• Websites that will save you money
• Get a new kitchen and bathroom for just £83.45!
• Freebies
• Accessories

Websites that will save you money

1. My Deco - find the perfect accessories at the best price

This website is a great place to start and it is especially useful for homeware and accessories. Much more than just a price comparison site, My Deco is crammed full of top tips and style ideas so it really is a godsend for anyone doing up their home.

Go to the ‘Shopping’ tab at the top then look under ‘Special Offers’ or select a room that you want to shop for. Once you’ve done this you can sort the results by price – choose low to high – and see what bargains are out there. It really is a useful tool that will save you heaps of time and money.

Another good thing about this website is that you can plan your own room by uploading a picture of your room and then trying out 3D furniture, paint, wallpaper, flooring and accessories. It’s such a clever way to get an idea of how a room will look before you buy anything. Unfortunately you can’t yet do this for kitchens and bathrooms but My Deco promise that they are coming soon!

2. Clearance Comet – ex-display with big discounts

This is an auction site for clearance items from Comet (not surprisingly). All of the products displayed on the website are fully operational and come with a one year guarantee. The items are in various conditions – new, end of line, ex-display, scratched, dented, used, returned and refurbished.

You should be able to get all your electricals here at really low prices. When we looked we saw some items with just one day of bidding to go with a current bid of just £1 so take a look now! Just click on the items to find out what condition they’re in.

3. Just Doors and Door Chic – revamp your kitchen cabinets with new doors

Don’t spend thousands on a new fitted kitchen. Instead, upgrade an old kitchen with new doors, handles or worktops – this will give it a completely different look without you having to fork out for a whole new suite.

Just Doors deliver to the UK mainland for free. All you need to do is measure the doors and drawer fronts that you have at the moment, then tell them on the order form and choose the colour you want.

Click here to see how to buy online. If your current cupboards are fine but the drawers are damaged, you can buy new drawer fronts from Just Doors for only £10, or buy some new handles or knobs from Door Chic.

If you do need to replace the whole cabinet, go for a cheap option and then add some ornate knobs like these to make it look more expensive than it really is.

Lark & Larks is another store specialising in replacement, made-to-measure kitchen doors, handles and worktops. The doors are really reasonably priced and in the budget range prices start from under £10. You can also opt to add a panel of glass effect acrylic to any door you choose and all products come with a two year guarantee.

Or, try Door Furniture Direct which concentrates exclusively on door handles, hooks and knobs of various styles and materials.  Check out the special offers to see if you can bag yourself a bargain.

4. TradeLeftovers

This site is primarily for tradesmen who want to swap leftover and spare materials – but do sign up. It’s completely free to register, there’s no commission and you could nab yourself a real bargain. Look at all the decorating leftovers here.

5. City Furniture Clearance

City Furniture Clearance sells used and refurbished contract furniture which has been taken back to their workshops and refurbishished. Pretty much any furniture item you can imagine can eb sold so it’s quite good if you’re after quirkier pieces.

You will have to sift through to find a gem but it is particularly good for big, decorative mirrors and antique reproduction furniture.

Have a look at the selection of mirrors here. A well-placed mirror can make a room look so much bigger – not to mention hide a multitude of sins – so use one to cover up any holes or marks on the wall. Look at the bathroom accessories here and the lighting here.

6. John Lewis – cut price quality homeware and furniture

John Lewis may not be the obvioous choice for quality furniture for less but the department store has added new items to its Value range which stretches across several store departments but has especially good deals on furniture. There are bargains in home furnishings, like a lampshade for £2.50 and a £5 spotty ironing board cover, kitchenware and utensils from £1.60 and bath linens from £1. Plus you get free delivery on all orders over £30. For more info and to buy, visit John Lewis.com.

7. The Showhome Warehouse - for something a bit special

For something a bit special head to The Showhome Warehouse in Northamptonshire where you can pick up ex-show home and sample pieces from top stores with huge discounts. Expect savings of up to 75% on some beautiful items, so if you find yourself in the area make sure you have a look.

8. Grab some freebies

Check out the newest free item website called Snaffleup. It works exactly the same way as the others in that no money is allowed to change hands. You simply search for items by category or enter your postcode and look at items being given away near you.

There is actually a category just for kitchen stuff, so do take a look and see what you could get for free. We’ve just been on and found a kitchen cupboard and seven foot work surface being given away!

Another website always worth a look is Gumtree. Just go to the website and under ‘Stuff for Sale’ click freebies for a list of free things in your area. Click on the items you want then email or call the owners to organise a time to collect – but be quick as they tend to go quickly.

The other two sites are Craigslist (choose your city, then look under ‘for sale’ and choose the ‘free’ tab) and Freecycle (you join your local network to find the items being given away near you).

9. BBC Homes

Get some interior design inspiration from the BBC magazine. It’s full of great images of all kinds of design ideas for every room. Also, check out the rules of design section which has some great advice on bathroom design.

Get a new kitchen and bathroom for less than £84

See how you could completely change the look of both your kitchen and bathroom by kitting them out with new accessories – and all without spending a fortune. In fact, we spent less than £100 getting everything we needed!

See how much we got for our money in various well known stores here:

All prices were correct on 15 March 2010.

How to revamp your kitchen and bathroom

Try a lick of paint

Paint your old kitchen cabinet doors to cover up any scuffs and make them look brighter and cleaner. Add some new door knobs or handles and they really will look brand new!

Painting the kitchen or bathroom walls is a really simple, cheap way to give a room a new look. Keep the colours fairly neutral and use pictures and bright accessories to give the room personality instead.

Try going into a big DIY store like B&Q where they mix up paint for you – they will sometimes have leftovers or unsold paint that you can get on the cheap or even for free! If not, try Wickes for a huge selection of paints and woodstains at good prices.

Fix up your windows

A new set of curtains will really freshen up your kitchen. Get your hands on some bargain fabrics from Curtain Factory Outlet, Cheap Fabrics and Cheap Curtains.

If you don’t want to stick with blinds, why not ditch them and get a window film like this silver etch effect film instead. It allows 70% of natural light through, while still giving you complete privacy – and prices start from just £14.

Replace small items for a big change

Replace old taps instead of buying a whole new bathroom suite. Click Bathrooms has a good selection of a variety of shapes and sizes, all at reasonable prices.

Or if your kitchen or bathroom is small you can lay down some new flooring without spending a lot of money. Try Wickes for some cheap vinyl floor tiles.

Get new accessories to update your kitchen and bathroom.

We love the funky and contemporary accessories from Beth Stevens. We particularly like the crazy range of chopping boards on offer and the vibrant Normann washing up bowls.

Buy matching items to bring the whole look together. Matching sets are available pretty much anywhere but there are usually good sets in big department stores like Marks & Spencer, John Lewis and Heals.

We had a look online at Marks & Spencer and saw this utensil pot for £7.50 with a matching set of tea, coffee, sugar canisters for £15.

Buy accessories that provide extra storage and look good at the same time.

Go to Organise My Home for some great storage items at low prices. Another website full of great looking storage solutions is A Place for Everything.

Tiles, tiles and more tiles!

Ask friends if they have any old tiles left over from their own home improvements. Once you have enough, break them up to make a mosaic.

If you want to buy new, go to stores like B&Q, Tile Click and Wickes for great prices .

And if you can’t afford to replace your old tiles you can alter the way they look quite dramatically with tile paint and transfers.

Buy transfers at Benporium which sends items by first class post to the UK for free, or Tile Transfers which has a clearance section here. Alternatively, try bidding for cheap ones on eBay. Look at the tile transfers here.

Useful links

• B&Q
• Cheap Curtains
• eBay
• John Lewis
• Just Doors
• M&S
• Russell Hobbs
• Tile Click
• Wickes

Related posts:

1. Budget home decorating: furnish your entire house for under £200 Need to furnish your new home but haven’t got the...
2. Selling houses: how to sell your home With the property market still depressed, now isn’t really the...
3. 50 Ways to Save in your Home The credit crunch means we all need to cut down...

Remember when sorting out your cover that high value items often need to be listed individually on your policy, and things like iPods need itemising as possessions covered outside the home.

So, where can you find the best policy to cover all of this? Well, you might just need to talk to your existing insurer, or you could check out all the latest offers below and find yourself an even more competitive deal.

Top home insurance picks

• 3 months free home insurance plus 10% online discount with NatWest

Spread the cost over 12 monthly payments, choose from two types of home insurance – Standard and Elite – and get a 10% online discount with their promotional code. Offer extended until April 23rd.

• Double discounts from the Co-Op

Get one third off your contents premium if you buy buildings and contents insurance together from the Co-Op plus a further 15% discount for buying online. As well as that, you can get up to 40% no claims discount. Get a quote here.

• 3 months free when you buy buildings and contents insurance together with Barclays

If you take out a combined home insurance policy with Barclays you’ll get three months insurance for free. You can get up to £500,000 buildings cover and up to £50,000 contents cover.

• 50% off combined insurance with Churchill

If you haven’t claimed in the last five years Churchill will give you a whopping 50% off buildings and contents insurance if you apply before 31 March 2010. Plus all new customers get a 10% discount when making an application online.

• 12 months for the price of 9 with Direct Line

Get three months free home insurance with Direct Line, plus FREE home emergency cover and an extra 25% discount for buying online.

• Up to 20% off Prudential home insurance

Get up to 20% off the cost of your buildings insurance, contents insurance, or both. You’ll also get an extra 10% cover during the Christmas period and on the months surrounding your wedding day.

• £30 cashback and up to 20% discount with Swinton

By entering the promo code HMWTDR648 you’ll get £30 cashback on your combined buildings and contents home insurance policy. And buying online will give you the chance to take advantage of their sale and get up to a third off the price of your policy.

• Good choice for those aged 50 and over: Castle Insurance could save you hundreds

Castle Insurance specialises in providing cover for over 50s customers. A recent report by Consumer Intelligence revelaed that 10% of customers aged 50 or over could save up to £211 on their home insurance with Castle. You can get a quote in under a minute, so why not give it a go?

What is home insurance?

Home insurance is insurance that covers your house and the possessions contained within it. The phrase ‘home insurance’ actually covers two different types of insurance: buildings insurance and contents insurance.

If you’re a home owner, you can get these two types of home insurance together in one policy, protecting both the structure of your home and all your possessions. You can also buy them separately.

If you don’t own your house, you don’t need to fork out to insure the structure (the buildings insurance part) – that’s your landlord’s job.

However, you do need a contents insurance policy to protect your furniture, clothes and other possessions.

• What is buildings insurance?
• What is contents insurance?
• How can I cut the price?

What is buildings insurance?

If you’re a homeowner, having buildings insurance will often be one of the conditions of your mortgage. If you’re renting, you don’t need it, so skip to the contents insurance section here.

What does it cover?

Buildings insurance covers the main building of your house and can be extended to cover the garage, fences, shed, walls and even the swimming pool if you’re lucky enough to have one.

Be aware that there are often lots of exclusions when it comes to extras like these. Insurers don’t like covering gates and fences for storm and flood damage – and other extras will often not be covered unless the main structure of your house is affected. Always check your individual policy to be sure.

Despite exclusions, a good buildings insurance policy should cover you for fire, flood, subsidence, storms, lightning, theft or vandalism, escape of water and oil (they’ll pay for damage caused, but probably not to fix the tank) and damage caused by falling trees, branches or other objects.

If you can no longer live in your house because of damage, your insurance will also cover alternative accommodation costs.

Don’t forget about the garden!

Research from Virgin Money reveals that one in seven gardens every year are victims of theft. We Brits love our gardens, spending more than £4 billion per year on them. Despite this hefty investment, many of us have failed to get appropriate cover from our home contents insurance policy. Whether it’s your garden gnomes, those brand new power tools or that snazzy BBQ you’ve just forked out for, there are a surprisingly large number of items to steal from a garden.

Firstly, ensure that your insurance covers items stolen or broken in your garden, then take some preventative steps.

• Check that your fences and gates aren’t broken.
• Lock valuables in your garden shed when you’re not at home, keep them secure with a strong lock and secure door hinges with coach bolts or non-return screws.
• Install a burglar alarm for your shed and consider some form of security lighting. You can purchase low energy dusk to dawn lighting as an environmentally friendly option.
• Beware of overgrown areas that could be used by thieves to hide behind and try some prickly plants for extra protection.
• Get more tips from the crime reduction website.

Fire Safety Tips

In the lead up to Bonfire Night here are some timely top tips for keeping safe both physically and financially.

• If you’re having a bonfire party, keep it far away from any buildings including garden sheds
• With lots of homes left empty burglars have the perfect cover so make sure you leave all the windows and doors locked, leave lights on and check your alarms
• Remember that if you have a house full of people, accidents are more likely to happen. With this in mind, make sure you have cover for public liability – this will cover you if any of your guests make a claim against you

There are around 200 house fires every day in the UK. Despite this, a frightening 46% of householders haven’t installed a smoke alarm, according to recent research from Halifax. Last year, Halifax handled over 2,000 fire damage claims costing a whopping £19 million in total to repair.  It’s vital to have home contents insurance to protect against this kind of damage but you can also take some preventative steps:

• Have at least one smoke alarm on each floor of your house
• Make sure you regularly test your alarm
• Electrical faults are a major cause of house fires so check they are all in working order
• It’s also a good idea to keep a fire extinguisher in your home
• If you light candles make sure any naked flames are extinguished when you leave the room
• Plan an escape route if a fire was to occur, then keep this route clear
• Keep doors closed at night to slow down the progression of a house fire
• If you have a real fire get it professionally swept by a chimney sweep. Visit www.chimneyworks.co.uk to find your nearest chimney sweep

How much should I insure my property for?

No matter who you buy your insurance policy from, you are responsible for calculating what is known as the ’sum insured’.

For buildings insurance, this is the amount it would cost to completely rebuild your house. Don’t get this cost confused with how much your house is worth (i.e. how much you would sell it for) as that is probably a higher figure.

Calculating this figure may seem daunting, but handily the Building Cost Information Service has a calculator that will do all the leg work for you – for free.

You have to register to use the calculator, but if you leave the box to receive more info from BCIS unticked, you won’t get any spam.

You then enter the external area of your house. You do this by going outside and measuring the width and the length of your house, then multiplying the results. This will give you the ground floor area.

If you have two storeys you’ll need to double this. And if your second storey is a different size, you’ll need to do a separate calculation for that storey and then add it to the total for the ground floor. If you have three storeys, you only need to calculate 70% of the third storey’s area.

Once you’ve calculated the external area, you input the type and age of the property, where it’s located and the cost of rebuilding any outbuildings.

You need to do the cost calculation for any extra buildings – like a garage – before you do the calculation for your whole property in order to know what the extra cost will be.

Finally, choose whether the policy should be index-linked (linked to the retail price index) and press go.

The site will then give you a clear report on how it has calculated the costings and the final amount necessary for a full rebuild.

Do I need to update the ’sum insured’ during the year?

If you don’t make any structural changes during the year, you don’t need to make changes. However, when you’re renewing your policy you will need to do a new calculation to take into account the rising price of materials and other building costs.

If you have an indexed-linked policy this will take into account inflation and the rising (or falling) value of your house – so you won’t need to do updated calculations.

Just remember that you should always review your insurance policies every year to see if you are getting the best price – even if they are index-linked.

If you make any major structural changes, you will have to consult your insurer. And if the area of your house increases because of an extension or building work, you’ll probably have to take out more cover to protect it all.

What is contents insurance?

The contents of the average home in the UK are thought to be worth more than £40,000. If you have any possessions of value, contents insurance is a must-have.

What does it cover?

Contents insurance covers anything of value that is not a fixed part of your home.

This includes a huge number of things, including clothes, shoes, furniture, luggage, sports equipment and even the contents of your fridge. You can even choose to include items from your garden in your contents insurance.

Policies can also cover items that you take out of the house like a bicycle, iPod or laptop. Valuables such as these – plus sporting equipment, jewellery and any expensive gadgets – need to be properly declared when taking out your policy as they often require extra cover.

Your insurer may have different terms for items above £1,000 in value, or they may want to take them into consideration when calculating your premiums. You’ll probably need to provide either receipts or valuations for these items.

You can also choose to pay for a policy that will cover you for legal expenses. This includes the cost of access to legal advice, as well as the legal costs of pursuing a claim for compensation after an accident that wasn’t your fault or pursuing or defending other actions.

Are there different types of policy?

Most contents insurance policies are ‘As New’ or ‘New for Old’. This means that no matter what the state of your possessions, the policy will cover the cost of replacing them with new items.

However, if you want to knock money off your premium you can choose to go for an indemnity policy. This is cheaper for the insurer as it takes into account the degradation of your possessions, caused by wear and tear, over a period of time.

So for example, if your sofa is five years old, you’ll receive enough money to replace it with another sofa of a similar age.

What amount of cover do I need?

As with buildings insurance, you are responsible for the ’sum insured’ or the cost of replacing all your possessions, should the worst happen. The lower this is, the lower your premiums will be.

Insurance companies will not pay out any more than the ’sum insured’. So you must be sure that your calculation is enough to pay for you to completely refurnish your pad – and replace all your possessions – should it be burnt down or flooded.

You might think it’s a good idea to underestimate the value of your stuff, in order to keep your premiums down. However, insurers will often come to your home and do their own independent valuation.

For example, let’s say you’ve valued your possessions at £25,000 but they’re actually worth £35,000 (a 29% difference).

