Question Time: At last, I’m debt free - what now? Overpay my mortgage or invest? Do I need pay NI if I want to retire early?

In our Question Time podcast, Martin Lewis gives you answers on anything and everything, including: should I prioritise saving, investing, overpaying the mortgage, or children’s savings for our new baby? I want to retire early; do I need to pay for National Insurance to get a full state pension? Should I overpay my postgraduate loan? Robert tells us his inspiring story about finally becoming debt-free for the first time in his adult life and asks Martin what he could do with his money next. Plus, does Martin dye his hair? You’ll be surprised by his answer! If you want to ask Martin a question, you now can! His Question Time podcast lets you ask Martin absolutely anything and everything (within reason!) – so if you’ve always wanted to know what time his alarm goes off, if he’s got any pets, or have a very complicated question about your personal finances, email it to [email protected] mailto:[email protected].

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 1:48Martin Lewis?

  Make sure that you have a cash emergency fund.

• 1:50Speaker 03

  Every great journey starts with one step, you know, and we just had to take that for that first step and just go with it.

• 1:54Martin Lewis?

  What I certainly wouldn't do is be buying yours just in case now because you don't need to.

• 1:58Speaker 04

  That was a bit weird if I just tapped him on the shoulder and said that.

• 2:01Martin Lewis?

  Genuinely, my eyes watered when you said you were going to have your debt-free day. Hello and welcome to the cunningly named The Martin Lewis Podcast. I do wonder what that's going to be about. And this is our Question Time episode, where you ask me your questions on absolutely anything and everything within reason. This week, you ask me: Should we prioritise saving, investing, overpaying the mortgage or children's savings for our new baby? I want to retire early. Do I need to pay for extra national insurance to get a full state pension? Should I start overpaying my postgraduate student loan? Martin, what's your beauty regime? Hey, I answer the questions, I don't ask them. And to finish,

• 2:41Martin Lewis?

  an inspiring question and conversation you just have to listen to. I had tears in my eyes, to be honest. Robert is in his 40s and has been in debt all his adult life. But now, having worked hard for the last few years, he's about to have his debt-free day next week. And he wants to know: What does he do with his money now? Play the theme tune!

• 3:18Martin Lewis?

  Hello and welcome to our Question Time podcast, where you get to ask me anything and everything you like, brackets, within reason, close brackets. You know, I have to have a little self dignity and privacy left. And of course, joining me, it's the one and only, the person you've all been waiting for, the custodian of questions himself, Mr Podcast Producer Matt Burnham Esquire. Matt, please add in some more applause music at that point.

• 3:47Speaker 04

  I love that. Thank you very much, again, for the applause.

• 3:52Martin Lewis?

  How's your week been? You all right?

• 3:53Speaker 04

  Yeah, I'm good. Actually, it's quite funny. You just reminded me, someone emailed into the podcast email, asking if I was related to the mayor of Manchester.

• 4:01Martin Lewis?

  Oh, could you be Andy Burnham's nephew, son, cousin? Are you?

• 4:06Speaker 04

  No, unfortunately not.

• 4:07Martin Lewis?

  Do you know? Have you done a DNA test? Have you done one of those DNA kits?

• 4:11Speaker 04

  We haven't. And he does come into the BBC quite a lot. And I was stood by him in the kitchen and nearly turned around and said, we've got the same surname. People think that we're related. And then I thought it was a bit weird if I just sort of tapped him on the shoulder and said that.

• 4:23Martin Lewis?

  Well, especially if you'd said to him, do you get people saying, are you related to Matt, the custodian of questions from the Martin Lewis podcast?

• 4:29Speaker 04

  I think he's an avid listener.

• 4:30Martin Lewis?

  That would have been especially, especially. Well, I have it because there's Paul Lewis, who presents Moneybox on Radio 4. And people always ask, are we related? And we're not related in any way, shape, size and form. I'm sort of an Arivista Lewis. From what I know, when my ancestors were leaving the pogroms in Russia, the anti-Jewish pogroms in Russia, they came to Liverpool and then they went to Ellis Island. And they got to Ellis Island and they said, what's your name? And my great, great grandfather said, David Levy Wilschinsky. And they said, welcome to America, David Lewis. And then they didn't stay long in Ellis Island. Then they came back here.

• 5:12Martin Lewis?

  So I think Paul is a Welsh Lewis and I'm a Wilschinsky Lewis.

• 5:16Speaker 04

  That's fascinating.

