salary life insurance through employer.
Health Insurance: Full family cover paid for by my employer.
Income/Expenditure Spreadsheet: I put our current figures through this spreadsheet and annual residue of approx 11000 (This is mostly made up of increase in salary for spouse from recent promotion.
What specific question do you have or what issues are of concern to you?
We are looking to do some upgrading in our home. We need approx 12000. We've been trying to do without for quite a few years now and are at the point where we now must go ahead and carry out these upgrades. We also want to clear the personal loan of 8500 asap. We were thinking of switching our mortgage to KBC to get a rate of 2.6% fixed over 5 years and to take out a top up of 20k to cover home upgrades and clear loan.
We are currently putting 280 from childrens allowance into savings accounts every month for kids education in the future. I know there are much better ways of using these funds but I'm not sure what to do. Should I take advantage of the share scheme at work? I can put in my bonus and twice the equivalent of my bonus into this scheme every year. I pay the PRSI and USC up front and can then take these funds out after 3 years without having to pay the PAYE (Obviously must pay tax on any profits on these) Should I instead use the government long term savings scheme for childrens allowance? Is there a low risk investment scheme I should consider?
I'd like to get an idea in general of what is the best approach we could take and will get us the best value for our money to upgrade our home and also save for our childrens future. Should we be instead putting as much money as we possibly can into clearing our mortgage earlier before our kids get to college going age and then use the money we had been paying into mortgage to now fund their education costs or is it better to save and keep mortgage at longer term. (We can also start reducing mortgage term by paying more once our childcare costs start to come down over the years - currently 1200 a month)
Many thanks for taking the time to read through this. We were thinking of going to a financial advisor until I saw someone mention that it would be worthwhile checking out this forum before paying through the nose for financial advice.
Spouse’s/Partner's age: 34
Annual gross income from employment or profession: 42500
Annual gross income of spouse: 74000
Monthly take-home pay: 6050
Type of employment: both private
In general are you:
(a) spending more than you earn, or
(b) saving?
(b) Saving.
Rough estimate of value of home: 280000
Amount outstanding on your mortgage: 102000
What interest rate are you paying? 3.9% variable PTSB
Type of Mortgage: Variable. 27 years left. Paying back 517 a month.
Other borrowings – car loans/personal loans etc: 395 a month on car loan (5.9% interest for next 3 years Cost of credit in total is only about 1000) 120 a month on personal loan. (8500 left to pay over 9 years Interest rate of 7.250%. We know this needs to go and was a bad idea to take out.)
Do you pay off your full credit card balance each month?
If not, what is the balance on your credit card? No CC
Savings and investments: 16000 savings. 1200 in company shares scheme. (Paying in 125 a month salary foregone)
Do you have a pension scheme? Employer 10% of salary + contributions of 6% salary. Spouse employer 5% salary + contributions of 5%
Do you own any investment or other property? No
Ages of children: 4 and 1
Life insurance: We both have. I also have 10 times my salary life insurance through employer.
Health Insurance: Full family cover paid for by my employer.
Income/Expenditure Spreadsheet: I put our current figures through this spreadsheet and annual residue of approx 11000 (This is mostly made up of increase in salary for spouse from recent promotion.
What specific question do you have or what issues are of concern to you?
We are looking to do some upgrading in our home. We need approx 12000. We've been trying to do without for quite a few years now and are at the point where we now must go ahead and carry out these upgrades. We also want to clear the personal loan of 8500 asap. We were thinking of switching our mortgage to KBC to get a rate of 2.6% fixed over 5 years and to take out a top up of 20k to cover home upgrades and clear loan.
We are currently putting 280 from childrens allowance into savings accounts every month for kids education in the future. I know there are much better ways of using these funds but I'm not sure what to do. Should I take advantage of the share scheme at work? I can put in my bonus and twice the equivalent of my bonus into this scheme every year. I pay the PRSI and USC up front and can then take these funds out after 3 years without having to pay the PAYE (Obviously must pay tax on any profits on these) Should I instead use the government long term savings scheme for childrens allowance? Is there a low risk investment scheme I should consider?
I'd like to get an idea in general of what is the best approach we could take and will get us the best value for our money to upgrade our home and also save for our childrens future. Should we be instead putting as much money as we possibly can into clearing our mortgage earlier before our kids get to college going age and then use the money we had been paying into mortgage to now fund their education costs or is it better to save and keep mortgage at longer term. (We can also start reducing mortgage term by paying more once our childcare costs start to come down over the years - currently 1200 a month)
Many thanks for taking the time to read through this. We were thinking of going to a financial advisor until I saw someone mention that it would be worthwhile checking out this forum before paying through the nose for financial advice.