If your insurer finds out, the chances are it will only cover you for the cost of replacing your possessions, minus 29%. So, if your flat screen LCD TV is stolen, and it’s worth £1,000, your insurer will actually only cover 29% of the cost – £710.

How do I calculate the amount of cover I need?

The Association of British Insurers have a handy guide to help you calculate the value of your possessions. Just remember not to scrimp, as being underinsured can be disastrous.

Go through the rooms in your house and fill out the form at the back of this guide, detailing all your possessions. Make sure you include absolutely everything – even the things you think are practically worthless – as it all adds up.

And don’t forget the carpets, wooden flooring, curtains and blinds – these cost to replace too.

You’ve then got to start on the mammoth task of finding out how much it would cost to replace each item. Keep your estimates rough but not too rough – if you don’t know how much something is worth, have a look around on the internet and you’re bound to find an equivalent with a price online.

You also need to make a specific note of anything really valuable to declare.

Then you can add it all up and that’s your valuation. Make sure it’s not more than the maximum cover offered by your policy. If it is, you might need to buy extra cover or change your policy.

And remember, when you’re choosing a policy, read the small print carefully. For example, there might be specific conditions relating to the wear and tear of your possessions, so it’s worth having a look at what they are.

Do I need to update the ’sum insured’ during the year?

Every time you buy something new or get given a snazzy present worth a lot, you need to make sure that you are still within your cover limit.

You can either work it out yourself, or make a quick call to your insurer with the details of the item and its valuation. They will tell you if that item exceeds your cover and if so, how to top your cover up.

What is the excess?

The ‘excess’ is the amount of money that you have to cover should you make a claim. Any remaining costs above the excess will be covered by the insurance company.

The excess on different policies varies, but it’s typically around £50. With subsidence claims however, it’s probably going to be £1,000 or even more.

If you’re seen as a risky insurance proposition, your insurer may ask you to have a higher excess. Alternatively, if you actually choose to pay a higher excess, it can reduce your premiums.

When deciding on the excess you’ll pay yourself, you need to balance up the risks – if you don’t need to make a claim, you could save money by having a higher excess. However, if your home or belongings do end up being damaged, you’ll have to foot more of the bill.

How can I cut the price?

To get lower premiums, you should make sure that you take the following action:

• Have locks recommended by police and security experts.

The more lock-friendly your house is, the more secure it is and the lower the premium you’ll pay. All locks should conform to the British security standards BS3621 (that means they can only be opened by a key).

• Have burglar alarms where necessary.

These reduce the risk of a break-in and therefore help keep your premiums low.

• Fit anti-crime devices.

Do all you can to make things difficult for burglars. If you live on the ground floor, grow hedges and prickly shrubbery outside the windows.

Fences, gates and doors should be properly maintained. Bars on windows are also essential for most basement and ground floor flats, particularly in cities.

• Try to pay for the insurance once a year rather than in monthly instalments.

Some insurers charge interest on instalment payments, which makes the whole process more expensive. Others don’t though, so it’s worth checking your policy.

If you are going to be charged interest, try to either pay upfront for the whole year, or buy your home insurance on a 0% purchases credit card and pay it off gradually without paying any interest.

• Insure valuables individually.

Most home contents insurance policies have a section that you can fill in which insures individual items separately. They can even be insured when they are out of the house.

So, for example, if you have some bits of expensive jewellery that you wear regularly, or even prescription glasses, you should insure them individually so that if you lose them in the street you can get the money back.

• Shop around – of course!

There are loads of different policies around, and just going with the one your bank or mortgage lender is offering could be a waste of money.

Use comparison sites such as Comparethemarket to locate good deals. You’ll need to fill in your details and study the different policies that are suggested. If all other things are equal, go for the cheapest. Then use a few other comparison sites to double check that you’re getting the very best deal:

• Comparethemarket
• GoCompare
• Moneyexpert
• Tesco Compare

Also, both Direct Line and Aviva refuse to advertise their prices on comparison sites so do check these separately so that you don’t miss out.

Useful Links

• Direct Line
• Castle Home Insurance (for those aged 50+)
  
• BCIS
• Association of British Insurers

Related posts:

1. Buildings insurance Buildings insurance is essential for any home-owner. Cut costs...
2. Insurance – best deals for the over 60s Insurance. One of those things we all wish we could...
3. Bicycle insurance As the weather heats up it’s a great time to...

A spot of redecorating is one area that could add value needn’t cost a fortune. Read on for lots of ideas on how to give your house a makeover on the cheap.

• Redecorating a few key rooms can make your house feel brand new.
• Dye your old curtains and pillows for a brand new look
• Get creative and take some free sewing classes
• Create more space without spending a fortune
• Read our expert tips from Martin Roberts presenter of BBC’s Homes Under The Hammer.
• Make sure you use the right people and try to avoid getting a loan – make the most of your savings with our help.

Redecorate

• Dos and don’ts…

DO stay safe. Always read the labels on paints, solvents, or other products and follow the guidelines. When using tools always read and follow the manufacturer’s guidelines and wear the appropriate protective gear. Check a ladder is secure before you climb up it, and if necessary get someone to hold it for you.

DO measure the room. Record the dimensions of the whole room including any windows and note the location of any plugs. Take all those measurements with you when you shop – it will make life so much easier.

DO get some inspiration. Read magazines, look online or browse stores to get an idea of the styles and colours you like.

DO create a focal point. Each room should have a focal point which the rest of the room is centred around. It can be anything you like – a fireplace, a bed, a window. If a fireplace sounds too expensive, a simple piece of art can work just as well. See websites like artrepublic.com and easyart.co.uk for huge selections of canvas prints, tapestries and posters that you can browse by subject, artist, price and size.

DO co-ordinate. Make sure the accessories, fabric and colour scheme work together throughout the room. Go to the ‘Sale’ section on the Cath Kidston website for some inventive ideas for your home.

DO consider wallpaper. It’s very on trend at the moment and by wallpapering a single wall you can completely alter a room’s look. Try Wallpaper Direct for a massive selection of exclusive wallpapers. You can tailor your search to find exactly what you’re looking for and once you select a design, a photo will load showing you how your chosen wallpaper looks in a room. Some wallpaper designs are rather pricey but there in the option to select ones at £20 or under. If you’d rather browse yourself for wallpaper, B&Q and Homebase have some budget options as well as some impressive designs.

DON’T be boring. Use a variety of textures – smooth, rough, shiny, matte - to stop a room looking dull and boring. Sheep-skin rugs, glass tables and leather sofas with a mixture of cushions go well together.

DON’T choose paint from a colour chart. Go to B&Q and ask for samples then test them on a small section to see how they look in natural light. Choosing the correct paint for the particular surface will infinitely improve the finished look. So if you aren’t sure, read the label and ask in stores what the best kind of paint is to use.

DON’T overcrowd a room. Simplicity is the key. So don’t cram a room with bits and bobs – it will only look smaller. Instead select a few key items and arrange them carefully – don’t place furniture where you risk wasting space. If it means you can only have one layout in the room because of a chimney breast, alcove or any other feature then so be it.

• What else?

Get insurance. If you’re going to undertake any major DIY projects do think about insurance – check your home contents and building insurance to see if you’re covered for accidental damage. It’s also really important to tell your insurer about these changes or you may not be able to claim. Read our home contents insurance article for more information.

Buy some new furnishings. Liven up your bathroom with new towel bars and other fixtures. A new shower curtain, toilet seat and set of towels will have a real impact. BHS currently has up to 20% off selected bath mats, pedestal mats and towels and Vintage bathroom accessories while John Lewis has some fantastic bargains on Egyptian cotton towels. Also, check out Marks & Spencer for great value bathroom fittings.

And don’t forget Argos and Ikea for discounted lighting and accessories for all rooms in the house.

Check the bigger department stores like M&S, John Lewis and BHS regularly for special offers and seasonal discounts. For constantly cheaper prices on lots of home improvement items try Wilkinson Plus and Ikea.

• Garden

Sort out the garden. Don’t forget the outdoor spaces – a great garden will add value to your house and you’ll be much happier having a nice space to spend the summer days.

Clean up any mess and get those green fingers working. Pull out weeds and replace them with gorgeous shrubs – go to Crocus for garden plants and flowers and check out the offers section to save some money.

Put woodstain on your garden fence. It will protect it from sun and water damage and prevent peeling and cracking. Always apply the stain in the direction of the grain. Use wax for surfaces that get a lot of wear and tear and won’t be exposed to water -  it will give a lovely soft glow and you can just apply another coat when necessary. Use varnish for a hardwearing finish – you can get both gloss and satin finishes. Go to B&Q for a huge variety of waxes and stains.

Get some new  furniture. Go to BHS for great deals on garden furniture and check out garden shop Crocus which also has a furniture section. Lights4fun sell funky lights for both indoor and outdoor use so why not give a tired looking garden a lift with some pretty lighting?

Dyeing to redecorate your home?

Renovate your home by giving new life to your old household textiles. You don’t have to splash out on new sofa covers just because they’re faded – dyeing is a great option. Old towels and cushions will look brand new just by changing the colour.

We’ve spoken to the experts at DYLON so check out some of their products and see how you can update your home simply by dying tired fabrics and accessories – and only spend a few quid!

DYLON Machine Fabric Dye

For larger items, such as dresses or furniture throws. One pack of Machine Dye will dye 600g of fabric to full shade – that’s a pair of trousers or jeans or one bath towel. Follow a simple step-by-step process of four washing cycles at 40ºC to: prepare the fabric, dye the fabric, wash off excess dye and clean the machine. There are 24 colours and shades to choose from. You can buy packs from The Dye Shop for £5.99 and if you order before 5pm, they will despatch your order the same day for free.

DYLON Hand Fabric Dye

For smaller items, such as scarves, shorts and vests or delicates. Suitable for cotton, linen, viscose, wool and silk. One pack will change 250g fabric; cotton, linen or viscose to full shade and wool or silk to a lighter shade. It takes 60 minutes. You can also use these dyes if you fancy being a bit creative, as they’re perfect for tie-dying and other crafts. From £3.89 from The Dye Shop.

DYLON Wash & Dye

Revive the colour in faded garments and household textiles with ease using Wash & Dye. It comes in 3 colours and the unique all-in-one formula dyes fabrics as it wash them, so you can take faded fabrics back to their original colour. Available for £6.78 from The Dye Shop.

DYLON Pre-Dye

Neutralise dark colours to allow them to be dyed to another strong colour or to a lighter colour. This is suitable for natural fabrics which can be washed at 85-95ºC, such as cotton, linen and viscose. Requires two washing cycles and will prep up to 2.5kg of fabric. Available for £5.95 from The Dye Shop.

DYLON Fabric Paint

Permanent and washable paints, applied to fabric using a stencil, brush or stamp. Available in 18 vibrant colours in standard and metallic effect. There are also paints for dark fabrics. Colours can be mixed to create individual colours. Fix using a hot iron. Available for £2.05 from Chaffinch.

DYLON 3D Paints

Squeezable permanent 3D paints for fabric, plastic, paper and card, applied using a nozzle. Available in 20 colours and 4 different effects – glitter, glossy, pearl and puff (for fabric only). The ‘puff’ expands when heated with an iron to give a unique ’stand-out’ 3D profile. These can be used to give added finishing touches to dyed fabrics and to DYLON fabric paint. Fix using a hot iron. They cost £1.83 each from Chaffinch.

DYLON Fabric Painting Pens

Permanent fabric painting pens available in Brush or Broad nib pens. Also fixed to fabric using a hot iron. For adding specific detail to designs, use Brush Nib pens. For outlining or writing on fabric, use Broad nib pens which have a chunky tip. Brush nib available in regular and fluorescent colours. They’re available individually for £1.99 or you can buy a pack of 5 for £3.36.

DYLON Image Maker

A fantastic product that allows you to transfer colour or black & white photocopies onto items such as t-shirts and cushions. Simply paste the Image Maker over the photocopy then place the photocopy face down on the fabric and let it dry overnight. Then all you need to do is wet and remove the paper and use a sealing coat of Image Maker over the image. You can create unique cushions, patchwork curtains or how about using on a blank canvas for an alternative to a framed photograph? These can be used on any washable fabric and costs £2.85. See full instructions here.

Free knitting and sewing classes

Make your own cushion covers or curtains to save a heap of money and start a great new hobby.

Lucky Londoners can get free knitting classes at the Peter Jones store in Sloane Square. Check here regularly for new classes. Beginners and seasoned knitters alike can join in and there are workshops, drop-in sessions and even knitting coffee mornings to enjoy. It’s a great way to make friends and get some top tips.

John Lewis also offer a variety of knitting, sewing and haberdashery classes at stores all over the country. Most of the knitting clubs are free – you simply have to turn up, meet other knitting enthusiasts and knit to your heart’s content! Workshops start from just £5 with the more expensive ones (some including lunch) costing between £25 and £40. To find out more and to make bookings, visit the ‘Our shops’ link at the top of the John Lewis homepage and select ‘Rowan Design Consultants’ on the menu on the left hand side.

Additonally, John Lewis offer free information to customers buying sewing machines and will also invite you back for a free hour-long lesson in order to increase your knowledge.

Different stores will vary in the classes they hold and services they offer. Go to the haberdashery department of your local store and ask for information.

Create more space

Creating more space (or the illusion of more space) can make such a difference to the way a room looks. Get rid of furniture you don’t need and rearrange what’s left so that you have as much space as possible.

Mirrors: Using mirrors to reflect light is a very easy and cheap way to create the illusion of more space. Next has some fabulous mirrors of various styles and finishes so take a look here. B&Q also has a great choice of designs, ranging from traditional to contemporary and art deco styles. You can search by style, size and colour on the website.

Light: Dark rooms feel cramped and uninviting so remove any heavy curtains from the windows and replace with light, pastel coloured blinds or sheer drapes. Blinds-Supermarket offers blinds from £15, while Ikea has some bargains for window textiles. If you are looking to sell your property, when you show people around make sure the rooms have all the lights on. It may not save you money at that specific moment but it will make the rooms seem brighter and bigger and may help towards a sale.

Floors: If you have a wooden floor underneath your carpet get rid of the rug and the room will instantly seem bigger. Use a sander and some varnish to make it look presentable and then lay down a couple of small rugs which will make the floor space seem bigger. Argos has a good range of great value rugs and mats.

Put up shelves: Again this is a simple way to create more storage space at very little cost and you can do it yourself quite easily. Click here for a guide to putting up shelves. You can buy some really attractive shelves that can be decorative as well as functional.

Loft conversion: This will add both space and value to your property. Check with your local planning office before you start the conversion – you’ll have to get building regulations approval and conform to fire regulations (which may involve installing fire doors and alarms). Choose your builder carefully. There are plenty of people specialising in loft conversions, but get quotes from three of four (you’ll be surprised how much quotes vary) and make sure they are a member of the Federation of Master Builders. You can check for builders on the website. Go to Grow Your Own Home for a free estimate of the costs.

Expert tips

We spoke to Martin Roberts, presenter of Homes Under the Hammer and he gave us some fantastic tips on ways to give your house a makeover. For more ideas read his book Teach yourself: making money from property and take a look at his website.

Shop around: Sites like eBay are great for making huge savings and you can get things for your home from all over the world. Also, try architectural salvage yards like Bygones architectural reclamation or UK Architectural Antiques. You’ll be able to find unique items such as antique cast-iron fire surrounds as well as modern fireplaces, doors, church antiques and kitchen items. Delivery from Bygones varies per item so make sure you check this before ordering. UKAA charge for delivery depending on where you are in the country and it may cost more for heavier items. You can view their standard delivery charges here.

Do it yourself: Labour is the most expensive part of any kind of renovation so one of the biggest ways to save is to do some of the donkey work yourself and then get professionals to finish it. For example, if you’re not confident about retiling your bathroom, remove the old tiles yourself, prepare the surface for the new ones, then just pay for someone to fit the new ones.

Create space: You can convert your loft into an extra bedroom or even consider spreading downwards by extending your cellar. Another good idea is to install a summer house or log cabin if your garden is big enough. You can use it as a workshop, a kids’ play room or just extra space to relax. There’s a wide range of choice at Garden buildings direct where they endeavour to deliver within 2-5 working days and delivery is free to most of the UK. Another option that will add value to your property is to create a driveway (if there is room) and create an off street parking space – you’ll need to get in touch with your local council to do it.

Decorating: Keep everything modern – but be warned that really fashionable styles go out of fashion pretty quickly too. Create a feature wall and work the rest of the room around it. Remember that small things can make a real difference. Try replacing just the front of your kitchen units – which you can easily do yourself – and it will transform the room.

Get stuff for free

Get stuff for free: Go to Gumtree and in the ‘Stuff for Sale’ section click ‘Freebies’. It gives you a list of free things in your area. You will have to collect the items but it’s a small price to pay for a free sofa or dining table! Just click on the items you want then email the owners to organise a time to collect – but be quick as things tend to go almost straight away. You can also try posting an ad of your own asking for items you need and someone might get in touch.

Freecycle is another way to get free items that people are throwing out. Go the website, sign up for free and join a Freecycle network near you. You can browse the networks by your region here. Once you become a member of a local group you can view the items being given away and post your own items. Everything posted must be free, legal and appropriate to all ages.

You can also try Snaffleup which works in a similar way to freecycle. You can search without signing up and the search gives the location of the items. This way you can see which items are realistic for you to go and get. If you do find something, you then sign up and you can contact the person offering the item. There are loads of other features to help you get your hands on goodies. Check them all out here. As with Freecycle, everything on Snaffleup has to be free and legal.