• 5:17Martin Lewis?

  So, yeah, so many, many other Lewis's out there, I am not related to you. But if there are any, if there are any Wilschinskis out there, then I might be related to you.

• 5:28Speaker 04

  Martin Lewis podcast. Speaking of the email address, we had one in from Elliot. And it was relating to last week's Question Time. So your wrestling question where you gave your wrestler name.

• 5:41Martin Lewis?

  My wrestler name was DDoS and I, my move, my signature move was, the credit crunch.

• 5:48Speaker 04

  Exactly. Well, what was the name that you gave yourself?

• 5:52Martin Lewis?

  DDoS.

• 5:53Speaker 04

  And what does DDoS stand for?

• 5:55Martin Lewis?

  Dedicated denial of service.

• 5:56Speaker 04

  Well, Elliot says, actually, you're wrong. He says, for the first time ever, when listening, I have finally a correction I can offer. DDoS actually stands for distributed denial of service. Because the load generated is spread out, in brackets, distributed, across a wide range of devices and in your case, people.

• 6:14Martin Lewis?

  Well, listen, Elliot, thank you very much. It was an off the cuff answer to a question about my wrestler name. So I wasn't thoroughly checked into gear. And you have distributed that answer very well. And I will not deny you the service of giving you a correction.

• 6:29Speaker 04

  Very good.

• 6:30Martin Lewis?

  Thank you so much. But let's get into the proper meat. What are we going to start with?

• 6:35Speaker 04

  Let's start with a question from Yasmin Martin. She's emailed her question in, [email protected]. She says, hi, Martin, Happy New Year.

• 6:43Martin Lewis?

  Happy New Year.

• 6:44Speaker 04

  She probably sent this a few days ago.

• 6:47Martin Lewis?

  Well, I'd just like to say, I am still a believer that you can still set up to the end of January, as long as you've got a reason for doing so.

• 6:54Speaker 04

  Okay, so you haven't seen the person since New Year?

• 6:57Martin Lewis?

  No, obviously, if you've seen them before, you shouldn't be saying it, it'd be ridiculous.

• 7:00Speaker 04

  Okay. Anyway, Yasmin says, she's got a question on prioritisation. That's a hard word to pronounce. Me and my partner bought-

• 7:08Martin Lewis?

  Only for you, prioritisation.

• 7:11Speaker 04

  Me and my partner bought a house two years ago. Since then, we've renovated the property and welcomed our first child in 2025. Congratulations. We used our savings on the house and getting ready for our new baby, and now we're in a position to put money aside again. What should we prioritise? Savings, investments, she says she's very interested in investing, but have none at the moment, overpaying their mortgage, saving for their daughter, she says she's opened a junior ISA for her after the podcast on children's savings accounts, so thank you for the guidance, or reducing the small amount of debt that they have on credit cards.

• 7:48Martin Lewis?

  Well, they're all wonderful options and huge congratulations to you. The one that first comes out to me is the small amount of debt on credit cards. If those are at a typical credit card interest rate of 24.9%, that's the obvious priority. The next thing I would say is to make sure that you have a cash emergency fund. So this is money in savings that could cover three to six months' worth of bills in the event that you were to lose income and you had to pay them. And I think that's always important and that should always be in savings. After that, paying off your mortgage depends on the rate of your mortgage and how much, if you've got a high-interest mortgage, then overpaying that will tend to be a really good use of money. Otherwise, I mean, my temptation would be investing, and it would be investing both for you and for your child.

• 8:32Martin Lewis?

  And it's interesting that you opened a junior ISA for your child. I would probably argue with junior ISA, you know, the investing rule is this, if you've got money you can put away for more than five years that you're not going to touch, and you've got a cash emergency fund, then investing tends to be the right outcome. So when it's your daughter who is less than a year old, I would think, unless she was born in the very beginning of January 2025, you've got at least 17 years before she can access the money in a junior ISA. So this is definitely A, money you're putting away for the long period, and B, money that you don't need for that time. So you really want to be looking at investing for her. And you can go on, there are lots of different sites out there. And we're not talking about money in one share, you want it in a fund and a broad spread of

• 9:17Martin Lewis?

  investments. So I would think that's a priority and similar for yourself, if it's money you don't need to touch. Now, so putting some away, drip feeding it each month is a great way to do it, because that helps you move against the vagaries of markets move up and down. It's called pound cost averaging, so that you're spreading it as you put money in. How much you want to do that and how much you want to save is your choice. The toughest one, and the one I'm sort of wrestling with as I talk, is overpaying the mortgage versus savings is a really simple equation. If the interest rate on your mortgage account is higher than the amount you can earn in savings after tax, you are better off to

