Just opened our credit card statement

[Mooycow]

And am so shocked , it’s over 25.000, ! My husband deals with all the bills ( I do everything else) ,he gets online billing and tears up the statement when it arrives , we have together spent the money ,it’s all way too easy ,obs, AIBU to be shocked that we owe that amount .

Or, blueshoes, a DH who thinks he understands finances but is actually clueless.

OP, Did you 'just' open up the letter or did you do it when the post came? Have you actually spoken to your DH about it?

Mooy, who made the decisions about tiles for the bathroom and any other fairly big ticket expenditures? Are there some big things and then a lot of little things that have really added up?

I suspect if your DH has been tearing up statements that there may be items you do not know about on the statements.

Could there be something like a gambling habit? You and DH are spending £5,000 per year on the cc.

Do you have access to the account online? If not then you need to get it. You can go back over your previous statements to see what merchants have been paid.

What is the interest rate? Friends £800 debt ended at 5k s they only made minimum repayments

Who puts bathroom tiles on a credit cart?

And am so shocked...My husband deals with all the bills...tears up the statement when it arrives

This IMHO is the real concern: Why did your husband hide the debt from you? At best I'd say its condescending, that he thinks a woman shouldn't deal with money. At worst, he's gambling or having an affair and has put costs of that on the credit card.

Seriously OP, as PPs have said, if you are making minimum payments then you will be spiralling into further debt each month.

You would be better off going to your bank and getting a loan or, if you have a mortgage, adding it on.

And you need to have a serious talk with your DH if he has been giving you the impression that he has been paying in full each month.

First things first. Time for some honesty. And card cutting. Can you either transfer the debt to 0% credit cards or remortgage? One or both of you must be on a pretty large wage to even be allowed to continue to use the credit card when you owe 25k so it shouldn’t be difficult to get one with a maximum balance of 20k. Even getting a personal loan to pay it off would be far cheaper than the double figures interest a credit card attracts. Paying off the minimum i expect will also be damaging your credit rating. What is he thinking? Don’t you have access to the credit card details on your online banking?

OP didn't state it was GBP £.

OP could live anywhere. It would be an odd time to be opening post at 22.48.

But it might be though

That’s a very good point Fluffy!

Good point. Let’s hope it’s less then. Sterling being pretty much (just about) the highest value world currency per unit.

OP, you poor thing. I would be devastated if this happened to me - both the debt (I’d rather go without the new bathroom tiles than go into debt for them) and also the lying (by omission).

Hope you’re OK.

It’s not a credit card it’s a debt card and you are right to be concerned. Debt is a serious issue for both individuals and society. The only people who benefit are financiers.
It’s a problem if you are using it for routine things like car services. You do (like many others) need to live within your means and avoid debt as far as possible.
I’d be having serious words about how you clear it ASAP so you can start saving for everyday costs like cars and holidays. Until the debt is cleared you should minimise your spending.

So if you've had the card for 5 years, basically you've spent at least £5000 a year on it each year in basic terms. You need to do a serious and honest income and expenditure, cut the card up and start living in budget. Paying off as much as possible each month.

This is about more than the credit card bill isn't it. It is about your husband's lying (by omission) about the state of the finances. Easy enough to get into debt and really difficult to get out of it.

I think your husband made some bad decisions and got in so deep he felt he couldn't tell you.

This is time to have a deep and serious conversation about this - cut up the card and seek assistance for your debt. There are some really good free organisations out there that will be able to give you advice i.e. a debt payment plan (I think they are that) etc

OP, I thought your joke was funny, but not quite as funny as all the earnest posters’ response to it.

If the OP lives is Turkey they would owe £4700 which is 25000 Turkish lira

The credit card statement could have been sitting on the kitchen table for a week for all we know, the way the OP is worded is somewhat vague.

It seems like one of those English comprehension exam questions we used to get, where you have to state whether it's a yes, a no or "we don't have enough information"

Wow!

First thing you need to do is sit down with DH and talk, how did it get so big?

Then assuming the discussion doesn’t result in another mn thread you should look to refinance.

As some people have mentioned adding it to the mortgage will be infinitely cheaper, or a personal loan. I just did a quick check on Tesco (on,y because I’ve used them before) others may be better. 25k over 5 years is £450 per month at 3.1% .

Hope for your sake you live in India op 🤞🏻

If not you need greater financial transparency with your dh as it's a problem you both need to address.

You need to know what other debts have been incurred in your name. Sounds very devious to me. Either that or you need to start getting more involved with household finances.

You do realise that this is more than most people earn in a year, don't you?

You need to get a second job, quick, and pay this off. The interest will be horrible and you will be paying so much more than the original sum.

And there was me stressing that we spent £300 on ours yesterday

Seriously, that's living WAY beyond your means. Not sure how you wouldn't realise that, even if you didn't see the statements.

OP you don't live well. You can't afford everyday stuff.

This. I’m always intrigued by people's definition of living well. You are only living well if you could afford to pay for everything in full by cash (cars, holidays, etc) and still have money in the bank for rainy days.

car services , tiles for bathroom that sort of thing

If you can’t afford to pay for these things by cash and have to put them on a credit card, then you can’t afford them to begin with.
Your DH is either not as good with money as you’d thought, or he’s hiding something.

We NEED to know what currency!

Have you considered speaking to a debt charity - CAB, stepchange or Christians against poverty? It's all well and good saying you have been wreckless and have lived beyond your means, but they may be able to help with a solution.