Use the right people

If you’re not recommended a builder, plumber or electrician from someone you know, try RatedPeople and MyHammer. These are websites that offer a free service helping you find recommended tradesmen in your area. Simply sign up, describe the job/trade, then get quotes and choose the one that fits your needs. You’re under no obligation to accept any quotes but if you do, you can rate the tradesman yourself once they’ve finished the job.

If you’re looking for some help with your home improvements go to Jobsgrapevine, which is a free forum where odd-job men, plumbers and the like advertise their skills.

Useful links

• B&Q
• Wickes
• Argos
• Homebase
• BHS
• John Lewis

Related posts:

1. Budget home decorating: furnish your entire house for under £200 Need to furnish your new home but haven’t got the...
2. Fashion: Revamp your Wardrobe for Under a Tenner! Most of us love to buy new clothes, but not...
3. Credit crunch munch: Free snacks, 2for1 forever and cheap recipes Enjoy some credit crunch munch with our top tips for...

Being the Leadership Development geek I am, I was struck tonight by a few parallels between “underland” and Leadership. So if you would like to follow me down the rabbit hole…

1)You must keep believing you can do what others think is impossible. Alice regularly thinks of “six impossible things before breakfast”. And, how about a Dodo anyone?

2) Be persistent – if your first go doesn’t work, try something else. Alice follows the “Drink Me” bottle’s label and then has to try the “Eat Me” cake. Only then does she get the key to the tiny door. Second time lucky, whilst learning from the first attempt.

3) Stay true to what you believe in. The White Queen could probably do away with her sister, but to do so would break her vows – something she is not prepared to do.

4)Change happens all the time. Don’t be afraid of it – the caterpillar welcomes his cacoon and in doing so eventually becomes a beautiful butterfly

5) Don’t expect to be the Champion on Day 1. Alice has to go through a number of experiences until she is able to defeat the Jabberwocky. The Mad Hatter knew she was always going to be the White Queen’s Champion (despite the Dormouse’s protestations) but she had to grow into the role.

6) Sometimes you need to get in bed with your enemies – the Bandersnatch originally tries to kill Alice, but eventually is one of her defenders.

7) Always have a few crazies on the team – not that surprising a piece of advice coming from The Innovation Beehive, but would Alice really have defeated The Red Queen if she had not been creatively inspired by the mad creative world of The Hatter and the March Hare?

8)The Red Queen may seem to have all the power in the world but she rules by fear and discovers it is not “better to be feared than loved”. We don’t want to get into a whole debate again about employee engagement (see the post In Response to The Sunday Times Best Place to Work) but you all know that this management style can only work in the short term (someone please call Downing Street).

9) Have a clear Vision of where you want to get to and communicate it clearly – my favourite part of the orginal Lewis Carol story (sadly left out of the Tim Burton film) is when Alice meets the Cheshire Cat and asks him which way she should go:

‘that depends a good deal on where you want to get to’ said the Cat
‘I don’t much care where’ said Alice
‘Then it doesn’t matter which way you go’ said the Cat

Oh and, by the way, the film is excellent!

Related posts:

1. Leadership lessons from Darth Vader HR would have a field day with the Star Wars...

• Currently you can put up to £7,200 into a Stocks and Shares ISA each tax year, or up to £3,600 if you have already put in £3,600 in a cash ISA. (from April 2010 it goes up to a total £10,200). If you’re over 50 you can put up to £10,200 altogether.
• Equities (shares) are better than cash investments long-term. You can put your money into a cheap, simple index tracker, or an ETF, or individual shares that you choose or a managed fund.

Once you put the money into an ISA you can take it out again, but once you take it out you can’t put it back in the Isa during the same year, or open up another one. Once the money is in the Isa though, you can transfer it directly into another Isa with another company if you want to, without making any difference to your annual allowance.

Should I have one?

Probably, yes. If you are investing for the long-term then certainly. Although in the short-term (i.e. under five years) the stock market can go up and down wildly, in the long-term it just goes up (in a wiggly line). In fact, it goes up at such a rate that you make much more money with your investment than you would if you just kept it in a savings account.

Really, Isas should be used for long-term investing, such as your retirement fund. That’s what they were brought in for originally – to boost our savings for our old age – and that’s why we are allowed to put the full £7,200 into shares-based Isas, as opposed to cash Isas where you are limited to £3,600. The government is trying to encourage us to put money away for our retirements because they know that we’re not investing enough right now. It also knows that, long-term, shares investments give a much better return than cash investments. That’s why it’s given us more incentive to invest in equities than in savings accounts.

Get a FREE investor’s guide to ISAs – click here.

Which are the best?

It’s hard to recommend the best actual equities investments because you don’t have a lot to go on other than past performance and your knowledge of funds and companies. With cash investments (savings accounts) it’s easy because you have a number to compare – they say how much interest they will be paying, at least for the next six months or the next year – and you can compare that with other accounts. With equities all you have to go on is how well the product has done in the past few years, how well the company has done generally and what the annual charges are (generally the lower the charges, the better the investment does long term). But none of those elements can tell you definitely which will perform the best this year, next year and in following years.

However, there are some types of equities investments that generally do well and are easy to invest in. Here is a run-down of the investments we think you should consider:

Index-tracking Funds

We like index-tracking (tracker) funds because they’re simple, cheap, easy-to-understand, and they work. You can find out a lot more about them in our article about index trackers here, but basically they work by putting a small amount of your money into every single company in the index you are tracking. So, for example, they might put a bit of money into every company in the FTSE 100, if that is what you are tracking, or every single company in the FTSE All Share index, or the FTSE 250, or even one of the foreign stock indices such as the DAX in Germany or the Dow Jones in America.

They work by computer, and computers don’t need payment so these funds are cheap. In fact it’s rare to find a tracker fund that charges more than 1% a year to manage your money, which is a good rate. The management fees you are charged each year have a direct effect on how well your investment does – i.e. the lower the charges, generally, the more money you make because less is being taken out of your fund each year. So this fact alone makes trackers appealing.

Tracker funds are also easy to invest in. Quite a few companies offer them (see the list below). Also, their trackers come ‘pre-wrapped’ in an Isa which makes it even easier to buy.

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs)

These are, again, quite cheap and effective. In fact, they work a bit like trackers and their charges are very low, usually less than 0.5%. Also, you don’t have to pay stamp duty on them. See our article about ETFs here for more information.

ETFs also come pre-wrapped in an ISA which makes it easier to buy them. To get an ETF, though, you need to go through a broker. We suggest TD Waterhouse as a cheap, online broker.

Managed Funds

Some managed funds (that is funds that are actually ‘managed’ by real people rather than a computer) do well – sometimes very well. But, sadly, the majority of them don’t. In fact about 85% of funds that are managed by the guys in the city under perform compared to the stock market. Not only that, but you are often charged a lot!

However, if you find a fund that has been well run by a really good fund manager, you can make great profits.  You can see how various funds have performed on the website Moneyspider which tracks them. It’s an independent service that tracks the performance of hundreds of funds, so you can see how each one compares with the others.

When you are choosing a managed fund remember that the annual fees are very important. Try to avoid ones with higher fees unless they have an exceptional track record. Also, there are some ’star’ fund managers whose funds have consistently outperformed the stock market, and their funds are generally worth considering. Finally though, remember that even if a fund has performed well in the past, that doesn’t guarantee that it will continue to do so in the future. You will need to monitor it once a year or so to make sure that it is still worth investing in.

Individual shares

Entire libraries are filled with books about how to invest in shares. There are several different theories about how best to make money through shares, and some people spend a lifetime trying. Others, like multi-billionaire Warren Buffett, spend a lifetime amassing a fortune through shares.

Essentially, if you would like to invest in individual companies rather than just funds, you will need to spend some time studying the market, studying books on investment and keeping an eye on the companies you put money into. In other words, it’s not an easy ride. If you just buy shares in a company because your friend says it’s good or a bloke down the pub gave you a tip off you are likely to lose your money. People who consistently make money by investing in individual companies are those who work at it and follow investing rules rather than their own whims.

So if you want to look into this, get reading and studying. We like the book The Naked Trader by successful investor Robbie Burns. He also recommends other works on investing in the book. Also check out investment websites such as the The Motley Fool and Interactive Investor.

If you do the work and decide on a company you want to buy into, you will need to make the transaction through a stockbroker. Happily, that doesn’t have to cost you much now that there are online stockbrokers that anyone can use. Just sign up to one, like TDWaterhouse, and you will only have to pay £9.95 per trade.

Getting Started

These companies offer Isa-wrapped index-tracking funds:

• M & G
• Scottish Widows
• Virgin
• Gartmore

For share-dealing:

• TD Waterhouse

Related posts:

1. More about Isas Individual Savings Accounts (Isas) are a good way to cut...
2. Shares (Equities) Equities, or shares, are what they say they are: a...
3. The shares v property argument This argument has raged across middle-class dinner tables and financial...

I don’t like moaning either but I can now say that I am having moments where my life is feeling a little bit more balanced. I guess not being able to afford to put Immy in nursery is an issue but thankfully I’ve been working more this month, maybe things are picking up.

Anyway I’ve gone on again. This morning Imogen was with the lovely Gemma and Rita. In that time I managed to a do a 45 minute run, have a shower and style (not just wash and blow dry) my hair; fit in three hours of work; put Immy’s washing on and dry it; eat lunch pay the milkman and ring up Sport Relief to find out what has happened to our entry (it had got lost!).

What on earth did I do before I had my little treasure puff? Where did the time go? What did I do with all those hours… Wasted them, although it didn’t feel like it at the time.

Mind you, I wouldn’t want my old life back for the whole world, it must have been quite boring. For me being a mum may be stressful, heart-stopping (at times) full on and crazy but it’s great!! As long as I have work and things like my blog, as well as Andrew it can’t be too bad.

Controlled crying part 2 (or is it 3)

Imogen is sleeping much better but boy was it hard to get her back in a 12 hour routine. We had to do the controlled crying thing again.. When she’s really crying you have to block your ears but these tantrums only last a little while, if you can bear it – I would recommend this as a way of getting little ones to sleep. I sat on the stairs a glass of M&S’s finest chardonnay (on special offer at £4.99) in hand to get me through. That and some dark chocolate.

Mummy’s Day – part 2!

Mothers Day yesterday was lovely too, everything in my life seems lovely at the moment so am embracing it while it lasts! Immy gave me a photo collage in a frame saying ‘I love mum’ along with Lindor dark chocolates. I gave my mum some flowers and the promise of a trip to London with a Bobbi Brown make over after Easter. Last year I remember feeling very brave taking Immy and my mum up to see the Madonna exhibition in London, how times have moved on. We had a lovely meal round my mum’s and my sister played with Imogen. Her little, or not so little ones, Anne (8) and Gracie (5) are in New Zealand with their dad at the mo. We miss them but they’ll be back soon.

Back to college…

I’m now enrolled on my course, as it goes along I reveal a bit more about it. With that and my book proposal to finish it looks like my evenings will be full up, but will still make time for Holby City – Connie Beecham is one of my favourite TV characters at the mo. Am glad she’s back.

My little treasure is growing up

This morning before going to Gemma’s she stood by the front door yelling. Turns out she wanted to go to the park, next to our road. She walked (with me holding both hands) right down to the playground – a good 200 metres I reckon. The little angel even tried to run after a crow. I think she’s fallen for the spider climbing frame, it’s got a big smiley face on it and she goes up and hugs it.

Oh and I have a confession to make, I’m sneaking in mouthfuls of Immy’s toddler milk powder. It tastes good! For the record it’s Aptamil’s growing up milk and yes you do get Boots Advantage Card points (you don’t get them on the 6 months and younger formulas because of breastfeeding proviso) It’s quite the yummy thing. But at £8 a carton I would hope so.

We’re on a budget this week so the only things we’re doing is supermarket whoring. We have a Sainsbury, Tesco. Waitrose and Asda near us. Waitrose do the best and cheapest free range eggs £159 for 9 (essentials range) and the cheapest and best own brand washing powder and fabric softner. Tesco has cheapest nappies, Asda cheapest veg and Sainburys has the best markdowns.

Please sponsor us!#

Andrew and I (and Imm) are doing a 6 mile walk/run for Sport Relief on Sunday, if you feel like sponsoring us you can donate here.

Related posts:

1. Trying to stay Hipp and organic on no sleep Excuse the delay in updating my blog but we’ve had...
2. I vant to veet you (and other things) It’s been a good and bad week. Immy’s been teething,...
3. Breaking and entering To the outside world I probably look well-organised, together and...

As I have mentioned before, both the Americans and Chinese have whinged at one another about each other’s currency policies. In my view both parties have some foundation for a just cause, but seemingly lack any form of appreciation or pragmatism of each other’s position.

The Chinese moan about the devaluing $ (until its recent recovery) and especially because much of their reserves are in US$ Treasury Bills. The Americans moan that the Renminbi has not been revalued and as such is ludicrously undervalued and thus had led to the dumping of Chinese goods on overseas markets and the distortion of global free and fair trade.

Sadly this is not helped by the populist rhetoric cast from the battlements of both parties – “we will not yield to any form of pressure forcing us to appreciate” said the Chinese leader Wen Jiabao in December 2009 – and Tim Geithner the US Treasury Secretary (he is the one who looks like a Lord of the Rings extra) said in January last year “President Obama believes that China is manipulating its currency”. This is hardly creative diplomacy and the US must understand that if the Chinese are to move, it will not be as a result of bombastic oratory from the foreigners.

Perhaps it would be more constructive if the Americans were to highlight the benefits of revaluing for the Chinese themselves in order to win more support and friends for this policy. The populist US politicians, and especially those in the House of Representatives, whose short term tenure of two years inevitably lead them towards near term popular policies, would be sensible to focus more on this and less on jingoistic, job-protecting flag-waving.

After all, a re-valued currency could help ease some of the pressure off an economy that has been building up quite a head of steam. In fact I think such a move will come and we may see the Chinese  currency being subject to a gradual appreciation, not just against the $ but rather against a basket of currencies – and it will be done on the basis of political pragmatism, not being seen to be giving in to ‘gweilo’ barbarian pressure. Those ‘tea party’ US politicians should also remember that between 2005/8 the currency actually did revalue against the $ by some 21%.

However, there is still a fundamental point – the Chinese national income per capita is $3,000 per annum. Thus its leaders will have to consider restructuring the economy away from just exports to the West, to some domestic opening up and improvement as well. The dragon cannot forever just sit on its trading reserves ‘geld’ which now stands at $2.4trn and rising.

As an aside, I noted with some concern a few weeks ago that the Chinese had in fact started selling some of their US treasury holdings. This was a worrying sign, so it was with some relief that I see the authorities have gone out of their way to reassure the markets that they will continue to be purchasers, but at what level is a state secret, as is the composition of their reserves as a whole.

***

So it has been a year since the market turned and the day that Satan entered the S&P 500 when it bottomed at 666. As you will also have heard it has been a decade since the ‘dot.com’ bubble burst, and for Tom Sheridan and I, the time when we decided that a change was required and we should go back to the common sense of disciplined investment management and not stockbroker gambling on the ‘stock du jour’.

So what happens next? After a very significant year long rally and with volatility (US VIX Index) at a near record low (a key gauge of risk aversion), implying a level of over confidence or even complacency, I can hear a level of creaking amongst these somewhat stretched valuations. We have come too far potentially too fast. Prepare for a correction.

***

So now we can all look forward to an exciting Budget on the 24th of this month. Leaving aside the political blather, the main requirement is to send a message out to the markets that the Government and Treasury really do have a credible plan for paying down our debt. Presumably we will not know the real plans from any party until after the election.

However, I would appreciate at least some greater clarity of direction. The problem has been quite clear – we have been living beyond our means and in the good times we didn’t manage our spending either at government or personal level. If excessive spending is the problem, then lower spending is your solution.

The arguments over higher taxes and spending cuts will rage, however what must be admitted is that most taxation is a negative and not an encouragement to grow and develop. Although VAT is a discretionary tax it still is a dampener on an economy. History shows us that with tighter housekeeping in economies like Canada and Sweden, vigorous tightening was followed by some quite significant growth. Examples of the opposite, where there were increased taxes and reduced tax incentives, occurred in both the US in 1937 and Japan in 1997 and in both cases the result was to see their economies fall back into a pit of recession.

It may be a painful process but at least there will be incentives; the bludgeoning of taxation does little to encourage anyone.

***

And finally……………You’ve heard of the dangers of texting while driving and talking on the phone while behind the wheel of a car? Well yet again our American cousins have taken this to a totally new level.

Seemingly a two-car crash on a Florida highway was caused by a 37-year-old woman who was shaving her bikini area while in the driver’s seat, according to the Florida Highway Patrol. Her ex-husband was steering from the passenger seat.

Megan Mariah Barnes and her ex-husband Charles Judy were driving southbound on Tuesday morning when they slammed into the back of a pick-up truck.

Ms Barnes said she was meeting her boyfriend in Key West and wanted to be ‘ready for the visit.’ Barnes and Judy allegedly drove on for another half-mile before switching seats. When they were pulled over, Judy claimed to have been driving. The trooper noticed burns on Judy’s chest from the passenger-side airbag, which disproved their story. The airbag in the steering wheel apparently did not deploy.

Three passengers – a man and two women – were treated for minor injuries – but presumably quite painful ones.

Have a good week.