• 9:59Martin Lewis?

  overpay the mortgage than save, assuming there's no early exit penalties and you've got a cash emergency fund. But when we start to look at overpaying the mortgage versus investment, it is trickier. So first of all, we're only talking about overpaying the mortgage if it's a relatively high interest rate. It sounds to me like someone who has been saving up money for this while actually has enough to do a little bit of everything. Get your cash emergency fund, put some money in a junior ISA for your daughter, start drip feeding money into an investments, and then look at overpaying your mortgage if it's a high interest rate, saving if it's not, if you want a little bit of extra cash. I think you've got a bit of money to do everything. But if it's spare cash, investing tends to

• 10:42Martin Lewis?

  work, as long as it's for the long term, as long as it's in a broad spread.

• 10:48Martin Lewis?

  We'll take this as official second contact of the pod because you did have your DDoS contact, but I'm not counting that as official. So this must be in the custodian of the questions format. You've got a caller for me, Matt.

• 11:01Speaker 04

  Yes, I do. I've got Craig in Harrogate for you. Hi Craig.

• 11:04Speaker 05

  Hello, how are you doing?

• 11:05Martin Lewis?

  Hello, mate. What can we do for you?

• 11:07Speaker 05

  Okay, so in the middle of last year, I was fortunate enough to be able to decide that it was time to stop working. I've consolidated my various personal pensions and got everything where and how I want them to be, but I'm not so sure about my future state pension. The HMRC app assures me that based on what I've already paid in across the last 40 years, I should receive a full state pension. I think it talks about £236 a week.

• 11:31Martin Lewis?

  Yeah.

• 11:32Speaker 05

  And it won't get any higher, which is great. My question is, as I'm unlikely to make any further contributions via national insurance within now and that state pension age, will that impact the level of the state pension when I come to take it? In essence, do I need to continue to make some kind of contribution in order to maintain that maximum state pension level?

• 11:56Martin Lewis?

  Okay, so I know you understand this, but just because we are a podcast, I need to explain it to everybody else listening to start with, and then I'll come in to answer specifically.

• 12:03Speaker 05

  That's fine.

• 12:04Martin Lewis?

  So you generally need 35 years-ish, and it is a huge capital letter-ish to get the full state pension. 35 years-ish of national insurance contributions, and then you get the full state pension when you hit retirement age. But there are so many different factors in here. What you do is you rely on the forecast that you can get on gov.uk that will show you both any missing national insurance years, and you can look at that there, and it will also show you what you're projected to get. Now, you've done this, obviously, by the way that you're there. When you've looked at your forecast, you should have got two numbers. You should have got an estimate of where you are to date, and an estimate if you continue to pay in future. I'm presuming the estimate of where you are to date said that you have enough to get the full pension.

• 12:49Speaker 05

  Correct, yes.

• 12:51Martin Lewis?

  Well, what I would say to you at that point is it all sounds good. The reason for the mild hesitation in my voice is it said there are only two people who truly understand the state pension and unfortunately, one of them has died and the other person now isn't really sure they do actually get it because it's that complicated. So, you know, I can't do cast iron guarantees, but the easy thing to say to you is this. If you stop work now, you can always buy back up to six years of past national insurance contributions. So, stop work, carry on with your life, and then make sure you put a note in your diary, send yourself a delay email, however you tend to do it, in about five years' time,

• 13:36Martin Lewis?

  for five years' time to go and check this process and see where you are again. And if at that point, something is changed, so it looks like you're no longer on for the full state pension, then I would buy back one of these missing years. What I certainly wouldn't do with what you've told me is be buying years just in case now because you don't need to. Does that make sense?

• 13:55Speaker 05

  That's fine. That makes perfect sense. Thank you very much, Man.

• 13:59Martin Lewis?

  Pleasure.

• 14:02Martin Lewis?

  Right. Caller done. Time for a read, surely.

• 14:06Speaker 04

  Question from Robert on student loans. He's asking about his postgraduate student loan. And actually, I saw you in a post-grad hat recently.

