Not the kind of good news I can share in real life, but I need to tell someone!

[EllisRoses]

So MN it is...

I am officially out of debt

I paid my last payment to Stepchange today. I have been on a DMP for years trying to claw my way out of £23k worth of debt.

No one in RL knew how bad it was, so I feel I can't celebrate with anyone. I just wanted to share it somewhere. Not a brag, it's my own fault for getting in so deep, and it's a long way until my credit score will recover but I am very proud of myself and feel like a huge weight has been lifted.

Well done! You definitely should be feeling proud of yourself.

Massive congratulations, OP! Genuinely happy for you.

No small achievement. Well done

So many of us have been there, more than you think. Well done for all the grown up behaviour, you should feel proud of yourself, I'm serious in that btw.

Yay OP!

Fantastic, well done, no mean feat.

Well done!! A fantastic achievement you must have worked hard for.

God, that sounds like a really hard time OP. You absolutely deserve every feeling of freedom you get.

Thats incredible, congratulations!!

Congratulations!

I'm so happy to hear you got out of it. Yes with Stepchange they take over and deal with your creditors for you, the only exception to this is when your creditors sell your debt on and the new debt owners will always contact you and then you need to get back in touch with stepchange. TSB, Hitachi and Barclaycard agreed to the DMP and froze all charges, but after a few months all debts got sold on, time and time again. It was frustrating.

I am in a huge amount of credit card debt and am terrified and reading this about creditors agreeing to DMP and then selling the debt on makes me even more terrified. At the moment I am living with family and making the minimum payments but I'm in persistent debt and the credit card companies want me to pay more which I can't do. This family member doesn't know about my debt and I can't tell them the truth. Moving here was just supposed to be a temporary stop gap after a relationship break up. I lived in his home so had to leave when that ended. I can't stay here indefinitely and my debts are so huge it'll take me years to pay off but once this pandemic is over I'll need to rent myself a little flat but can't afford to do that and pay my debt. I feel stuck in this vicious circle and the worry is making me ill.

The other difficulty is that if I enter in to a DMP or IVA before moving out then I probably won't pass credit checks so won't even be able to rent anywhere cos I won't have a guarantor. So I'll have to rent then default on my debts but I'll be facing debt letters and debt collectors then. It's all such a mess and sometimes I feel like like there is no way out.

Fabulous achievement. Well done! That is a seriously impressive achievement

Excellent work OP. Be proud of yourself.

@Icantchangemyusername there is a way out of this. Clearly not easy - but there are people out there to help. Good luck

@Icantchangemyusername

I'm so happy to hear you got out of it. Yes with Stepchange they take over and deal with your creditors for you, the only exception to this is when your creditors sell your debt on and the new debt owners will always contact you and then you need to get back in touch with stepchange. TSB, Hitachi and Barclaycard agreed to the DMP and froze all charges, but after a few months all debts got sold on, time and time again. It was frustrating.

I am in a huge amount of credit card debt and am terrified and reading this about creditors agreeing to DMP and then selling the debt on makes me even more terrified. At the moment I am living with family and making the minimum payments but I'm in persistent debt and the credit card companies want me to pay more which I can't do. This family member doesn't know about my debt and I can't tell them the truth. Moving here was just supposed to be a temporary stop gap after a relationship break up. I lived in his home so had to leave when that ended. I can't stay here indefinitely and my debts are so huge it'll take me years to pay off but once this pandemic is over I'll need to rent myself a little flat but can't afford to do that and pay my debt. I feel stuck in this vicious circle and the worry is making me ill.

Your debts being sold on once on the DMP is nothing to be scared of. It's nothing more than admin. Every time they were sold on I'd get a letter to say who to, I'd phone Stepchange and give them that info and that would be it. They always agreed to keep interest frozen. It was never any bother, mere inconvenience. Honestly the scariest part is that first phone call to Stepchange but the relief you'll feel when they tell you it's ok, they can help and they mean it is huge.

Thanks @EllisRoses that is reassuring.

Well done! I finished paying back my 5k credit cards and a family loan of 6k last month, the weight off is great! Congrats again op.

That's great news OP. if I were you I would wait a year and then see if you're able to be accepted for a credit builder credit card (but only if you know you will be able to be careful with it, as some of us can't resist temptation, me included!) put something on it each month-your petrol, or food shop, or something you were buying anyway, get the bill, pay in full before your due date. I work for a credit card company and this will really help to build your credit rating back up

Congratulations, OP, that’s a heartwarming achievement!
Well done you!💐

I can only imagine the relief! Well-done OP. A fab achievement!

Well done op, that’s a massive achievement 💐

Well done! That's such a great achievement.

Congratulations. I hope sharing your story will help anyone who is in the position you were in before you made that first call.

Congratulations! That sounds like a lot of hard work and sacrifice.