Justin A. Urquhart Stewart
Director
Seven Investment Management Limited

Related posts:

1. After hating the 8 – watch out for the malign 9 Beware of consensus – it is often an excuse for...
2. An Air of Palpable Excitement I can’t remember seeing such group ecstasy for a long...
3. In Goldman’s Eyes….. What a difference a week can make. Last quarter the...

The other thing is, Easter Sunday lunch. I am having 14 people including 5 kids so I will be staggering lunch. Kids at 12 noon and the adults will try to have a semblance of a civilised meal at about 1230pm (kids eat quickly). We will shove them in front of the telly while we eat, in the spirit of all holiday family meals which we are just trying to get though without  killing each other.

It will be lamb. A boned shoulder (or two, for that ,many people) which I will be stuffing with feta cheese, chopped olives and herbs, salt and pepper, plus garlic. You could also use a bog-standard Paxo-type stuffing mix too, which would be fine once all the lamb juices have seeped into it. Add a knob of butter though. I usually do boiled potatoes when I have a large crowd, out of laziness. But otherwise par boil them and tip them around the lamb for the last 20 minutes of cooking time. Or into a separate tray with a bit of butter and olive  oil to stop the butter burning. I may even try out my Marmite roast potatoes recipe (a small dessert spoon of Marmite added to a hot roasting tray of melted butter, swirled around and then tip your par-boiled potatoes in. I haven’t done it yet but I am told it is wonderful).

Veg will be good old carrot batons (everyone loves them) and a green veg (not broccoli because it is a bit boring) – maybe savoy cabbage shredded, boiled briefly and mixed with a tin of Campbells condensed cream of mushroom/cream of celery soup (my secret cheat, it turns into a lovely creamy sauce).  Plus another cheat – I tend not to buy mint jelly but instead to mix a good spoonful of concentrated mint sauce into a couple of spoonfuls of jam – apricot, plum or damson are good. You can then serve this as it is, or mix with creme fraiche, a crumbled chicken stock cube and possibly the meat juices from the lamb (if you are not using them to make a separate gravy). I did a variation of this on Sunday and snipped a whole pack of fresh mint leaves into it – it was lovely with my honey garlic chicken.

For 14 people, including kids and oldies, you can’t beat some sort of crumble (apple, rhubarb, pear) plus cream/instant custard/creme fraiche but I might also do a raspberry mousse-cake this year. Like a cheesecake with crushed digestives on the bottom (mixed with melted butter to make it stick together). Then I will concoct a topping with whipped cream, crushed raspeberries, sugar and gelatine and maybe a few secret ingredients (crushed amaretti biscuits perhaps, folded through or sprinkled on the top).

You will see I have not really crystalised my Easter thoughts yet. But that is the way I cook. I ruminate on what I have in the fridge, what seems to be in season, what’s on offer at the supermarket, what I will have delivered in my organic veg box that week. And then I decide what I could make INCLUDING all my leftovers of course. I will ruminate further and let you know if I have any great ideas. Any more great ideas, I meant.

Related posts:

1. A feta compli – (groan, sorry) Feta Dip I do love a dip but I am...
2. Cold Weather = Baked Potato Time 4 baking potatoes = 79p at Waitrose. You can probably...
3. Cheap Food Recipes: All serve 4 – all under £1 a head! Hot Lentil Soup Ingredients: 1 green pepper, chopped 1 onion,...

• What’s going on in the energy industry?
• Switch energy supplier to save
• What you need to know about tariff types
• Simple step-by-step guide to successful switching
• Make even bigger energy savings

What’s going on in the energy industry?

In 2008 gas prices increased by 43.9% on average across the 6 big suppliers – British Gas customers fared the worst with prices shooting up by 50%. Electricity also increased by an average of 26.3%. We told Moneymagpie readers that capped energy tariffs were a good idea because of the steep price rises announced. Those of you who did would have saved a lot of money but many of you will have recently come to the end of those capped tariffs so it’s important to make the switch again.

Companies switch their capped tariff customers to their standard rate when the fixed period comes to an end and this is usually the least competitive option so it’s time to switch if this is the case.

This year, so far, British Gas has cut prices by 10% on both gas and electricity with other companies following suit and cutting prices on gas by 4.1% on average and 8% on electricity.

Whilst these reductions are a step in the right direction they are by no means enough to make up for the previous year’s increases, so it’s crucial that you take matters into your own hands.

At the beginning of the year, online energy tariffs were £170 cheaper than standard plans. Today they are £249 a year cheaper so the savings can be impressive, according to uSwitch.com. As the cold weather sets in we’ll all be using much more energy so it’s vital to cut those bills – and the way to do this is switch to an online tariff.

Even those of you already on online plans may not be benefiting as those sneaky suppliers tend to bring out new plans with lower prices rather than cut the prices on existing plans. The only answer is to take control and make the switch.

Why compare and switch?

• Because it will save you money! You could save up to £378 a year.
• Because it’s so simple. Your new supplier organises all the switching. All you need to do is take the final meter reading on the day arranged by the new supplier. Once they have this reading, the new supplier organises the final bill and the closure of your old account.
• Because it’s free. You don’t pay a penny to switch and there’s absolutely no obligation to do it immediately – you can simply compare and make a decision at a later date.

Energyhelpline’s comparison service is completely free and unbiased. They show you the best rates around from suppliers in your area and you can choose the one that suits your needs.

If you’ve never switched energy suppliers, you’ll almost certainly be able to save money by switching now. The good news is that it’s really simple to do, and it will only take a few minutes to get the ball rolling.

To find more about the various tariffs on offer, keep reading.

Alternatively, you can skip straight to our step-by-step guide to using the comparison service by clicking here and see just how easy it is for you to switch and save.

Capped tariffs

What are they?

When you select a capped tariff you’re fixed into paying a set rate for a certain period of time.

This can be both good and bad. For example, if prices rise as they did last year, people on capped tariffs will benefit. However, if prices fall, those on a capped tariff will miss out on the savings.

Generally speaking, the cheapest premiums for capped tariffs are higher than the cheapest non-capped tariffs – because companies want to safeguard themselves against wholesale price increases.

Should I get a capped tariff?

The situation is unpredictable at the moment. Prices could potentially drop again this year – although it is unlikely to be by much – so now is probably not the time to switch to a capped tariff.

In a nutshell, capped prices are not always the most competitive. However, if you’re willing to pay extra for the peace of mind of knowing that your bill will stay the same for a couple of years, this could be the right option for you.

• The question you need to ask yourself is can you afford a price rise? The benefit of a capped tariff is that you know what you’ll be paying – you can budget for that and insure against prices rising.
• Check the exit fees Some companies charge an early exit fee if you leave before the contract ends so do check – it may well be that its worth paying the exit fee if you’ll make considerable savings by switching.
• Compare, compare, compare If and when you decide to switch to a capped tariff, it’s very important that you compare various suppliers and find the cheapest tariff available. You’ll also need to decide how long you want the fixed deal to last – most companies offer capped premiums for between two and four years.

Pre-payment meters

What are they?

These are meters that need to be topped up with a card – as you would with a pay-as-you-go mobile phone. The cards themselves can be topped up at newsagents or Post Offices.

We don’t recommend that anyone keeps a pre-payment meter if they can help it, because:

• You’ll pay a lot more for your energy
• You can’t save money with online discounts
• You can’t pay by direct debit – which would save you time and money

So – if you’re able to, change to a normal meter as soon as you can. Sometimes it isn’t possible to get rid of a pre-payment meter because of poor credit rating (if your household has a history of missed energy payments, for example).

Sometimes suppliers will only let you change the pre-payment meter if you’ve been with them for a set period of time. And unfortunately, you’ll often have to pay quite a high fee to have one removed.

If you can’t change yours, it’s still really important to compare pre-payment meter tariffs and switch to the cheapest.

How can I save money on a pre-payment meter?

• Compare prices and if you find a better tariff, switch and start saving.
• Energyhelpline recommend a supplier called Ebico. It’s a not-for-profit energy provider who charges the same price whatever your payment method. So for those on a meter, it’s a good option.

Single fuel and duel fuel tariffs

What are they?

Most people get their gas and electricity from separate suppliers – known as single fuel tariffs. However, you may be able to save money by switching to a duel fuel tariff – in other words having the same supplier for both your gas and your electricity.

Which one do I go for?

All of the major suppliers offer duel fuel tariffs (usually with impressive sounding discounts) but never assume that one of these is the cheapest option. Always do a free comparison to be sure.

How? Select both gas and electricity on the comparison service.

Where you live may play a part. For example, a duel fuel tariff with a single supplier may be the cheapest choice in one area, but in another, you may be better off with separate providers.

More often than not, duel fuel will be cheapest because companies offer ‘loyalty incentives’ to stick with them for both gas and electricity.

If it does work out cheaper to go for a duel fuel tariff, there are these added benefits too:

• You won’t have to pay two different bills each month
• You only have to set up one direct debit to one company
• If there are any problems with either your gas or electricity you only have to deal with one company

Economy 7 tariffs

What is it?

Economy 7 electricity tariffs have two pricing structures – one for the day and one for the night. The night rate is much cheaper than the day rate – but the day rate is usually more expensive than other tariff rates (up to double the normal rate).

So – to make this sort of tariff worthwhile, you need to use as much of your energy at night as possible. Unfortunately, the ‘night’ hours tend to be pretty unsociable, for example from midnight to 7am.

A good way to use Economy 7 tariffs to the max is to set your appliances (washing machine, dishwasher, tumble dryer etc) to come on during the night. Lots of appliances have built-in delay timers so that you can do this – but if yours don’t, simply buy some timer plugs.

• If you are already using an Economy 7 meter you can switch your provider just as you would with a normal meter. So it’s just as important to compare prices and find the cheapest deal.

Should I switch to Economy 7?

This can be a good tariff option if you have storage heaters. Storage heaters work by storing energy during the evening which is then used to heat the house during the day. However, you’ll have to change the actual meter and there may be a charge for this.

Here at Moneymagpie, we’re very wary of the high day rates with Economy 7 tariffs. Companies should be encouraging people to use more energy at night (when there is a surplus) not punishing those who are switching to Economy 7 with very high day rates!

Our main concern with Economy 7 tariffs is that the lower night rates could be cancelled out by the high day rates.

How to switch

Energyhelpline recommends that whatever the situation, you should do a price check on your energy arrangement each year to ensure you’re still getting the best deal. Then – if necessary -switch your supplier.

Step 1: Start the ball rolling!

Head over to our energy switching page. The first step is to fill in your postcode and hit continue. You’ll then be directed to this page:

Here, you’ll have to type in a few details about your current supplier and how much your yearly bill comes to:

1. Current supplier eg. British Gas, London Energy
2. Current tariff eg. Standard, Click Energy
3. Current payment method eg. Quarterly billing, monthly direct debit
4. Current usage – choose from £ per month/quarter/year or kWh per year. Alternatively, select the ‘I don’t know my gas usage’ box. When you do this, Energyhelpline will estimate your usage for you. All you have to do is select your house size (small, medium or large) or – if you want a more detailed estimation – you can select the second tab and give more precise details about the size of your house (number of bedrooms, insulation level etc)
5. To get the most accurate information, enter the amount of energy you’ve used (in Kwh) on this page (the total will be on your last bill) rather than just the amount you’ve spent.

You can choose to compare prices for gas or electricity tariffs alone, or both together. It’s a good idea to compare both because the default results are for duel fuel tariffs (which are usually cheaper).

Now click ‘continue’ – you’ll then be asked:

• How you want to pay in the future
• Tariff type eg. paper billing only, internet services available – if you have no preference simply select ‘search all tariff types’
• You can then choose to arrange the results by price, or service rating, or choose to view only green tariffs

Step 2: Compare tariffs

Now you get to compare tariffs. See an example of a results table below:

Up will come a list of the cheapest suppliers for your needs, with details of how much you can save. If you’ve chosen to compare both gas and electricity the first tab of results will be for duel fuel tariffs (which are usually the cheapest).

You can also choose to view only gas only, or electricty only (the second and third tab on the table). This is always worth doing, just to double check that duel fuel is the best option.

So – do a quick calculation of the cheapest gas tariff added to the cheapest electricity tariff and make sure it’s not cheaper than the cheapest duel fuel tariff.

You can also choose to arrange results by service rating:

1 Star – Poor
2 Stars – Below Average
3 Stars – Average
4 Stars – Good
5 Stars – Very Good

Energyhelpline calculates these ratings from complaint levels received by the independent market watchdog Consumer Focus.

If you’re happy with what you see, you can switch there and then and start saving straight away. Not bad, eh?!

Step 3: The switch

Once you’ve checked all the search results and chosen a supplier you’d like to switch to, you’ll asked to enter the rest of your details:

• Your address
• Whether you’re the property owner, landlord or tenant

These details will then be forwarded on to your new supplier, who arranges the switch. You will receive an email from Energyhelpline confirming the details of the switch, as well as contact details for your new supplier.

If you do want to switch to paying by direct debit, you’ll have to fill out the DD form and fill in your bank details. A few of you may also need to know your gas or electricity meter number – you can find this on an old bill or on the meter itself.

IMPORTANT- You’ll still have a seven working day cooling-off period to cancel the arrangement.

You’ll receive a welcome pack within a week – and after four weeks the new supplier will let you know when the switch will take place.

ACTION POINT - On this day you need to take a meter reading and give that to the new supplier. They will then contact your old supplier so that they can arrange your last bill and close your account.

You don’t need to change meters/wires because the new supplier uses the same ones. Remember, it’s only after you’ve paid the final bill that you can cancel your direct debit with your old supplier.

Savvy searching

You can either make the switch right away, or if you want to be extra-sure you’ve got the best possible price, try a number of other comparison websites.

Other sites to try include uSwitch and EnergyChoices. It’s worth checking out as many as you can before you commit, to make sure you get the best deal.

You can also check out Switch with Which? who have teamed up with the RNLI and will donate £10 to them for each customer who changes their energy supplier. This way you’ll get a cheaper energy price and help a great charity at the same time!

Switch to online billing

If you haven’t already done so, switch to online account management. Suppliers will charge less if you opt to have paperless bills and pay by monthly direct debit.

Online accounts also allow you to enter your own meter reading online, which saves the company having to send someone out to do it.

The saving they make is passed on to you – and according to Energyhelpline it can be anything up to £378 a year. Just be aware that the prices of these tariffs do rise, so keep an eye out!

Cut your energy bills

There are lots of ways you can cut your energy bills at home. Have a look at 50 ways to Save Money and the Planet to find out more.

Go further and opt for a green tariff

If you really are keen on going green, you could consider switching to a supplier that provides electricity from renewable sources. There are a few companies out there who do just that:

• Good Energy uses only 100% renewable sources like wind farms, and small-scale hydro and solar power generators from all over Britain.
• Ecotricity builds wind turbines, and gets its energy from wind power.
• And Green Energy UK is another electricity provider committed to renewables.

Do you have tips and ideas for switching providers and cutting your energy bills? Get on our forum and share them with everyone.

Alternatively, if you want to let off steam about your energy supplier, make your case on our Rip-Off Britain Blog.

Useful links

• Energyhelpline
• uSwitch
• Good Energy
• Ecotricity
• Green Energy UK
• Switch with Which?

Related posts:

1. Exactly why are the big energy companies making so much money? After a flurry of profit announcements last week by both...
2. Insulation – Save Money and Conserve Energy We want to show you the various ways you can...
3. Energy-saving light bulbs Yes, yes, we know – eco-lightbulbs are all very well...

You can trade in your old banger if it’s 10 years-old or more. According to AA Financial Services over a fifth of people who have a car of this age say they’re thinking of using the scheme but currently there are only 24,000 registrations. Not long to go before you can’t do it – so get your skates on!

Under the ‘bangers for cash’ scheme your car is worth £2,000 – but when the scheme ends, which could be before the end of the month, its value will simply be what you can barter on the forecourt and the chances are you might end up having to pay someone to tow it away.

The scrappage scheme was introduced in April 2009 since when over 376,000 cars 10 years old or more have been scrapped in favour of new, more efficient and greener cars.  It has also provided a useful boost for the motor industry.

Personally I think it would be helpful to all concerned if the government kept the scheme going for another year at least. Get these old bangers off our streets and stop them just being dumped in a lay-by somewhere (a big problem in our inner cities).

Actually, another thought (given the likely petrol price rises this year) is to get rid of the car altogether and go in for car clubs, walking, cycling and all other forms of alternative transport. You could save yourself £1,000s a year and get a bit fitter too. Which reminds me, I’ve got to start walking and cycling a lot more now the weather is improving. Something has to get those spare tyres shifted!

Related posts:

1. Government to subsidise motorists…. With the Budget only a couple of days away,...
2. Budget blues I’m at Sky News right now doing their ‘Unplugged’ session...
3. Ways for kids to make cash Want to keep your kids entertained this summer without spending...

• Mortgage arrangement fee
• Mortgage valuation fee and homebuyer’s report/structural survey
• Higher lending charge
• Exit fee
• Valuation and legal fees
• Solicitor’s fee
• Stamp duty land tax

Mortgage arrangement fee

If you’re a first-time buyer or remortgaging, you’ll have to pay an arrangement fee to the lender to cover the costs of setting up your mortgage. The price of arrangement fees has been on the rise in recent years, and whilst it varies widely (depending, mostly, on the size of mortgage you are taking out) don’t expect to get much change out of £1,000.

An increasing number of lenders are charging arrangement fees that are a percentage of the loan amount, say 1% or 1.5% rather than a fixed fee. They do this so that they can keep the mortgage itself looking like a really good deal so they can get to the top of the ‘best buy’ tables. So you might find yourself paying a bigger fee (much more than £1000) in order to secure the best rate. This is where you have to do your sums and work out if it really is cheaper in the long-run.