• 14:15Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, well, I did. I, yes, I was very kindly. The University of Sheffield decided to give me an honorary doctorate of letters. And I went and I got to make a speech at the graduation ceremony there. And I wore a big red gown and a mortarboard hat on the top. And it was very nice. So, you could call me Dr Lewis, if you like. It's a de-lit, technically, a de-lit, a doctorate of letters. I mean, you'd have thought a doctorate of numbers for me, but I'm very happy with either. And it was a wonderful honour and I'm very grateful that they choose to give it to me. What's your question? Move on from that.

• 14:45Speaker 04

  It's from Rob. So he starts with, hi, Matt and Martin.

• 14:48Martin Lewis?

  What? Hi, Martin and Matt. Hi, Martin, brackets, and Matt.

• 14:53Speaker 04

  I think Matt and Martin is the best way to do it. Anyway, he has a question.

• 14:58Martin Lewis?

  Or at least not doing it correctly.

• 15:00Speaker 04

  He knows that you call student loans a graduate tax, but his postgraduate loan has a 6% interest rate and only has 11 grand left. He earns £54,180 a year gross pay, should he pay it off?

• 15:16Martin Lewis?

  So I actually don't call student loans a graduate tax. I say it works more like a graduate tax and should be named a graduate contribution system because technically it isn't a tax, but that isn't what the question is about. So he's got £11,000 left, he earns £54,000, £180 a year, should he pay it off? I don't, I'm going to assume that it is a relatively recent postgraduate loan, so that he's still got a long time left to repay. Postgrad loans, you pay 6% of income over £21,000, so that is the lowest repayment threshold, which means, and a lower repayment threshold means you're paying more a year. And the interest rate is currently RPI plus 3%, which is 6.2%, which is pretty heavy, to be honest. I mean, I have to say, I'm

• 15:59Martin Lewis?

  assuming that you're on an English and Welsh postgraduate loan, it is different, the interest rate's lower, and the repayment thresholds are different in Scotland and Northern Ireland. So this is for England and Wales. Because that interest rate is quite hefty, and because you are very likely on your income to clear the loan in full before the loan wipes, then it is a real interest rate, 6.2%, if you've got the money, is higher than you would earn in savings, so there's no point in saving rather than overpaying this. So if you have the spare money, then yes, you should pay it off. The one risk of paying it off is if something were to happen to you in future, so that you aren't below the threshold and you wouldn't be able to pay it off, and this loan would later be wiped, then you would have paid it unnecessarily. But if you've got good foreseeability that you're going

• 16:44Martin Lewis?

  to continue to be earning at that mid-high level that you are earning at the moment, then assuming that you've got 15, 20 years left on the loan, it's relatively expensive, and I would be looking at paying it off, there is however, the baboon, the big but. If you think you're going to need to borrow for other reasons in future, car loan, mortgage, then it becomes more questionable, because while the interest rate is high at the moment, if inflation drops, as we're expecting it to do so, the interest rate will get lower. And also, the terms of your postgrad loan, when your, it's income proportionate and it will wipe if you don't repay it, are better than any other form of commercial debt. So it may- Maybe what you don't want to do certainly is to pay this off only to have to get a car loan

• 17:29Martin Lewis?

  at 10% in two years' time that you're having to borrow for, where effectively you, once you pay this off, you can't get the money back. So yes, I would be paying it off unless you have a likelihood that you're going to need other worse commercial lending in future, in which case I'd just put any spend money you have into a highest interest rate savings that you can to offset the interest on this in the meantime, so that you don't need more expensive debt in the future. So if I did do that quite cohesively, logically in telling the story, something flipped into my head as I was doing it, but hopefully that makes sense. Just a quick extra note on that, that the answer to the question of should I pay it off is very specific to the loan you are

• 18:09Martin Lewis?

  on and the plan type you are on. And the answer I've just given is for an England and Wales postgraduate loan. You cannot read across the same answer to people on other loan types.

• 18:22Martin Lewis?

  Right, Matt, what have you got? Another, another read for me?

• 18:25Speaker 04

  A read, a fun read, a funny one.

• 18:27Martin Lewis?

  Putting the fun read at this point?

• 18:29Speaker 04

  Yeah, why not?

• 18:29Martin Lewis?

  So you're going a bit woo, breaking the format somewhat, wasn't expecting it.

• 18:34Speaker 04

  Going rogue.

• 18:35Martin Lewis?

  Well, you are the custodian of questions. It is your call. I mean, I do not have the power to overrule.

