Roy

Those wall panels save so much time and money. Also there's no grout going mouldy like with tile.
This is a really old, outdated bathroom. Even the bath is good old cast iron! Rather than ripping it out, I did the same. Bought a sink unit for £150 (already assembled). New sink/bath taps plus a rainfall shower (appx £150 eBay). Concrete effect wall panels and black edge trims (appx £150). Shower screen 100 squids from eBay. Vinyl stick down planks for the floor (£10 per square meter). Blind from eBay. Battery operated LED mirror. New toilet seat. Done.
Total spend appx £750 including other bits (towel rail, adhesives etc). But also cost many hours of my time on top. I did a plumbing course a few years ago. (And no, I'm not a butch lass! I just love being self sufficient and sadly have experienced quite a few cowboys who assume landlords don't care about a good finish. But I do. Which achieves great rents and good tenants as a result. TOUCH WOOD!)
Saved thousands. You can't beat real tile, but it's a rental and any profits are always many years down the line after initial outlay of 25% deposit, refurb, legals, extra SDLT etc.
Last pic is the before pic (please don't tell me you prefer it!)

Looks just like all of my bathrooms! Those sheets of plastic instead of tiles are neat, saved me learning to tile at least 🤣

Upgrades!
     

Upgrades!
     

Upgrades!
     

Upgrades!
     

You say that until you find out he has a small c0ck. Shame really as sound chap.

@Martin1983 As @James32 says. Become a paid up Member. I had been looking to buy from my usual sources but decided to pay for one month. My savings in the first month more than paid for the years membership. Its only a couple of coffee's cost for a months Premium Membership. 

Cheers @Roy I love the design but weirdly got my eyes set on the older type skx007  style dont know why
Lovely watch though

@MikeG1978
Cheap Seiko?

TL:DR - Buy a Premium Membership on TSF (silver or above) and hang out in the UK ungraded section.
The most economical way to accumulate silver on any budget is to gain as much knowledge as possible. You are on the right track by posting here
Be on TSF and buy a Premium Membership - silver or above. This is pretty much essential as the best value deals are hidden from non-premium members for 3 days. If they are good value they will generally sell out within 3 days (or 3 minutes if Salesman32 is on the prowl) TSF can offer the best value as there are 0% selling fees. There are other 0% marketplaces like Facebook but that's a much riskier proposition. To successfully navigate risk you have to know the value of each item and also be able to verify authenticity. Verifiers and such tend to be expensive which defeats the purpose. With silver it's very rare to find deals at spot so you need to be hyper-vigilant if you come across any such deals online. TSF is a much safer environment and more accountable than FB or eBay Auctions, estate sales, coin clubs and other private sales. This takes a lot of work but people have managed to buy silver at spot or even below spot from estate sales in particular. When you factor in the time and expense of travelling, researching and participating in auctions, then the real-terms price is higher and proportionally higher the less you buy. Verification can be an issue depending on what you buy. For bullion coins like modern Britannias which have security features you don't need to spend any money verifying
The most time-efficient and viable method is hanging out in the TSF trade section and jumping on good value listings. This depends on spot price and the general mood but you should be able to pick up single silver coins in good condition for £24-28 in a capsule. Most sellers aren't going to offer free shipping on a single coin and the objective is to stack at the lowest possible premium, so, to get the best price you will probably have to buy 10 coins minimum or more likely 20 or 25 coins (a tube) (£500-650)
The cheapest coins lately are probably 2023 KCIII Britannias. There's lots of them about and the going rate appears to be £24.50-28/coin, with a realistic price being in the middle around £26/coin. These offers are generally only available to Premium Members
Buying when spot is "low" is easier said than done especially for silver. Nobody really knows what "low" is for silver and we all have our opinions on that. IMHO the price right now is "low" as I expect it to be higher within the near future. The absolute lowest silver can go IMHO is $18/oz and much more likely the floor is $20/oz (£16). In the UK you have to consider VAT so even if silver is £16/oz spot it's going to be £20/coin + for physical. It's unlikely IMHO to ever be £16 again. There is strong support around $25 (£20), the price keeps bouncing around that support lately. There's more strong support around $22.50 (£18)
Realistically a "low" price for silver in the near future is £18-20/spot. There is the premium to pay for physical on top of that so £24-25/coin is a very good price IMHO and you're unlikely to find coins in good condition below that price unless you are a bullion dealer
IMO buying poor condition coins (badly milked or physically damaged like dings or bent out of shape) is not a great idea. Those are much harder to sell in private sales. You can sell coins in any condition to a bullion dealer but you'll only get spot for them, maybe even below spot if they're really bad, and you paid above spot to buy them. If you purchase a Britannia in good condition for £26 you can sell it immediately if you need to for £26