As a general rule, the bigger your mortgage the less important the fee is because the interest rate is much more important. So it might be worth paying the fee in order to get the cheap rate. If you have a small mortgage, though, the reverse is true.

Some lenders will let you add the arrangement fee to the mortgage. This can help if you are short of cash but it’s worth remembering that you will pay back more in the long run because you will be paying interest on the arrangement fee as well as the mortgage itself.

Mortgage valuation fee and homebuyer’s report/structural survey

The mortgage valuation is organised by the lender is exists to reassure them that the property is worth what you are borrowing. Although the valuation is for the benefit of the lender you will still have to pay for it. The more expensive the property, the higher the valuation fee, but as a rough guide, you’re likely to pay in excess of £200 on a £100,000 property.

Importantly, a mortgage valuation isn’t a survey. If you want to check the condition of the property you will have to pay for a homebuyer’s report or a full structural survey. This can be conducted at the same time as the mortgage valuation and will cost you a few hundred pounds more, depending on what type of survey you opt for.

For more information on property surveys, click here.

Higher lending charge

If you have little or no deposit, there may be a higher lending charge (HLC). This is to cover the cost of insurance taken out by the lender in case you default on your mortgage payments and there is any shortfall in what you owe the lender once your house has been sold.

The higher lending charge is usually a percentage of the mortgage amount and could add up to a few thousand pounds, so avoid paying it if you can. In fact, as most lenders are insisting on a serious down payment before you can get any mortgage, it’s rare for the higher lending charge to be an issue.

You should also be aware that any insurance your lender takes out only covers their back, not yours. So whatever you do don’t default on your payments thinking that it won’t really matter as the costs are covered. You will still be liable to pay back what you owe, and leaving it too long could land you in trouble.

If you’re struggling to pay your mortgage always get professional advice as soon as possible.

Exit fee

If you decide you want to get out of your current mortgage deal and take out another one, or if you want to pay off your mortgage early, then you will probably be charged an exit fee. Lenders claim this is cover administration costs, and they can charge as much as £295.

There’s been quite an uproar in recent years regarding exit fees, mainly because a number of lenders were charging mortgage buyers more than had originally been agreed in their contract. Fortunately the FSA stepped in and forced these dodgy lenders to reimburse what they had overcharged.

If you think you might have been overcharged on your exit fee, you must contact your old lender and insist on being reimbursed. If you don’t ask you certainly won’t get, so don’t give them any excuse to hold on to money that’s rightfully yours. If you have a problem getting back what is rightfully yours then contact the Financial Ombudsman Service and get them to take up the case for you.

Valuation and legal fees

If you are remortgaging, you may find that some lenders will offer free valuation and free legal fees. This could save you a few hundred pounds, so is worth considering.

However, remember that when you move house or buy your first home you will have conveyancing costs which can be anything from £500- £2,000 or more depending on where you live and how much your home is worth. It’s often cheaper to use a licensed conveyancer than a bog-standard solicitor. You can find a conveyancer local to you through the Association of Licensed Conveyancers.

If you’re interested in remortgaging your home Directgov has some great advice on where to start.

Solicitor’s fee

There may also be a fee to pay to your solicitor or conveyancer for the telegraphic transfer of mortgage funds. This can cost around £50.

For information on solicitor’s and how to go about finding one in your area, click here.

Stamp duty land tax

If the property that you’re buying is worth more than £125,000 then be prepared to pay Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT). The level of tax starts at 1% for homes costing between £125,001 and £250,000, and rises to 4% for ones priced at £500,001 or more.

Some parts of the country are classed as being “disadvantaged areas,” and you can buy a house here for up to £150,000 before paying any SDLT. For more information on this, click here.

If you’d like to work out exactly how much SDLT you’ll have to pay, click here.

When working out the cost of a mortgage, it’s important to get a full breakdown of the fees as well as the rate. If you can’t do the sums for yourself, ask an independent mortgage broker to help. In fact our independent mortgage service, run by London & Country can answer all your questions about fees.

For more information on the cost of buying a property, see the HMRC website. Directgov also offers some great, simple advice when it comes to understanding the mortgage application process.

Related posts:

1. Remortgaging: how to get a new mortgage deal If you’re looking to remortgage, the best advice is to...
2. Remortgaging to pay off your debts Anyone struggling financially will know what a desperate situation debt...
3. Tracker mortgages: the Moneymagpie guide Tracker mortgage payments are directly linked to the Bank of...

• Rent your space for cash
• Get free money
• Sell your old stuff for cash
• Make money by in your spare time

Make money in your spare time…

Panelbase - Make money from online surveys

This is one of the very best online survey sites. The way it works is fairly simple and most of the surveys are straightforward and quick to complete.

Surveys can take from just two minutes to fifteen minutes and for every survey you complete you’ll earn between 50p and £10 (although a £10 survey is unlikely).

Once you’ve reached £10 you can take the money out – either straight into your bank account, as a cheque or as vouchers, or if you’re feeling kind you can donate your rewards to charity.

Panelbase also has prize draws so you could get a free case of wine or some shopping vouchers to boot. You can try other  sites like Lightspeed Panel or Toluna plus IPSOS and GreatUKSurvey. See our full article on making money from online surveys here.

SarosResearch.com – Make money from market research

Register with a market research company like Saros Research and get paid for having an opinion!

Simply enter your details on the website and you’ll be sent an email when they need you for a specific focus group. The way it works usually is that you meet other members of the group in a nearby office, sit down and watch an advert, or sample a product. Then just say what you like or dislike about it.

It’s a good idea to join several companies as you’re unlikely to be asked to do more than three or four per year.  But Saros Research is a great place to start – it states that you’ll make between £30 and £50 for around 2-3 hours of research.

SlicethePie.com- Get paid to listen to music

If you love your music, sign up to Slicethepie for free and get paid to listen and review music by unsigned bands.

This isn’t necessarily a big money-earner as you’ll only get 5p per review at the beginning, but as you get a better ’scout rating’ there is potential to make more and more money.

Not only is it a good way to make a few extra quid but you could get to hear the next big thing before anyone else. Read all about it in our article here.

Lottoaid – win cash and give to charity at the same time.

OK, this isn’t quite making money but you have the opportunity to win a cash prize every now and then. Also, as it’s run by Actionaid, you know that any money you give in will be going to a good cause.

Plusnet – earn by referring

Plusnet has consistently great prices for its broadband and they even cut your bills further if you to refer your friends. You’ll get a discount off your monthly bill for every person that joins them on your recommendation, for as long as they are a customer. There’s no limit to the number of people that you can recommend – so you could get your broadband for free.

Sell, sell, sell…

eBid – Sell items for quick cash and no listings fee

You’ll all be aware that you can buy and sell items on auction site eBay, but another site that works in pretty much the same way is eBid. What’s different about eBid however, is that you don’t have to pay to list your items (called an insertion fee and ranging from 10p to £1.90 for most items). Although, as with eBay, they do take a Final Value Fee – of 3%.

All you need to do to get selling is sign up to a buyer’s account – then upgrade your account from buyer to seller. This gives you access to a standard auction format.

Musicmagpie – sell your CDs, DVDs and games.

Nothing to do with us – honest! – but it’s a good idea nonetheless. Send off your old CDs, DVDs and online games and get a cheque back. You’d be amazed what’s popular too. A ‘Sonia’ CD single fetched over £100. It’s amazing what people will buy! Check it out here.

Moneymagpie mobile recycling comparison – Cash for trash

Never throw away old mobile phones. Recycle them instead for easy money. Go to the Moneymagpie mobile recycling service – enter the make and model of your phone and then see which recycling company will give you the most for it.

You could make as little as £1.80 (for older, or damaged phones) or as much as £160 (for newer, well-kept phones). Go and raid your drawers and check at the back of the cupboard to see if you can make cash with your trash.

Spareroom.co.uk – Rent out your space for cash

Got a spare room you don’t use? Or, if you really need the cash, could you move out of your bedroom and sleep in the sitting room to free it up to rent out?

You can make up to £4,250 tax-free from renting a room each year so this is one of the best ways of making money almost from nothing! Go here to register.

Parkatmyhouse.com – rent your drive for cash

Use your drive or your garage to make money for you. Parkatmyhouse covers the whole UK and you can put your space on the site for anyone coming to your area to park in…for cash!

GreenMetropolis.com – Sell old books for £3

Sell books online at Green Metropolis for £3 a piece. It’s easy to do: log on, enter the book’s ISBN number (check the back of the book) and describe its condition.

There’s no charge for listing books, so it really is the ideal way to make money and recycle your old books.

Etsy.com – Get creative and sell your wares online

If you love to get creative and make jewellery or arts and crafts, Etsy is the place to go.

This US website is designed exclusively for buying and selling handmade goods so you’re more likely to have success here than somewhere like eBay.

Register your username (which is also your shop name so choose carefully!) for a basic buyer’s account – then upgrade to a seller’s account. There is a fee of $0.20  per item listed but this covers the item for four months and includes the option of five photos to show off your wares. When you sell an item there’s a 3.5% final value charge.

Get extra cash

Zopa.com – Earn 8.2% on your savings (yes really!)

Looking for an alternative to paltry savings rates? Head to Zopa where lenders made an average return of 8.2% in the last twelve months.

Zopa works as a sort of online financial community, bringing lenders and borrowers together and cutting out the banks. Borrowers are categorised according to how risky they are considered to be. Lending to higher risk people with poorer credit ratings provides better returns.

You decide who to lend to and what rate you’ll charge, as well as how long to lend your money for (choose from three, four or five years) and of course how much you want to lend (from £10 to upwards of £25,000).

Find out exactly how it works in our full article here

EntitledTo.co.uk – See if you’re entitled to free money!

Use the EntitledTo benefits checker which works out whether you’re eligible for any benefits. All you have to do is enter some details – such as how much you earn, your council tax rate, any savings you have.

The calculator covers all of the major benefits including Working Tax Credit, Council Tax, Housing Benefit, Pension Credit and Child Tax Credit. Benefits rules change all the time so there’s a good chance that even if you weren’t eligible say a few years ago, you could be now.

According to EntitledTo there is more than £8 billion worth of tax credits and benefits in the UK that are going unclaimed. So see our article on claiming what’s rightfully yours.

Mylostaccount.org.uk – find money in dormant bank accounts

This is a free online service that will search through bank and building society records for you to see if you have any money lying around in a forgotten account.

Official figures state that up to £850m of our own money is lying in inactive current, savings and building society accounts, so it’s definitely worth checking.

Always give as many details as possible, including maiden names and previous addresses, in order to increase your chances of finding a lost account. Find out more ways to find money you don’t know about here.

Useful Links

• Etsy.com
• GreenMetropolis.com
• GreatUKSurvey
• Mopay
• eBay
• Zopa
• Musicmagpie
• eBid
• Spareground
• SlicethePie.com

Related posts:

1. Money-making ideas for students Today students need to make money more than ever. Thankfully,...
2. Best Money Saving Websites We’ve scanned the web to find you the very best...
3. Knitting: Earn from Making, Teaching and Selling Whether you’re an avid knitter or you’ve never picked up...

A firm of solicitors which worked for a major claims management company has just been shut down by the Solicitors’ Regulation Authority (SRA). The SRA closed the Manchester office of Consumer Credit Litigation Solicitors (CCLS) (a particularly nasty name as it was clearly purposely designed to look like the Consumer Credit Counselling Service, a genuine debt advice charity!). This nasty-looking firm advised the claims firm Cartel Client Review.

I can’t stand those companies that say they will wipe off your debt ‘due to legal technicalities’ in your loan agreement(s).

Sure, one or two people (really just a handful) have managed to get their debt annulled because the original agreement was faulty. But even for those people:

• that debt will remain on their credit record as ‘unpaid’ for years to come, making it much harder for them to get credit elsewhere
• it’s just plain immoral not to pay back debts that you have knowingly built up.

Sure, the banks have been doing shocking things and have been very immoral in many of their dealings but as the old saying goes ‘two wrongs don’t make a right’. We’ve got to tread the right road as individuals, whatever others seem to be getting away with.

But what really gets me is that these firms are cynically manipulating the public to get money for claims that are mostly (really well over 90% of the time) going to get nowhere. It’s only one or two here and there that have a hope.

The companies that charge upfront are the worst. I’ve spoken to people who have stumped-up thousands in the false hope that their debts would be wiped off. They haven’t been and they won’t.

Don’t be fooled – these claims companies need to be avoided. Totally.

Related posts:

1. Blow for Debtors – Landmark Court Ruling Bad news for anyone helping to wipe out their credit...
2. Bad loan rates mean potential gains for savers I’ve just had a press release from Moneyfacts.co.uk saying that...
3. Dodgy seminars Do you remember those ads for property-investing seminars? You’d get...

Those vegetables from the box are coming in handy. My sister has bought me a new book: Red Velvet Chocolate Heartache by Harry Eastwood (www.amazon.co.uk). It’s a recipe book for cakes that use vegetables.

A thrifty way to cut waste?

When the vegetables in the fridge are wilting, I usually stir them up into soup but making cakes is far more fun obviously. And they are absolutely gorgeous! It’s not just classic recipes like carrot cake; the book is full of super-light and fluffy lemon cakes made with courgette and chocolate cake filled with butternut squash…

It’s a good way for cake lovers to get some extra vegetables of course…and making what is often an unhealthy choice a lot better for you is probably the point of the book (vegetables replace fat in many of the recipes). But the problem is that the recipes are so good that I’m not simply thinking that it would be good to fill a cake with vegetables. I’m actually now looking at vegetables and thinking: cake.

Waste not

There’s no point wasting vegetables or fruit, whether you turn them into cake or not. Figures show we chuck a third of the food we buy, which is really awful. Main target for the bin is bananas. As soon as they’re slightly past their best, they’re slung out. But the rising cost of cocoa and sugar, which is pushing up the price of jam, chocolate and confectionary may mean we have to get thrifty with those bananas. There’s a couple of bananas sat in my fruit bowl with over-ripe spotted skins but I’m resolved not to throw them away…I’m going to grill them, bake them or mash them but I’m not going to bin them.

Related posts:

1. Birthday cake Shop-bought birthday cakes are expensive for what they are –...
2. Half price slow cookers… I notice Robert Dyas, the ironmongers, are selling slow cookers...
3. I’ve tried ‘em all… My latest fad, and I’ve tried ‘em all, is wheat-free....

I’m all for paying a fair price for food and buy Fairtrade products when I can, as well as supporting local bakeries, delis, green grocers and markets. But sometimes, like many of us, I fall back on the supermarkets.

I don’t particularly enjoy the experience and tend to dash around flinging items into the trolley in a desperate bid to be out of the place as quickly as possible. But I’ve recently started buying online and find it suits me nicely. For a start, it’s far easier to stick to what’s on the list. And it cuts out all those ‘are we out of pasta?’ moments (if you’re sat at your own kitchen table, you’re easily able to check how much of what you should be buying).

It also means you can trawl the major shops for the best deals and find the right time to buy things in bulk. (For example, I cut the cost of fruit juice almost by half when I snapped up a load in a discount offer last month, instead of buying just a few packets every week. Same brand, same juice, far less money). Try Mysupermarket.co.uk as it helps you compare prices between stores. When I buy online, I’ve been going for the cheap slots – if you’re prepared to unpack your bags last thing at night, delivery charges can drop to just 99p.

I’m also looking at other ways to save (such as buying from websites that sell discounted produce that has past its ‘best before’ (but not ‘use before’ date) too. But more of that later.

Fruit and veg

I’m currently having a fruit and vegetable box delivered from Abel&Cole and can recommend it. A leaflet came through the door offering £50 back (to spend at Abel&Cole), after a certain number of deliveries and a minimum order, which made it a great time to give the box a go. I reckon it’s worth keeping an eye on the website to see when other offers are on because the quality of the (organic, local, seasonal and fairtrade) produce is excellent: abelandcole.co.uk. To find vegetable box schemes in your area see Freerangereview.com. The site also lists local farm shops, so it’s a great way to see what’s available. It’s always worth seeing if there are any offers or you could try different schemes on alternate weeks as a trial before you decide which one (if any) will work for you.

Mothers Day

Last minute gift ideas needed? There are lots of gorgeous things on Folksy.com. It’s a great site for ideas and instructions for things you could make yourself (some of them are fairly simple). But if you don’t think there’s time to make a present before Sunday, there’s a section where you can buy someone else’s handiwork. Not that I’m suggesting you pass it off as your own…

Related posts:

1. Pets: slash your costs In the UK we currently spend £93.6 million a week...
2. Cut your costs There are two main ways to reduce your outgoings: Buy...
3. Profits good, costs bad I decided to run My Itchy Dog as a business...

Are you perplexed by pensions? Confused by CGT? Stumped by self assessment?

Billions of pounds of hard earned cash is wasted every year through unnecessary tax payments or failure to use tax breaks. But how do you ensure you are not paying more than you should?

Help is at hand with Philip Pearson from P&P Invest, and Ian Hudson, Hudson Green & Associates, both IFAs specialising in tax, who will be joining us to answer all your questions. Submit your questions now and join us here at 1pm.

Related posts:

1. How to avoid overpaying on tax – transcript of live webchat Last wednesday we ran a live webchat on how to...
2. Managing your Money in the Recession – Transcript of live webchat Here’s the transcript from our live webchat conducted on Thursday...
3. Health Cash Plans: Save Money on Medical Expenses Small medical expenses don’t seem too bad by themselves, but...