• 18:39Speaker 04

  So we're going to go to Kate. She's in Devon slash Cornwall. I don't know if she's on the border or something, but she has emailed in. She says, hello, Martin and Matt. My silly question for Martin to lighten things is, as you appear on TV, YouTube, et cetera, it might be that you have to be a little bit vainer than you might otherwise be. So what's your beauty regime, please? But she does go on to say, thank you for all the serious bits, though. Seriously, you are the fifth emergency service, police, ambulance, fire, coastguard, in case you want to query the numbers. All the best to you.

• 19:12Martin Lewis?

  Oh, well, thank you very much for the, for the kind words at the end. Yeah, look, I am on telly. So you do, when you're on telly, you do have to, first of all, it does put pounds on, so it does make you more conscious about your weight. And I know I need to weigh 12 stone seven. And when I weigh a little bit more than 12 stone seven, I manage myself to get my weight down to 12 stone seven. That is my ideal, my ideal weight for, for doing what I do. What do I do as my beauty regime?

• 19:36Speaker 04

  Moisturizer?

• 19:37Martin Lewis?

  I do do moisturizer. I'm going to tell you something I've never said before, but I think is pretty obvious. I don't think this is shocking, but you need to hear the explanation. Matt?

• 19:47Speaker 04

  Uh huh.

• 19:47Martin Lewis?

  I have my hair dyed.

• 19:52Martin Lewis?

  But I need to explain to you why. So, as a fifty something man, my hair is thinning. And as my hair is thinning, if my hair is not dyed, it starts to, and I think my wonderful redheaded grandmother, this is from her, it starts to go red on the top. Which means, it's red on the top, dark black on the sides, and grey at the bottom. So I have three toned hair. And I used to get to the point where people would start putting on social media, why are you dying your hair red on the top? And it came to that, and in the end, I made the decision that I was going to dye my hair on the top, my natural, unredened colour.

• 20:36Martin Lewis?

  Not to get rid of the grey, I'm very happy to be grey, and I keep the grey at the bottom at the sides. But because, just so it doesn't look this weird, and there's nothing wrong with being a redhead, but there is something wrong with being a redhead, a dark head, and a grey head. And just to give a little bit of homogeneity. And, uh, so you could argue there's a bit of vanity in there, but it's also, when you do what I do on telly, you'd be amazed, people asking, I mean, I just think, why are people asking about my clothes? But they will, where are your clothes coming from? What are you doing? What, you know, all of it. So, uh, I think that's probably the biggest bit of my beauty regime, and it also makes your hair look thicker, which is great when you're dying on the top, so there's an added advantage there, is that I think, just for, and Question Time listeners, this should

• 21:20Martin Lewis?

  not be said outside the Question Time room. This is only for regular Question Time listeners and not to be discussed elsewhere. Fair?

• 21:28Speaker 04

  I think you've said it now, it's out there.

• 21:30Martin Lewis?

  Okay.

• 21:32Speaker 04

  But in all seriousness, SPF, you do, you do use SPF, don't you?

• 21:35Martin Lewis?

  I don't use SPF, I, I use SPF when I'm out of the country, yes.

• 21:39Speaker 04

  You should use it every day.

• 21:40Martin Lewis?

  And I, well, I use it in the summer, I don't use it in the winter.

• 21:42Speaker 04

  Okay, fair enough.

• 21:43Martin Lewis?

  I mean, to be fair, you know, I'm, I'm walking everywhere, I put my hood on, and I use it when I play golf, because often you're out in the sun that way. But, um, uh, I don't, I don't do it in the winter, I'll be honest, but as soon as it gets to summer, I have a little suntan lotion by the door that I'm put, I put on when I go out.

• 22:01Martin Lewis?

  Right, so after that, after the bum shell about my beauty regime, you've gone wild, you've gone rogue, you've thrown the funny in earlier than you normally would. Please tell me we're going back to format and you've got a caller for me. Of course. Robert in Glasgow is here. Hello, Robert.

• 22:19Speaker 03

  Hello, Martin. Hello, Matt, our lovely creator of questions.

• 22:22Martin Lewis?

  Oh, yes, well done. It's stuck, it's stuck. Yeah, it is stuck. That is who you now are. And Robert, a Robert with a Scottish accent. As a pun man, I'm just gonna try and grit my teeth and not say anything. What's your question?

• 22:36Speaker 03

  Thank you. There's always been a focus, quite rightly, on reducing costs of debt. But my question's about what to do once you're out of debt. I'm 42 just now. I live with my wife and my 10-year-old daughter. I work in the civil service by day and have done so since I was 18. Now, during that time, I've been promoted a few times and I could probably say that I earn a reasonable salary when compared with some.