On the issue of American banks... they are indeed not like Lehman Brothers with excessive speculative leverage. But it is a traditional feature of American banking that banks will offer mortgages with a fixed rate for the entire duration of the mortgage. You would never get this in the UK or other countries I know of. A fixed rate mortgage in the UK means one that is fixed for 3 or 4 years before reverting to the floating rate.
For a bank to offer a mortgage at a fixed rate for 20-30 years is reckless and irresponsible. If interest rates rise, as they have, the bank is committed to receiving only the low rate of return from the existing mortgages on their book. While at the same time their savers expect to be paid the prevailing rate. US banks are offering 0.5% interest on their savings accounts because they cannot afford more given the low rate of income they receive from their mortgages.
The result is savers are withdrawing their deposits and putting the money into money market funds or directly buying US government bonds where they can get 4.5%. And why shouldn't they? If I had a savings account at a bank that was paying 0.5% in the current climate I would not put up with it. At present in the UK you can get 3% on a savings account with no restrictions on access or 3.75% if you are willing to have some restrictions. If American banks are unable to provide this return for their savers then they have screwed up.

Here's mine. Get cheese dip, bake in oven, meanwhile you cook pork belly chops in a cast iron pan*, when both are ready enjoy chops dipped in cheese. This stuff has no right to be this good.

*alternatively you can oven bake them.
+


PS. £1,633

From an album mainly concerned with a future where freedom, pleasure, and arts are banned. 🤔

Oh ffs, couldn't they hold on 1 more week, I've been saving for an ounce of charlie all month 🙄 
Wait that didn't sound right, I mean charles gold 1 oz coin.. not the Colombian marching powder 😳

In the same vein, my Mrs asked me yesterday what she could do with the metals if any thing happened to me,so I had to explain in layman's terms,now I have to sleep with one eye open and check the car before I use it 🤣

There are lots of the "Don't tell my wife" types of tropes that tend to spring up around any hobby / passtime that involves spending money.
I feel they can 'tarnish' the reputation of stacking / collecting / investing as an activity - making it out as something that can't be enjoyed and explored together; but it also cheapens the relationships themselves. It's the same as the welcome mats and door signs designed for Amazon and UPS deliveries... "Hide packages from husband."  Surely, we can do better?
 
Anyway, in completely unrelated news, I had my first experience of an online Precious Metals auction today. For God's sake, don't tell the wife!!
😂

A good metric would be is how many hours do you have to work per sovereign year on year.  It will be different for some as income change.
In 2017 the average wage is estimated to be £28,795 in 2023 its £33,000.  
In very broad terms £200 a sov in 2017 thats 143.9 sovereigns per year top line the average wage paid 
 today £405 a sov in 2023 thats only 81.4 sovereigns per year top line of the average wage paid 
works out a 43% pay cut  for  renumeration.paid in sovereigns (and this is factoring in you have had  pay rise over the last 5.5 years WTF!)  😳
  this is very broad but when you factor in other costs ie cost you more to get to work, fuel, train, food, and you have much higher living costs than 2017, the pound has lost well over 65-70%+ in only 5.5 years. 
1872 hours worked in 2017 13 hours worked top line per sovereign 
1872 hours worked in 2023 22.99 hours worked top line per sovereign 
Now back to work slackers before you are working a month to buy a sovereign!  
EDIT......For you to have the same work-hour gold ratio then the average wage today need to be £58,279.50p to keep buying gold sovereigns at the same rate 143.9 per year 

Everyone is looking for standards of beauty.
If some magazines are telling us that a woman is gorgeous, everybody is comparing his wife with that woman and will start comparing.  But... I prefer to spend my time with my wife, even is not the most wanted woman. For me she is The Woman. The same is with coins. I like my coins, even are not graded. I've worked hard to have them, I am happy to spend time with them, I will never buy a high grade Xcoin only to keep it somewhere in a safe and to tell my friends that I have a 70 grade Xcoin. The grading system in my opinion is useless. In my eyes, a beauty is a beauty, even is a little tired. But is my personal opinion.
 

It's significant that both coins share the same date.
Best as a pair methinks.

Diversification is also important.  Other forms of investment such as Premium bonds maybe?  Perhaps I am luckier than most. Here’s last months earnings….
 

Yesterday TSF hit 20,000 forum members. Thank you to all of the forum members and especially to the Premium Members whose membership greatly helps us to grow the forum further. An extra special thank you to all Platinum group Premium Members.
We have a busy year ahead with lots of planned promotions to grow the forum even further  

@ZRPMs
   

Some folk live like animals. Probably never cleaned from the day they moved in.
 

23 years and I've finally called it a day.
I tip my hat to you young 'uns @AuricGoldfinger @katyc @modofantasma? you have the drive and the energy to slog on!
It's not the game it once was 😐