Don’t forget you can treat yourself too – take advantage of all the Mother’s Day bargains with our selection of the best deals on the web.

• Best value flowers
• Bargain bubbly
• Spa treats for less
• Cheap city breaks

Get the best value flowers…

Rather than browsing the wilted offerings at your local garage forecourt, your best bet is to go for a snazzy bouquet that can be delivered straight to your mum’s door.

Free chocs and free delivery

Bunches.co.uk sells fantastic looking flowers from just £9.99 – plus you get free delivery and free chocolates with every order!

We also love John Lewis because you don’t have to pay a penny for standard delivery of flowers and plants. Prices start at £18.50 and there is a great selection to choose from.  Start browsing here. If you really want to impress then order the stunning Super Heaven Scent for £40, or for something a little bit cheaper but just as pretty go for the 18 Mixed Tulips for £19.50.

• Next has a great variety of flowers (from £20) and several of their bouquets come with a free vase. This bouquet here costs £28 but is full of roses, spray carnations, lisianthus and eucalyptus. Plus you get a box of chocolates. Alternatively, take a look at this bouquet for a classic and stylish arrangement of cream roses at £33.
• Flowers Direct also has a comprehensive selection (from £24.99), and offers free chocolates and same day delivery (great if you’re a last minute shopper).
• Marks & Spencer has some gorgeous bouquets from £19.50. Again some come with free chocolates or vases. We like this Tulip gift bag for £25 and this Shades of Pink arrangement with five malibu roses, five anastasia white blooms, five hot pink spray roses and five ruscus. It costs £39.50 but comes with a free bottle of cava and it’s an online exclusive. It can be ordered up until 7 April and if you place the order before 5pm you’ll get next day delivery. But be warned, if you want them delivered on Mothers Day you’ll be charged an extra £3.
• ASDA will give you £2 off any flower order when you enter the voucher code namemum at the checkout. This offer is  until Thursday 19 March.
• Arenaflowers.com offer a lovely range of Mother’s Day flowers, most of which you can “Make Deluxe” if you want to splash out that little bit extra. They even cater for mum’s who live overseas, offering an International Flower and Gifts delivery service.

…or trees!

If she’s a bit green-fingered, why not surprise your mum by giving her a tree for Mother’s Day? They last for years and really add to a garden or room.

• Anything from lemon to olive trees are available through Tree2mydoor (from £24.50), which tends to have the most reasonable prices.

• Should your mum have no garden (or little space indoors), you could go for a Bonsai gift kit (£12.95). She’ll be able to grow her own mini-trees needing nothing more than a spare windowsill or shelf.

Luxury chocs for less

You can’t really go wrong with chocolate and there are lots of places to find gift wrapped goodies at great prices.

• Thorntons sells everything from continental chocolates (£12) to champagne truffles (£15). They also offer a great range of flowers accompanied with chocolates if you just can’t make up your mind what to go for.
• Why not nab some great value gift-wrapped Belgian chocs from M&S for just £8?
• For something a little bit special take a look at the Mother’s Day Champagne & Chocolates hamper from the Chocolate Trading Company. At £49.95 it’s a little bit pricey, but enter the code Winter8 when ordering online and get 8% off!
• Hotel Chocolat offers Mother’s Day chocolate gifts from £6, together with some luxurious chocolate sets (from around £15) that mark a new high point in chocolatey self-indulgence – surely a good thing!
• If your mum loves her choc the treasure box from Cadbury Gifts Direct is bound to put a smile on her face – it costs £20 and is crammed full of all the Cadbury’s classics such as Milk Tray, Roses, Dairy Milk, Crunchie bars and much, much more.

Find some bargain bubbly

Champagne always goes down a treat, especially if your mum’s partial to a tipple.

• One of the best value bottles of champagne on the market is Waitrose’s Bredon Brut NV champagne (£19.94).  If you want to splash out a bit more, you can send a bottle of champers with your own personalised label and message (from £29.95 at Barrels and Bottles).
• Should you be feeling particularly flush, you can get a bottle of Moet & Chandon Brut Imperial, NV, Swarovski Gold Edition (75cl) for £44.99. The bottle has been beautifully decoarted with Gold Swarovski and can be purchased from Gifts International.
• Don’t forget there are plenty of excellent alternatives to champagne, which taste great yet cost a fraction of the price. For example, Cava Calamino NV (£7.49 from Majestic) is great value bubbly, while a bottle of Montana Sparkling Brut Cuvée NV is a classy yet affordable alternative to champagne (£6.64 from Waitrose).

Spoil her with a spa

Give your mum some top-notch pampering with a spa break.

• Red Letter Days sells good value spa treatments from £49 as well as various other activities, such as flotation tank experiences and other pampering treats.

• Marriott Hotels offers a pamper day treat from £49, and will allow your mum to bring along a friend to use the facilities (such as the swimming pool and spa) free of charge.

• Lastminute.com is currently offering a brilliant 2 for 1 Dove Spa deal for just £95. The offer includes four treatments for your mum and the person she chooses to take with her (which will hopefully be you!).

Lift her up, up and away

Your mum might have her feet firmly stuck on the ground, but why not change that for a day?

• A hot air balloon experience can be had from as little as £85 if you book online – try the British School of Ballooning website or Balloon Flights UK.

• If you book through Red Letter Days, you’ll even get to help inflate the balloon itself! Take your mum up to 3,000 feet, giving her a tranquil birds-eye view over the British countryside. You can fly from locations all over the UK – and your mum gets to toast her maiden flight with a glass of champagne when she lands!

Treat her to a Royal day out

Booking a day-out at Buckingham Palace makes a great treat for mothers who love a bit of pomp and pageantry. Have a snoop round the palace, taking in the Queen’s gallery, Royal stables and magnificent state rooms (which boast works by the likes of Rembrandt, Rubens and Canaletto). The palace is open between 26 July and 28 September (tickets are £16.50 per person and must be booked in advance).

Uncover affordable art

Indulge your mum’s artistic streak. Artyprints has a huge catalogue of prints and posters for you to browse online, and is currently knocking 15% off the price of all orders. They sell everything from abstracts to photography, covering artists from Whistler to Warhol – so you’re bound to find something that’s to your mum’s taste. Prices range from £5 – £500.

Take a break

Why not whisk your mum away from it all?

• Lastminute.com has some great easter city breaks which would make a lovely Mother’s Day present. Why not take in the sights of Paris for just £122, or soak up the history of Rome for a mere £182.
• Or stay closer to home for very little cost. Take advantage of Travelodge’s Easter sale and book a room for just £19 (stays must take place between 3 April – 4 May, subject to availability).

Get best-value from beauty products

If your mum is into make-up, forget the high street. Make-up and perfume is almost always cheaper online.

• At Debenhams save 10% on brands ranging from Yves Saint Laurent to Estee Lauder.
• Benefit Cosmetics is offering free delivery on all orders £50 or over.
• Or head to John Lewis, which offers everything from bronzers and blushers to a host of other pampering delights for around the £20 mark.
• Wantthelook.com boasts an impressive range of hair and beauty products to suit all ages. They are currently giving away a gorgeous heart shaped locket when you purchase any two Paul Mitchell products.

Don’t forget you can earn cashback on your shopping through sites such as Quidco – take a look at the merchants who offer cashback through Quidco here.

Go Green….

Treat your mum to some eco friendly presents from Nigel’s Eco Store. Choose from a huge selection of gifts including a Babyliss Eco Hair Dryer for £19.99, soothing Rosa Passionata Night Butter for £16.99, or a heavenly Domestic Goddess Aromatherapy candle for £12.95.

Feed her inner film buff

Whether your mum is into chick flicks or world cinema, there are loads of good value movies available online.

• You can get Mamma Mia! from just £4.96 at Play.com – and if your mum swoons at the mere mention of Colin Firth, why not pick up the entire BBC series of Pride and Prejudice from Amazon, for the bargain price of £4.99!

• Alternatively, you could get your mum a cinema pass, which would allow her to watch an unlimited number of films for a fixed fee (Cineworld offer a deal from £13.50 a month).

• Or why not buy her a subscription to a service like LoveFilm and your mum can rent out DVDs from a massive selection online. The films get posted to her to watch in the comfort of her own home. When she’s done with them, she sends them back by prepaid post, and gets sent the next films she’s requested. Simple! LoveFilm rentals start from £3.99 per month and rise to £18.99 per month for unlimited rentals.

Show off her digital photos for a snip

Instead of leaving photos hidden away on a computer, display your mum’s memories where everyone can see them – on a digital photo frame. Asda is selling Kodak’s P720 digital photo frame for a knock-down £27, a 40% reduction on its original price.

Donate to charity

You could celebrate Mother’s Day by helping mothers who are in need. Aid organisation Maternity Worldwide helps save the lives of women in the developing world, whose health is put at risk by poor maternity care. For a £15 donation, Maternity Worldwide will send a personalised ‘Safe Birth’ certificate to your mum – and you both get the satisfaction of knowing that your gift will make a real difference to the lives of other mothers.

Get your mum a personal assistant…

Is your mum the busiest person you know? Whether she’s snowed under with work or domestic chores, why not hire a personal assistant to help her out? It can be for as little time or for as long as you want. The PA Division will sort out her to-do list (anything from doing her filing to washing her car), leaving your mum free to relax and spend her time doing the things she wants to do. You can expect to pay around £25 per hour, contact the company here for a quote.

…or do it yourself!

Your mum waited on you hand, foot and finger for more years than you care to count – so why not return the favour? You could begin by making her breakfast in bed, then allow her to put her feet up while you do all the cooking, cleaning, washing up and shopping. Top it off by preparing a meal or taking her out for dinner. If you’re eating out, you could try:

• Lastminute’s half price deals at restaurants across the country.
• The ‘Mum’s Eat for Free’ Mother’s Day deal at HaHa Café Bars – meaning you get two meals for the price of one. The deal only applies to the HaHa ‘Favourites’ section of the menu. See the full menu here and find your nearest HaHa here.
• Taking her somewhere really nice for just a tenner – see the full selection of restaurants that are part of this promotion here.
• Use Toptable to book your meal and earn points to save a heap of money at top restaurants all over the UK.

Or if you decide to eat in why not treat her (and yourself!) to a Marks and Spencer food feast. M&S also currently have 25% off their French wine selection, which should wash that grub down a treat!

Make her day by doing that, and you will officially be the world’s best son or daughter!

Related posts:

1. Great Gift Ideas: How to choose a present for every occasion Finding the perfect present often leaves you tearing your hair...
2. Mother & Bump – get your top on In the last year I’ve gone from paying off debts,...
3. Mother & Child I am no longer a woman with a bump! On...

• Financial support
• Free leisure
• Free health
• Mother’s Day Treats

Financial support

There is plenty of financial support that mums (and dads) can get from the Government to help towards the costs of having a family, supporting children while you go back into education and putting children through their own education. There are benefits for those who are out of work, those who can’t work and those on a low income. Read on to find out what you and your children are entitled to.

Governmental Support for Parents

Child tax credit – tax credits are payments from the government. You will usually be able to claim child tax credits for a new baby, any child that lives with you who is under the age of 16 – or 20 if they are in full time education or approved training. If you are a lone parent but share joint custody of the child, only one household will be able to claim. If you cannot decide which household will claim, then the Tax Office will do this for you.

Sure Start Maternity Grant – this £500 grant is to help parents on a low income pay for things for a new baby and does not have to be paid back. You must be receiving certain other benefits to claim the grant and there are conditions concerning the child’s age when you claim. For more information and to download a form click here.

Health in Pregnancy Grant - if you are a mum-to-be and at least 25 weeks pregnant, you may be able to get a one-off tax-free grant of £190 to help towards the costs of your new baby. You can get a claim form from your doctor or midwife.

Child Benefit - this is a tax-free payment from the Government that you can claim to help you pay for the upkeep of your child. It is usually paid every four weeks but can be paid weekly. You can claim if you have a child under 16 or a child over 16 but still in approved education or training. For your eldest or only child you will get £20 a week, then £13.20 for every other child.

Child Trust Fund - this new scheme will help you get your child’s savings started. If your child was born on or after September 1st 2002, is not subject to any immigration restrictions and qualifies for Child Benefit, then you will receive a voucher for £250 around a month after you start to receive your Child Benefit. If your household receives Child Tax Credit and you have a household income of £16,040 or less a year, then your child will receive an extra £250.

Once your child reaches 7, they will get an additional £250 (£500 for low income households) and a total of £1,200 can be paid into your child’s account every year.

Employment support

Jobseeker’s allowance – if you are currently unemployed or work less than 16 hours a week, but are looking for a full time or part time job then you may be eligible to claim Jobseeker’s Allowance to help with the costs of living. How much you can claim depends on your circumstances.

Employment and Support Allowance – if you have a disability or health condition that prevents you from working, you may be able to get Employment and Support Allowance which replaced Incapacity Benefit and Income Support in 2008.

You will have to fill out a questionnaire about your illness or disability and how it affects your everyday life and you may also have to take part in a medical examination. You may be able to work while still claiming ESA but there are certain rules to this.

Income support – this is for people who don’t claim Jobseeker’s Allowance or Employment and Support Allowance and have a low income. To be eligible to claim you must work less than 16 hours a week and have less than £16,000 in savings. There are some exceptions but to claim you will not be in full time study.

If you live with a partner and they are in similar circumstances, only one of you will be able to claim Income Support, but there are extra amounts that you can claim based on yours and your partner’s circumstances. You will need to contact your local JobCentre Plus to find out more.

If you are a lone parent, you can claim Income Support until your youngest child reaches the age of 10. From 25th October 2010, this age will fall to 7. Before your Income Support payments are due to stop, you will have to attend an interview at JobCentre Plus where you will be advised on other benefits you may be able to claim if you have not found work, or a job that you work at for more than 16 hours.

In Work credit – this is a tax-free payment of £40 per week (£60 if you’re living in London) made to lone parents who have been claiming certain benefits for a year or more and go back to work for at least 16 hours a week. In work credit is paid for a year in addition to other working benefits like Income Support and ESA. There are certain conditions to claiming In Work Credit:

• You must claim before you start work and you must fill out and return the form to the JobCentre within five weeks of starting work
• You must your new job to last for more than five weeks and you must work at least 16 hours a week
• You must have at least one child living with you who is aged 16 or under

For more information, visit the JobCentre website.

Job Grant – if you are aged 25 or over, have started full time work (16 hours or over) and were claiming Income Support, Jobseeker’s Allowance, Incapacity Benefit or Severe Disablement Allowance for 26 weeks prior to starting work, then you may be able to claim a tax-free lump sum Job Grant. For lone parents and couples with children the grant is £250.

Childcare and School Support -

Pre-school Childcare costs – all 3 and 4 year olds are entitled to 12 and a half hours of free early education for 38 weeks of the year. This can take place in nurseries, playgroups, pre-schools or at a childminder. From September 2010 this will increase to 15 hours a week. To find out when your child will become eligible for their free place click here.

Free school lunches for children - as a parent, you do not have to pay for your child’s school lunch if you claim any of the following:

• Income Support
• Jobseeker’s Allowance (income-based)
• Employment and Support Allowance (income-related)
• Support under part VI of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
• The Guarantee element of State Pension Credit
• Child Tax Credit, providing you are not entitled to Working Tax Credit and have an annual income (as assessed by HM Revenue & Customs) that does not exceed £16,040
• Working Tax Credit during the four-week period immediately after your employment finishes or after you start to work less than 16 hours per week

Your Local Authority is responsible for providing free school lunches. You can apply here.

Help with school uniforms – families on low income or benefits may be entitled to clothing grants or vouchers from their Local Authority to help with the costs of school uniforms. To apply, enter your postcode to find your LA here.

Free school transport - if you are a working mum, it can be difficult to get your children to school. The good news is, your child is automatically entitled to free school transport from your Local Authority, if;

• they are between 5 and 16 years old
• they attend the nearest suitable school but it is further than the statutory walking distance – that is, 2 miles for pupils under 8 and 3 miles for those aged 8 and over.

Find out more and apply for home to school travel support by entering your postcode here.

Support for Parents in Education -

Care to Learn – if you are under 20 and still in education or planning to go back into education, the Care to Learn scheme can pay up to £160 per child per week (£175 in London) for childcare and associated travel costs. For more information, visit the Direct Gov website here.

Other childcare help – if you’re over 20, there is still help you can get if you’re still in education and need help with childcare. Depending on your household income, the Sixth Form College Childcare Scheme will pay £160 per child per week towards childcare costs (up to £175 in London). You must be aged 20 on the day you start your course and you can be studying full or part time and be the main carer of a child under 15 years of age.

The Free Childcare for Training and Learning for Work Scheme is aimed at low-income,  two-parent families, where one parent is working and the other wants to go back into education or training. The scheme will help pay for your childcare – up to £175 per child per week or £215 if you live in London.

You must be 20 or over, be unemployed or working less than 16 hours a week, have one or more children aged 14 or under (18 if disabled), have a partner who is working and a household income of £20,000 or less a year.

Education Maintenance Allowance – if you are between 16 and 18, you could get weekly payment of £10, £20 or £30 depending on your household income, which is paid to help with the costs of studying after school age.

If you don’t qualify for any of the above schemes, you may still be able to get help through your sixth form or college.

Support for Working Parents -

Parental Leave – working parents are entitled to take up to 13 weeks leave for each child until they reach their fifth birthday. This leave is most likely to be unpaid, but if you need some time to spend with your family or some time to make arrangements for your children’s welfare, then you are able to take leave from work and have a job to come back to!