• 23:05Martin Lewis?

  Good for you.

• 23:06Speaker 03

  However, when I was 18, I made quite a few poor financial decisions, I'll say, and debt began to build up. I refinanced this several times and things just got worse and worse. I then got used to living in credit and having that revolving credit and never actually having access to my full salary. And that situation continued until my mid-30s. And really around about then I began to get sick of it and I decided to do something about it because I was really struggling quite significantly. So I took your advice and contacted Step Change,

• 23:47Speaker 03

  who then helped me through some things. And basically, for the last five years or so, I have been... Using a significant proportion of my salary every month to pay down my debts and next week is my final payment.

• 24:00Martin Lewis?

  Oh, your debt free day.

• 24:03Speaker 03

  My debt free day, yes, will be next week.

• 24:05Martin Lewis?

  Oh, I love it.

• 24:06Speaker 03

  Very much looking forward to it. Thank you. So really, I have, I will have, I don't have just now any credit cards, any car payments, any loans, anything like that. The only thing that's there now is my mortgage, which is fine. So really, my question is, what now? What do I do when I have no unsecured debt? How much should I save or invest? How should, should I allow myself luxuries? I know that these might to some people sound like some kind of silly questions, but literally at no point in my adult life have I worked and had no debt. And perhaps my family background, money was always a problem as a child for my parents. And so I've never really seen that positive financial situation.

• 24:51Speaker 03

  So how do I go about living the rest of my life, enjoying this kind of newfound freedom whilst building a future for my family? And perhaps most importantly for me, being a positive role model financially for my 10 year old daughter for the future, so that she doesn't have to go through what I have been through.

• 25:10Martin Lewis?

  First of all, if it's not patronizing to say, well done. You're, you're at a wonderful part now, but I know it won't have been easy to get there. And it takes discipline and self-control and a change of your brain set. And I think that will already make you a good role model for your daughter. And I would be honest and open with her. I would go next week and I, you know, I think the three of you should mark this as an occasion. And you should actually say, and you should explain to her what debt means and what it was, and you made mistakes young and it's, and now, and that this means life is going to be better for all of us. So huge, huge congratulations from me. I genuinely, my eyes watered when you said you were going to have your debt free day because I know just how big a moment that is.

• 25:52Martin Lewis?

  And my ultimate philosophy about money, I mean, people always think that I'm about being tight. It's absolutely not that. I am about getting the most happiness out of your life by looking after your money in the right way. And being in debt is a misery. And it's a misery that is so much bigger than whatever you materially buy with what you've borrowed from, especially the unsecured debt. So getting out of it is, is a real joy and it's a joy to hear. But you're right, those are important questions. So it sounds to me like it's almost like someone who's been on a diet and when you finish on the diet, you still feel nervous about eating things because you've trained yourself so hard not to eat and that you're in that brain set at the moment. Is that fair?

• 26:32Speaker 03

  I think it is. And actually, it's funny, it's why I'm, we have it at my car just now, it's been paid off, been paid off for about a year because that wasn't part of the arrangement when I first made it. And I'm now thinking, it's now getting to the point where I'm having to pay significant amounts of money to keep it on the road, but I'm too scared to actually go and buy another car on credit because I don't want to have that over me. I've enjoyed not having the car payments. So really, I don't mind paying relatively large repair bills for the car because that's maybe only worth two, three, four months of a car payment. And so I'll end up better off in the long run. But at some point, the car, the car will become unreparable. And so really, there's things like that which have kind of get in

• 27:15Speaker 03

  the way of my mindset now. I'm scared to want to go and do anything now.

• 27:19Martin Lewis?

  So the first thing I'd say to you is that actually, genuinely, when we look at the psychology of money, one of the problem money casts is miserliness. Now, I'm not accusing you of that. You've done exactly the right thing. But it's important to understand that money and the money that you earn has a purpose and that purpose is to give you the best life possible. Now, if I were looking at and saying, you've been putting away £850 a month, you need to make a decision. I think you certainly, because you've got that wonderful discipline that you've set up, you could still be putting aside £400 a month and using that to build, or £500 a month, and using that to build a sound financial future. And the rest of that money, you need to, and I'm not make, only you can make the decision

• 28:02Martin Lewis?

  of where you are on that. So you know, you might decide it's £600 a month, £700 you want to put away. But the rest of that money, you need to actually give yourself permission to spend, to enjoy and to improve your quality of life now, because you're doing very well on it. So. You know, and if that's going well, maybe I can put that to a new car payment. Then you can put it to a new car payment if that's what would give you the maximum amount of utility, the maximum amount of happiness in your life. And I think you actually need to sit down, do a budget and work through what am I allowed to spend? And what am I not allowed to spend? And funnily enough, for someone with your mindset, who's had to rigidly put themselves into that mindset, I think a budget would be really helpful.

• 28:47Martin Lewis?

  So that you, I don't know if you do, do you do piggy banking or jam jarring where you have separate accounts for different things?

• 28:53Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 28:53Martin Lewis?

  Right, so that's still fine. And then, of course, the advantage of that is if you have, if you give yourself a discretionary spend account. Yeah, and you have one, an account which, and then you look in that and it's got a thousand pounds in, then you can spend a thousand pounds guilt free on something that makes you happy. I mean, you do all the money mantras, is it worth it? Will I use it? All of those things. But on something that's going to enhance your life, you will have to give yourself permission to do that. And you can still do that and be a good role model to your daughter because you're going to be saving a lot for her future and for your future. So I, I think it is time to do a budget, but from a good reason, to give yourself permission to spend. And to have an account where the money in it is, it's almost your guilt free spending account.

• 29:36Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:37Martin Lewis?

  Because would that help?

• 29:39Speaker 03

  Absolutely would, it's, it's, it's very exciting, even the thought of it. Because what we've tried to do with my daughter so far is to show her how you get money by working, you know, and you, and you, and you get hopefully a good job by studying well at school. She is still at primary school, but trying to get this into her head just now that things don't appear from nowhere and you only get things by working for it. So this all ties into that same thing and we will get nice things because mommy and daddy have worked, you know, for it and we have saved our money. And so I'm looking forward to be able to show her that as a practical example.

• 30:10Martin Lewis?

  And I have to say, my daughter's thirteen, so I'm a few years down the path. And the difference in perception and understanding about these things is going to be massive over the next three years. Cause I've seen it changed and she will get more interested and be more inquisitive about what's going on. So the timing is perfect. I think it's perfect. Let's talk about the rest of the money. Okay? So the rest of the money, you've got a mortgage. Do you know what your mortgage rate is?

• 30:33Speaker 03

  Oh, it's, we, I'm currently on 1.99% and it's, that, that was a five year fix. And it expires on July 27.

• 30:42Martin Lewis?

  I mean, talk about, talk about some.

• 30:44Speaker 03

  I timed it nicely. Yeah, I timed it nicely, yeah.

• 30:47Martin Lewis?

  Brilliant. So, I mean. There's no point going on to mortgage. There is no point in you overpaying that mortgage at the moment, but there is point you having potentially having money put aside to be able to mean that you, when you remortgage in 2027, that you can get a smaller mortgage at that point to reach it because mortgage rates are going to be a lot higher and that's something that's going to change. So you could certainly be putting money away for that you would want to save in the highest interest rate savings account. You can work out how to go and get those yourself, I'm sure. And you'll be wanting to put that money aside. I would also say at your age, you need to be contributing to a pension and you've got a civil service pension. So that would be good. And you probably want to start investing. And you know, you've got,

• 31:29Martin Lewis?

  it sounds to me like you've got money that you do not need to touch for at least five years and that will be spare money. So going to get yourself an investment account, not a savings account for the money that is spare money and you won't need to use your mortgage to put, put a certain amount in each month. I'm not, let's say a nominal £150. I'm not saying £150, I'm giving it you. And you go and you put that in a broad spread of assets. You get yourself, this is not advice, these are examples. It could be you get a global tracker fund. It could be you get an S and P 500 tracker fund and a FTSE 100 tracker fund and you split it between those, that type of thing. Go and do some reading on that. I can't, I'm not regulated to give you any advice or help on that. But that's the type of thing.

• 32:12Martin Lewis?