You must have been employed with the same company for a year or more and have a contract with that company, you must be named as the child’s parent on their birth or adoption certificate or have legal responsibility for the child if they are under five (18 if disabled).

Flexible Working - if you have a child under six or a disabled child under 18, you are allowed to ask your employer for a more flexible working pattern to help you care for your child. You must have worked for your employer for at least 26 weeks, be the child’s mother, father, adoptive or foster parent, legal guardian or the partner of one of these and have responsibility for the child’s upbringing. You can download an application form for flexible working here.

Free leisure

Mums go free at Ballyearl - if you’re local to Ballyearl Arts & Leisure Centre in Newtownabbey, you can take advantage of a free squash lesson or gym session (plus a cup of tea!) when you bring your kids along for £3 each. You’ll need to book in advance to avoid disappointment. Download the application form here and visit the centre’s website here.

Free mum and baby fit classes – mums who live in Rushcliffe, Nottingham can benefit from FREE weekly mum and baby fit classes at Cotgrave Leisure Centre. Classes take place on Thursdays from 9.45 – 10.30am and are suitable for mums with babies under a year old.

Free swims for pregnant women – if you live in Bristol, you can purchase an Everyone Active Discount Card for just £3.50 and benefit from free swims at six different leisure centres in the area. You’ll need to fill out an application form ad take it to your nearest Everyone Active centre with proof of residency and your National Health Service Card to prove your eligibility. Those who do not live in Bristol can purchase a Discount Card for £30.

Free health

If you are pregnant or have had a baby within in the past 12 months, you are entitled to free prescriptions and free dental care. You must complete an FW8 application form to get a Maternity Exemption Certificate – you can get one from your GP, midwife or health visitor. The certificate will be valid for 12 months.

Mother’s Day Treats

Lastminute.com have loads of Mother’s Day offers, treats and discounts, including 2for1 on Bannatyne Relaxation Days, 50% off mother and daughter photoshoots now just £19.50 and Hairspray tickets from £22.50.

Marks & Spencer has 50% off all fine jewellery at the moment, as well as buy one get one half price on selected fragrances. H Samuel has plenty of offers on Mother’s Day gifts, like half price pendants and earrings and buy one get  one half price on Willow Tree ornaments.

Tesco.com and Interflora are offering Mother’s Day bouquets from £19.99, while Moonpig.com has cute little bouquets from just £15 and can deliver via courier on Mother’s Day providing you order before 2pm on Saturday 13th.

Thorntons has some great offers on flowers with chocolates from just £28 and some bargain chocolate boxes like this heart shaped plaque with truffles for £5.99, which can be iced with a message!

Useful Links

• Mumsnet
• Netmums.com
• Direct.Gov
• Marks & Spencers
• Lastminute.com
• Tesco
• Thorntons

Related posts:

1. Disability Benefits: Get What’s Rightfully Yours Whether you care for someone with a disability or whether...
2. Benefits for the over 60s We were recently asked this question: “My husband recently turned...
3. Benefits for the Over 60s Freebies and discounts! Financial benefits Savings accounts for over...

• The state of the mortgage market today (March 2010)
• What is remortgaging?
• Three steps to finding the best mortgage deal
• Do’s and don’ts

How things currently stand (March 2010)

There are several reasons why homeowners are being urged to take advantage of the market and remortgage:

• There has recently been a surge of new mortgage deals from lenders (both tracker and fixed) that have cheaper rates than were previously available.
• At the same time, lenders have recently increased their Standard Variable Rates (SVRs). (This is the default mortgage rate you get landed with when your current deal comes to an end.)  And it looks like mortgage providers are going to raise their SVRs further still.
• This means that for many people, remortgaging works out cheaper than leaving your mortgage to automatically go onto your lender’s SVR.

So where does this leave me?

• If you’re paying an SVR of 3.5% or more – or you will be in the near future when your current mortgage deal runs out – you should at least consider remortaging (providing you have at least 20% equity in your property).
• We recommend talking to brokers London and Country to advise you on your personal circumstances. We like them because they are completely independent and cover the whole market – so you can be sure you are receiving impartial and unbiased advice. They will also provide free advice and won’t charge you for getting quotes either!
• If you have less equity in your property – say around 10% – you need to be extra careful in your research. A fixed rate mortgage could be more suitable for you (depending on your circumstances). Again, London and Country can advise you on this.
• The key point is that the majority of SVR rates can’t compete with the current fixed-rate deals – so don’t pay a higher rate if you can avoid it!
• If going for a fixed-rate deal, it’s probably best to go for a five year fix at the current rates. Two or three year fixes are a cheaper option (at least to begin with) but they don’t protect you from interest rate rises over the long term.
• However, there are still some reasonable tracker deals around with interest rates remaining at rock bottom – and looking likely to stay that way for a while yet.

Act now

• The general long-term fall in house prices has meant that your loan-to-value has been getting worse. So act now if you need to remortgage in order to grab the best rate available.
• Three steps to finding the best mortgage deal.
• Talk to independent brokers London and Country for a free quote.
• Download our FREE comprehensive Mortgage Guide

So do it now before you lose out. Get in touch with London and Country who will search the whole of the market and bring you the best deals. If you find a good one, agree to it asap – you can always change your mind later on if a better one turns up (although if you’ve paid an arrangement fee to the first one you may lose that if you switch, so factor that in).

Also, we’ve put together a quick and fun guide to getting a mortgage to give you an idea of what you should be doing now in order to get the best price possible and minimise your ‘mortgage shock’. Download it now and send it to your friends – it’s completely free!

What is remortgaging?

There are two types of remortgaging.  The first is simply transferring your mortgage from one company to another or moving it to a different type of mortgage with your current lender.  This is what you need to do when you come to the end of a fixed deal. (If you don’t you will be put on your lender’s SVR which is likely to be an expensive rate.) When you remortgage for this reason, the balance of your mortgage remains the same. You are just transferring to a deal with different rates of interest.

The second type of remortgaging is when you need to borrow more money, so you take out a larger mortgage in order to pay off other debts or perhaps buy a car. We advise against this wherever possible.

This article deals with the first type of remortgaging: those who are coming to the end of their fixed term period (where interest rates remain at the same rate for the first two years or more) and are facing higher interest rates unless they change mortgage.

Three simple steps to get the best deal

We’ve put together three simple steps to help you get the best deal for you:

• Start looking now

If you’re coming towards the end of your fixed-term period, start looking straight away. You can arrange a remortgage up to six months before the end of your fixed term period – and because the good deals are snapped up so quickly at the moment, arranging it early is the best thing to do. If you find a better deal later on it’s fairly easy to cancel one that you’ve signed up to before the money has been transferred over.  So if you do find a good deal, grab it quick smart – you can always get out of it later on.

• Get a broker

The second thing that you should do is get yourself a decent mortgage broker.  A good mortgage broker will look at the whole of the market for you (not just a few companies that they are tied to) and be able to get you the best deals that are on offer.  Moneymagpie has teamed up with London & Country – one of the best independent brokers in the UK – you can speak to them for free about your mortgage needs.

If your broker does find you a great offer, you should also consider having a chat with your current provider to see if they can match the offer.  They won’t always be able to – but if they do, you can avoid the (sometimes excessive) exit fees that are involved with changing your mortgage provider. You may get cheaper arrangement fees.

• Start budgeting

As soon as you start looking, you should start to budget for your new mortgage.  Your new deal may be more expensive than your current payments, so you should start budgeting increased mortgage payments into your monthly expenditure. However, as interest rates are still currently at rock bottom due to the economic crisis, you may get a better deal than you have currently. In which case we suggest you continue paying the same amount as you did before (or even more if you can afford it) so that you can pay off your mortgage quicker and save yourself a TON of money in wasted interest payments!

How much will it cost?

The costs that you will have to fork out for straight away are the arrangement fees for the new mortgage and the exit penalities on your current mortgage.  These vary greatly across different banks and different mortgages, but can be between about £100-£3,000.  More recently, arrangement fees have become a tool to manipulate comparison tables.  By offering a lower rate of interest but high arrangement fees a mortgage provider can get up high on comparison tables. They then make the money back by hiking up arrangement fees.

This can work to your advantage: if your mortgage is over £200,000 you’ll probably save money by paying a higher arrangement fee and then lower interest. However under £200,000 it’s probably better to go for a slightly higher interest rate to save on arrangement fees.  For more information on cost see our article on mortgage set up costs.

What if I can’t get something I can afford?

If you are facing real problems: either no one will offer you a new mortgage or the ones you are being offered are simply too expensive, then you have two choices. Either you will have to be resourceful and try to make more money out of your house in order to be able to afford it, or, if this is not possible, you should get help and advice to stave off repossession.

Ways to make money from your home

• You can try renting your driveway or a room in your house (the latter is tax-free income up to £4,225 a year).  Renting to a foreign student can be the best of both worlds because you get to make money from them but they tend not to stay long so you don’t have to put up with the same person for months and years.
• Alternatively, if things look really tough, you could move out of your house entirely for a year and rent the whole place out.  You would either have to find an accommodating friend or pay rent to live somewhere smaller and cheaper, but you could end up making enough money off the rental income to cover the cost of both your new residence and your mortgage.

If things are looking really bad…

If you really can’t afford it, you may have to sell your home, leaving you free to rent for a while whilst the market gets back on its feet.  This is not ideal but it is better than having the place taken off you. In this situation, do what you can to make the property look as attractive as possible and put it on the market at an attractive price. That way you will be able to get a quicker sale and deal with your mortgage problem earlier rather than later.

If the situation is even worse than that then go DIRECTLY to one of the charitable advice agencies below – particularly the Citizens Advice Bureau and Shelter.

Do’s and Don’ts

Don’t be tempted to use a sale and rent back company to sort this all out for you.  We have not found any of these deals to be good for the homeowner. They will often hugely undervalue your home and then, after a year or so, they could hike up your rent to make you leave.

Do get help quickly. If you are facing real debt problems and fear you may be repossessed, remember there are free services there to help you. Get in contact now with the CCCS (Consumer Credit Counselling Service), the Citizens Advice Bureau or National Debtline. Also the charity Shelter has a lot of experience in dealing with housing problems and is very helpful.

Useful links

• London & Country Mortgage Brokers
• CCCS
• National Debtline
• Citizens Advice Bureau
• FREE Moneymagpie Guide

Related posts:

1. Remortgaging to pay off your debts Anyone struggling financially will know what a desperate situation debt...
2. Offset Mortgages: the mortgage you can pay off quickly and cheaply Having an offset mortgage can help you pay off your...
3. What type of mortgage – part II Second decision: what payment rate will you go for? We...

You have to quit smoking.

It’s National No Smoking Day on 10 March and if you need to save some cash (don’t we all) then what better time to kick the habit?

We know it’s not an easy thing to do – yes, some of the Moneymagpies are smokers too. You have to choose for yourself whether or not you want to, or think you can, quit. We’re going to give you a nudge in the right direction though because there are absolutely loads of incentives to give up.

Why should you quit?

• For your wallet – you could save as much as £2,870 a year.
• Because it’s free! – there’s glowing praise for the NHS stop smoking service, and it’s completely free so make the most of it.
• For your health – within 24 hours of quitting all the carbon monoxide will be gone from your body, and your lungs will begin to repair themselves.
• For your social life – you’ll have more confidence and much more free time when you don’t waste it smoking!
• If you need more inspiration, read Nigel’s story.

Your health

It’s an obvious one, but just think of all the things that will improve if you quit…

• Your skin will look healthier and younger after just a few months. As a non-smoker you will also get fewer wrinkles as time goes on.
• You’ll be able to go for a run without coughing and spluttering all over the place, and having to stop every 100 meters. Did anyone say FIT, as well as healthy?
• You will look a whole lot more attractive when your body repairs itself. Gone will be the yellow stained teeth and the lifeless, brittle hair – not to mention the smell.

If that isn’t enough, check out these stats from the NHS:

• Within 48 hours your body has completely rid itself of nicotine.
• Within two weeks your circulation will improve.
• After three months your lung function will have increased by as much as 10%, meaning any coughs and breathing problems will improve dramatically.
• After 10 years, your risk of lung cancer falls to half that of a smoker and your risk of heart attack falls to the same as someone who has never smoked.

Your wallet – save thousands

If the many health benefits of a smoke-free life aren’t enough to entice you to quit, the increase in the weight of your wallet could well be.

What the money you save can buy you

A packet of 20 cigarettes costs about £6.13 at the moment. Working on that basis, (we’ve rounded up to the nearest pound) have a look below to see just how much money you could be saving and what you could spend it on.

Giving up five cigarettes a day saves:

• £11 a week – 2 for 1 cinema trip with Orange wednesdays (plus change for popcorn!)
• £46 a month – Official England football shirt – World Cup 2010 kit
• £558 a year – 7 night all inclusive 4 star holiday to Cyprus in April or May
• £5,585 a decade – Good condition used BMW 3 series

Cutting out 10 cigarettes a day saves:

• £21 a week – Luxury cosmetics from Benefit, like  ‘That Gal’ brightening face primer or ‘Dr Feelgood’ velvety complextion balm.
• £92 a month -  22 bottles of wine/35 pints of beer
• £1121 a year – An Apple MacBook Pro 13 inch MB991 with free delivery and free Microsoft Office.
• £11,206 a decade - Completely redecorate your home

Giving up 20 cigarettes a day saves:

• £43 a week – 2 course meal and ticket to Wicked courtesy of Lastminute (with £3 change for ice cream in the interval!)
• £184 a month – Two return tickets to Paris on the Eurostar and £46 spending money
• £2,237 a year – Brand new Canon EOS 7D Digital SLR camera with zoom lens, lithium battery, 16GB memory card, tripod and carry case – plus £391.85 left to buy another lens!
• £22,374 a decade – Deposit for your first home!

Insurance

Apart from the obvious financial benefits of not having to buy cigarettes, giving up can also save you a small fortune on your insurance premiums.

Smoking makes you more of a risk as far as insurers are concerned since you are more likely to claim. As well as reducing the number of life insurance options open to you, it can increase your premiums by as much as 78% according to our friends at Beatthatquote.com.

Using their example, the average premium for a healthy 35 year old man who has £100,000 cover for 20 years is £8.85 per month. If this man was classed as a smoker though, the premiums would rise to £15.75 – that’s an extra £1,656 over the term of the policy!

Remember that smoking might also increase your home and car insurance premiums as well.

However, it’s good to know that most insurance companies will officially reinstate you with non-smoker status, 12 months after you quit.

We’ve shown you it’s worth it, so make sure that you get a new life insurance deal once you can be classified as a non-smoker. Check out the best on offer with our comparison service.

Hidden costs

A study into the costs of smoking by the NHS has shown that smokers can spend as much as £676 a year before they’ve even bought their cigarettes.

This goes on costs like maintaining the same personal hygiene as a non-smoker – this can set you back nearly £200 per year, while the cleaning, repairing and replacing of clothes comes to £213.

Your social life

Giving up can do wonders for your social life, not least because you’ll have loads more time.

According to the NHS, the average time spent smoking a cigarette is about 10 minutes. This means a ten-a-day smoker could save almost two hours a day, and a whole month over the course of a year, by giving up. Imagine what you could do with all that free time…

Being able to quit should give you a huge confidence boost – if you manage to give up you can be immensely proud of your achievement. Hopefully you’ll have more self-esteem to go out and do all the things you’ve always wanted to.

Also, if you’re looking for that special someone, you’re more likely to get a date after you quit. According to NHS research, non-smokers have a better chance of being attractive to the opposite sex than smokers.

You can also stop feeling guilty about putting your friends and family in danger because of passive smoking – and in turn they’ll be so grateful to you.

Quitting is free!

The first few weeks of quitting are the hardest, so you need determination and will power. You’ll also need some help and the NHS can provide it.

Your first stop should be the NHS Free Smoking Helpline: 0800 022 4332 – open seven days a week from 7am until 11pm.

The NHS smokefree website is also well worth a look. There are words of encouragment as well as loads of free resources and information.

Also, check out the No Smoking Day website for some really useful tips to help you quit.

You can choose to go to free sessions and discuss things with others. But if you’d prefer to go it alone, support is available at home with the ‘Together Programme’ – find out what’s best for you here.

Nigel’s story

Moneymagpie spoke to 45 year-old Nigel Manton who gave up smoking two years ago. Nigel had been smoking from the age of 13. He smoked on average twenty a day, but sometimes as many as forty.

Nigel said that a combination of factors convinced him to quit: He began to wake up feeling very wheezy, his partner was a non-smoker and wasn’t keen on his habit and he really wanted to do a trek in Nepal and realised that if he continued to smoke he just wasn’t going to be able to.

Nigel said that he really needed reasons to want to quit – he thinks if you plan to give up you’re much more likely to succeed than if you make an impulse decision.

He also points out that there are no prizes for giving up the hard way, and having help from the NHS makes it so much easier than trying to use will power alone.

Nigel used the NHS helpline (above) and was put in contact with a local council support group – details of these can be found on the NHS smokefree website.

He told us that it was not unlike an AA meeting, and that the support was invaluable. Nigel received help planning his course of action. He explained that the members had help choosing the right kind of nicotine replacement aids – the NHS say that using these double your chances of being able to quit successfully.

If you attend all the meetings – Nigel had one a week for six weeks – then you receive a form entitling you to the nicotine replacement aids for free. So you really can give up for nothing!

Nigel told us that his main incentive to persevere was the carbon monoxide test that each member had to blow into, in front of everyone else at the start of each meeting. It was the thought of doing this that kept him going to begin with.

It took Nigel six weeks to quit – he said that after that his cravings were completely gone and all his friends kept telling him how much healthier he looked.

He told us that quitting was easier than he thought it would be, and advises those who are trying to kick the habit to make the most of the services the NHS provide – you might as well make it as easy for yourself as you can.

Useful Links

• Quitting with NHS
• No Smoking Day Site

Related posts:

1. Big Brother smokers It’s happening again. The Big Brother nightmare. All women this...
2. Smoke-free savings Smoking is now illegal in pubs, nightclubs, restaurants and...
3. No smoke – more fire For some people, the UK ban on smoking in public...

Once you get down to it, though, you realise that there are three decisions you need to make.

1. Repayment or interest-only?

• Repayment mortgages are the most popular. Part of your monthly payment covers the interest on the loan and the rest eats away at the capital (the actual amount you’ve borrowed). It means that at the end of 25 years (or whatever the length of the loan) you will actually own your home outright.
• Interest-only mortgages are slightly cheaper than repayment ones as your monthly payments only pay the interest on the loan. This means that at the end of the term (length of the loan) you will still owe the amount you originally borrowed. This means that most people set up a separate payment each month into an investment vehicle that will grow as the mortgage continues.

It’s very important to remember that if you plan to take out an interest-only mortgage, you really do need investments to back it up. Without them you are very vulnerable because – as we know all to well – property prices can drop, which could leave you in negative equity (where the value of your house is less than the value of your mortgage).

2. Which payment rate?

Fixed Rate

With a fixed rate mortgage, your interest rate will stay the same for the term of your loan – no matter what. Regardless of what happens to the economy, the Bank of England base rate, or whether you have a repayment or interest-only mortgage, the amount you pay each month won’t change with a fixed rate.

Essentially this type of mortgage offers you stability and peace of mind. There is also the potential for you to save money if the base rate increases during the term of your loan.

On the other hand, you could end up spending more than you need to if the base rate goes down while you have the loan. The other problem is that fixed rate mortgages are likely to charge you for making early repayments or leaving before the end of the term.  

This type of mortgage is good for…

First time buyers who are vulnerable to rising interest rates because they are on a tight budget. However those in unpredictable financial situations, for instance couples who are about to start a family, might also appreciate the stability a fixed rate mortgage offers. There’s alot to be said for always knowing how much you’re going to have to pay.  

Find out more about fixed rate mortgages here.

Capped

These mortgages have a variable interest rate but there’s a fixed upper limit which can give you the best of both worlds. The cap lasts for a fixed period (usually two or three years) within which, again, you are tied to the lender and charged high fees if you try to leave. It is useful if you think mortgage rates might fall but you don’t want to pay more if they rise.

This type of mortgage is good for…

Variable or Standard Variable Rate (SVR)

This is the standard mortgage rate that lenders usually offer. It could go up or down, depending on what the base rate does and how much money the mortgage company feels like making.

These tend to be flexible which means you won’t be charged for making early repayments or opting out early. The disadvantage is that they are generally a lot more expensive than other deals.

This type of mortgage is good for…

Discount

These offer a discount on the lender’s usual variable rate for a fixed period. They can be cheaper than the normal rate but they still could go up, even though at a lower rate, if the lender’s variable rate goes up in that time.

This type of mortgage is good for…

Tracker

This mortgage sets an interest rate that is usually just above the Bank of England’s base rate and goes up and down exactly as the base rate does. So if it’s set at, say, 0.75% above base rate and base is 5% then your mortgage will be 5.75%. The obvious plus (and minus) point with this is that while the base rate’s low you’ll have a cheap deal, but when it’s high your interest will be too.

This type of mortgage is good for…

Offset

These are still a fairly new and relatively unknown concept in mortgages. Offset mortgages bundle up your current account, savings account and your mortgage into one product. This means that any credit in your current or savings accounts is ‘offset’ against your mortgage.

So although you pay the same amount into your mortgage each month, more of that money goes to paying off the capital of your debt (the actual debt itself) rather than being wasted on paying interest.

This is because the company only charges you interest on the amount of the mortgage that’s left after your savings are taken into account. So say you have a £100,000 mortgage but you have £20,000 altogether in your savings account and current account, you will only be charged interest on £80,000.

So, in theory at least, it’s cheaper and you get to pay the mortgage off quicker. It’s also very flexible so you can overpay when you like and borrow back money that you’ve paid off.

Flexible

More and more mortgages include some flexibility now – i.e you can overpay or underpay or even have payment holidays without being penalised. 

This type of mortgage is good for…

These can be useful if you’re self-employed or expecting some life changes in the near future.

Bear in mind that the types of mortgage we’ve mentioned above are not mutually exclusive – you can for instance have a flexible discount tracker mortgage.

3. Extras or a different style of mortgage?

Endowment mortgage

• This is one way of paying off an interest-only mortgage. Very popular (with mortgage brokers) in the 1980s because it paid them a MASSIVE commission.
• The idea is that you get an interest-only mortgage and then you invest in something else that, you hope, will grow faster than the mortgage interest rate. Then at the end of the 25 years you can pay off the mortgage and have a bit left over. Not only that but the endowment gives you life assurance to cover your debt should you die before the end of the term.
• However, those 80s endowments did very badly because they overestimated how much the stock market would go up and, worse, they tended to have high charges paid to the brokers and the insurance companies that provided the policies. Generally a pretty bad product.

Use your pension or an ISA

These are also ways of paying off an interest-only mortgage. Either you can take out an ISA (Individual Savings Account) which will grow (you hope) enough to pay off the final mortgage debt.

Or, you can link part of your pension (up to 25% of the lump sum) into your mortgage so that it can be used to pay off the amount you borrowed at the end. You can only get at the money when you reach 50 but it’s quite a good investment because you get the amount you would have paid in tax added in.

Mind you, given that most people have pensions that are far too small, it’s probably best to avoid this type of mortgage.

Sub-prime:

If you have a dodgy credit history or you are self-employed and normal lenders won’t give you any money, you can still go to one of the mortgage companies who will lend – at a price – to people that no one else will touch.

The big disadvantage of these is that they tend to be much more expensive than normal mortgages. However, at least you can get the money and, possibly, switch to a cheaper deal a year or so down the line if you keep your nose clean and pay your mortgage on time every month.

Beware, though. Although there were lots of companies who used to give out these mortgages like sweets, there are hardly any now and it’s really difficult to get them. If you have bad credit and you want to remortgage, be prepared to pay a very high interest rate for the privilege!

Guaranteed:

Could mum and dad guarantee a larger-sized mortgage than you could afford on your own? Or could you do it for them? This mortgage is for people who can’t afford a large enough mortgage (on paper) because they don’t earn enough, or they are older than the mortgage company likes.

With this one, you pay the mortgage but a relative will guarantee it for you. If you can’t pay somewhere down the line, the mortgage company will come after your relative for the money.

• Again, these mortgages are much less common now as banks cut down on the more unusual mortgage deals.

Self-cert:

• Also called ‘liar mortgages’ these are fast becoming an extinct species as banks get really twitchy about lending to anyone who doesn’t have a solid income and a huge deposit.
• If you’re self-employed and your accountant saves you tax by making your income look small this can stop you getting a decent-sized mortgage. With self-certification (self-cert) mortgages you say what your real income is and the mortgage company lends on the basis of your say-so.
• Most of the time they don’t ask for proof of your earnings, which is also helpful if it’s just a plain hassle to get your accounts together. Again, though, the rates for these loans tend to be higher than the norm because they are riskier.
• Also, it’s far too tempting for some people to go for a massive mortgage, just because they can. Then they get into trouble when they can’t actually pay it each month. This is another reason why there are far, far fewer of these around than before.

Cashback:

• Mortgage companies were so desperate to get your custom that they were offering all sorts of incentives including a percentage of your mortgage back as a cash lump sum (usually about 3-5%). Very few are doing it now but they could come back later.
• This can be worthwhile but there’s always a downside, usually a higher interest rate overall and a tie-in deal that keeps you with the mortgage for a long time with heavy penalties for pulling out.
• You really need to do the figures for these mortgages and work out if this deal really is cheaper in the long run or if there are too many hidden charges.

Shar’ia mortgages:

• These are primarily for Islamic borrowers but anyone can take them out. In fact, they are becoming more popular as some non-Muslims believe they are more ethical than others.
• The way it works is that the bank buys the property for you, then you buy it off the bank by leasing it from them over a period of time with a really big ‘rent’. It’s a bit like hire purchase for houses!

25-year fixed mortgages:

• Where you fix your interest rate for the full 25 years. This is really only for people who really like to know exactly how much they will be paying for their mortgage every year and think that interest rates will go up over time.
• The Government is keen on these (and they’ve been popular in the US for some years) as they make the property market less volatile. However, there are only a few on the British market and most have penalties if you pay them off early.
• This can make them less worthwhile as we think you should definitely pay off your mortgage early if you can. If you find one that doesn’t have penalties, though, it could be worth considering.

Download our FREE mortgage guide for loads more help and information

Related posts:

1. What type of mortgage – part II Second decision: what payment rate will you go for? We...
2. What type of mortgage – part III Third decision: do you need extra products to back up...
3. Offset Mortgages: the mortgage you can pay off quickly and cheaply Having an offset mortgage can help you pay off your...

Related posts:

1. Men v Women – who are the best? The battle of the sexes has been more in the...

Recipe: Mushroom (Dr. Vera’s) Soup with soured cabbage

Ingredients:

300g mushrooms

1 onion

1-2 potatoes or a bunch of parsley

2 tablespoons olive or coconut oil

1/2 of jar of soured cabbage

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 bay leaf

 Method:  Peel and chop onion, mushrooms and potatoes. Boil potatoes or parsley in 1. 5 litres water. Heat the oil in a frying pan and lightly fry onion for 2-3 minutes, then add mushrooms and fry for a further 2-3 minutes. Add the fried stuff to the boiled potatoes (or parsley) and when it boils again, add 4-5 full tablespoons soured cabbage. Add salt, bay leaf and cook for another minute. Serve, without sour cream or bread if you’re sticking to the whole gluten-free/dairy-free thing.

Related posts:

1. Fish and chips night My husband thinks he’s died and gone to heaven as...
2. Leftovers-stuffed chicken This is less a recipe and more a list of...
3. Curry week! 23rd-29th November As it’s national curry week, we can indulge in spicy,...

India, to state the stunningly obvious, is no China. Yes certainly in terms of square kilometres, population and many other dimensional statistics both are huge, but thereafter they are best identified by their differences rather than similarities. In our somewhat patronising Western view we tend to lump groups of nations together and most fashionably and recently have done so with two others – Brazil and Russia – to form the investment acronym and fad of the BRIC countries.

Brazil and Russia are primarily commodity based economies, although the former does have a burgeoning middle class. The latter, although having a developing middle class, has a population which is in fact shrinking quite drastically. Not only does it seem that the Russians have given up breeding but, unlike us, they seem to attract few immigrants apart from those brought in by the security services. Both nations react to global demand for raw materials and certainly when China breathes in, Brazil breathes out (exports) iron ore.

Both China and India have growing and developing populations and with them will inevitably come the increased demand for consumer goods and other popular disposables. Such demand will develop according to the growing wealth of those nations, but will also be helped by the development of their consumer credit and banking facilities.

A key difference between the two is of course their political systems – one the largest democracy in the world, and the other the largest communist oligarchy in the world. Certainly the central control mentality of the communist system probably lends itself to a more efficient method of developing such a huge nation, but the functional democracy of India is to be considerably admired given the ranging differences of the nation and some of its more unruly parts.

China has funded itself through trade surpluses whereas India has been running a deficit for many years, albeit at a very affordable level. Part of this has been down to its remarkable savings rate – which is something of a distant memory for us back in the UK. Such savings have helped fund the development with a rate reaching an astonishing 36% of GDP until somewhat falling back more recently. With a middle class of some 450m, this is a huge lake of wealth which, if properly harnessed, will help fund significant development into the future.

So for the Indians it has been ‘Crisis, what crisis?’ In addition, whereas the Chinese saw a dramatic rise in unemployment, although the figures are unreliable, such an impact in India seems to have been more muted.

It seems quite likely that growth levels in India could be sustained at a figure close to 10% and at that rate, the nation’s economy will overtake the UK economy within a decade and potentially Japan’s within two.

However, there are some worrying areas of concern that must be addressed. One that rarely seems to be highlighted has been the influence and spread of the Naxalite (Maoist) guerrillas who are apparently active in a third of India’s 626 districts. This low profile insurgency claimed some 998 lives last year but has barely been recognised outside the country. Unless this sort of running wound is addressed then this could affect potential development, especially given the social pressures that are inevitable with such a fast changing economy and society.

If effectively addressed however, then confidence in the government can be further enhanced: if, though, this is just left to fester, then external investors will be attracted to other more stable areas of Asia – such as its neighbouring fellow leviathan.

***

Well with all the prevailing news of economic gloom that we are being fed in the UK, one could be forgiven for finding that most of the population is thoroughly depressed. It was thus rather surprising to see last week’s consumer confidence figures being at the highest level since the beginning of 2008. This is despite the gloomy prognostications of all the politicians and certain journalists who love to focus on the darkest of threats even on the brightest of days.

However, there is another area where I think we short change ourselves and that is that we tend to regard our investments purely in nominal terms and not taking account of other issues. These could include inflation, but also, and more importantly for those of us in ‘Blighty’, the impact of our yo-yoing currency that can have a very considerable impact.

For those investors who are US$ based, they will still be suffering especially where they have overseas investments. As the US$ has recovered, so the value of those investments has diminished and of course this includes any of their dividends being repatriated. In US$ terms in fact, world equities are still 25% below their 2007 high.

For the Japanese the situation is even worse. Unlike the majority of American investors who still seem somewhat bemused by the term ‘overseas’, the Japanese have had to invest overseas ever since their markets crashed back from their zenith at fractionally under 40,000 in the Nikkei 225 in 1990, to a nadir of around 7,000. For effectively twenty years their markets have gone nowhere. Their answer was of course to invest overseas but with a stronger Yen they have now found themselves in a position of being still 44% below the peaks of the Summer of 2007.

In the UK we have always expected to have invested either directly or indirectly around the globe – obviously an old empire thing. Even in the FTSE100 we not only have a growing number of overseas companies but also large multinationals with the result that some 65% of profits from this membership are coming from overseas. So we have in fact been sheltered from the worst of the market storm and, if you add in the recovery in valuations since last March, the result has been that we have recovered all the losses since 2007. In fact the FTSE All-World equity index, on a total return basis including the reinvestment of dividends, is quite astonishingly at an all time high!

The pride before the fall when the Pound reached $2.10 was illusory and had, for those who were watching, obviously gone far too far. The fall back since then has in fact been a great boon for us as a relief pressure valve which of course those heavily indebted Eurozone members did not have. If we hadn’t had that chance to devalue, our investment and economic position could well have been very considerably worse.

***

And finally from the quirky state of California…………..

A couple who tried to save water and money by removing their lawn are being taken to court by the city of Orange. Quan and Angelina Ha, who now have a scheduled court date, decided to replace the grass on their front lawn with wood chips in 2008. The Ha’s said they’d just had a baby and began to think about her future and the effect of what is happening to their environment.

Thus they made a decision to replace their water thirsty grass with the far more environmentally friendly chippings. At a time when Southern California cities fine people for overwatering their thirsty lawns, the Ha’s said they’ve saved hundreds of thousands of gallons of water and drastically lowered their water bill.

But the city cited them for violating a law that requires ‘live landscaping’ to cover 40 percent of the yard. The couple planted drought-tolerant plants last year but the city said it wasn’t enough.

The city said it wants them to come up with a compliance plan. Ah yes, this is the land of the free!

Have a good week.

Justin A. Urquhart Stewart
Director
Seven Investment Management Limited

Related posts:

1. What a Silly Measure The FTSE 100 index is generally a rotten measure of...
2. All Things Must Change Can the City of London kindly stop moping around like...
3. An Air of Palpable Excitement I can’t remember seeing such group ecstasy for a long...

I’m 15 years old and I have a weekend job in the local tea shop where I live. I really enjoy working there as everybody is lovely but it’s also great experience to see all the different things you have to do to keep everything running in order – there are loads more things than I expected!

I don’t wish to ever work or run my own café in the future however, it’s good to know how hard I have to work just to get £10, this has given me a real sense of the value ot money and I now think twice before I buy something – do I really need it?

I’m not currently saving up for anything in particular but another great thing at the weekend about having a weekend job is that I can put the money I earn into a bank account and then in the near or distance future if I do see something I like I can buy it without having to worry about paying my parents back. I have been working at ‘Badgers’ for a year and half now and I have managed to accumulate quite a bit of money, which makes a purchase like buying an iPod seem much less drastic.

Working a whole Sunday does shorten my weekend considerably but I don’t usually find it that much of a problem, as I still have time to go out and have a break from school. However, with starting my GCSE courses last September, I do get more homework than I used to which does take up quite a bit of my free time but I haven’t had any real problems with work interfering with my school work – it just means that I have to work hard to fit everything in.

Related posts:

1. Say Goodbye to the Naughty Noughties – Welcome to the Lean (and probably Mean) Teens I suppose the end of a decade was never going...
2. Easy money for charity I gave over £100 to charity this weekend and it...