  And you put the money aside and hopefully in 10 years' time, that will substantially outperform savings. Also for your daughter in a junior ISA, you could do the same. And you could do an investment junior ISA for her when she's 18, which will hopefully, if she does have university costs. I mean, if she's not going to university in Scotland, that could happen, that you might want to put aside then. But you need to see this as a glorious opportunity. The one caution I would give you is you've built up the discipline. And actually, unless you have millions and millions of pounds of your income, financial discipline is still a really important skill for giving yourself happiness. So I would stick to the path that you've had, but give yourself a certain amount of permission for

• 32:56Martin Lewis?

  some spending, but take the advantage of, you know, you are habitually. Good at budgeting now to to put some money aside and protect yourself for the future because and and I hope this doesn't happen to you and I hope this is wasted information. But one of the biggest causes of debt and one of the biggest causes of money problems is change of circumstance and we are all potential victims to change of circumstance. I mean, I always remember talking to a man who lost his leg and it stopped him working and it changed everything and he said to me, I never knew I was going to lose my leg. Well, of course you didn't. So that's why I would still keep some of that discipline together. Anything else you want from me? I'm so excited for you.

• 33:33Speaker 03

  I'm very excited and probably the thing that excites me the most is being able to give my daughter the childhood and adolescence that I didn't have. And given her the chance to go on those school trips and to do those things, the things I never even dared ask about as a child because I just knew we couldn't do it. And so I'm excited for her. But actually, the main thing I'd like to take out of this call is for anybody else listening who finds himself in that situation to just make the leap and make the call. I found that there have been lots of interactions with Step Change. They've been incredibly helpful. Never judge you. They're just there to help. They sorted everything out for me, made a plan. That plan has varied over the five years as things have gone up

• 34:13Speaker 03

  and down in life. And just to go out and do it, I understand that it's scary. I've been there with my head in the sand. That doesn't work. And just go out and do it because every day that passes is a day that you could be closer to your debt-free day.

• 34:28Martin Lewis?

  Robert, wonderful. But let me ask you one thing. I'm interested in this from your psychology. I mean, it's great now to look back at the path that you have trodden and that it's worked for you. When you first started and you got onto the debt management plan with with Step Change and there's also, I should say, Citizens Advice and National Debt Line, they're all brilliant organisations, will do something similar and do go and get help. If you're if you're concerned about your debts, get help soon. But when you started and you had, did you know how long it was going to take you to get to this point? And how did you mentally cope with that sort of knowing you were in the tunnel for quite a period of time?

• 35:05Speaker 03

  I did know that and at that time, five years seems a long time away, but actually things have flown by. You know, when I started this, you know, Covid was just around the corner when this kicked off for me and we can look back.

• 35:20Martin Lewis?

  That might have helped you a little, actually.

• 35:22Speaker 03

  I think it did. I think there was an element that certainly did help, but no, I just had the attitude of, well, you know, it may seem a long way away, but there is no way to deal with this other than to deal with it, you know, and to start the journey. And every, every great journey starts with one, with one step, you know, and we just have to take that first step and, and just go with it because what I didn't want to, I didn't want to get into my mid 40s, 50s, 60s and so on, living the same way that I was in my 20s and 30s. A lot of my kind of early life, it's not been happy during that time and I've been so constrained and I just want, I wanted life to be different.

• 35:59Martin Lewis?

  I think you're inspirational and I think you will help a lot of people by making this call. I hope I've helped you a little bit, but I genuinely so appreciative for you calling up and talking to us. Well done, mate. I'm wishing you and your family a glorious, still somewhat frugal, life going forward.

• 36:15Speaker 03

  And to you. Thank you.

• 36:16Martin Lewis?

  Cheers, buddy. And I don't think we can top Robert's call, so I think we should end there. That is it for this week's Question Time. Don't forget to subscribe so you know when we release a new episode. We put out a new Question Time episode each Monday alongside the regular podcast on Thursdays. Interesting definition, Matt. Which is the regular podcast? Which isn't the regular podcast? Is Question Time now an equal billing podcast? Moving on. Anyway, aren't you lucky? Two doses of money-saving tips and tricks a week. Do make sure you send in your questions to martinlewis podcast at bbc.co.uk.

• 37:04Speaker 06

  Martin Lewis is the founder of MoneySavingExpert.com. But of course, other consumer and price comparison websites are available. You can get in touch with Martin's podcast production team by emailing [email protected]. The offers and rates mentioned in the podcast are correct at the time of recording. However, if you are listening on demand, it's worth double checking as details can date. Remember to subscribe on BBC Sounds and leave us a review however you listen.

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• 38:55Speaker 07

  Welcome to The Haunted Library. Join me, Colin Morgan, as I read Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. A story of science and ambition, loneliness and longing, and what it truly means to be human.

• 39:14Speaker 07

  Listen to The Haunted Library wherever you get your podcasts, or find us on YouTube.