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 .

It sounds like you are living beyond your means OP. Tbh I'm surprised by the shock on the thread I think a lot of people do when you look at the cars they drive round in etc. You need to pay it off, insist on full access to finances and start going on cheaper holidays.

If they can afford the repayments kaniel then the solution is fairly obvious.

Billben exactly! I have friends who are living in this sort of ticking time bomb Two DC at private school, two cars on hire purchase...posh ones at that....she's a SAHM and he works about 14 hours a day in a very physical job to try to pay for it all.

One thing goes wrong and it will all collapse.

I don't know how people take the stress! We have peeling wallpaper in our hall but we both work...anything we buy is paid in cash.

You will need to sit down and think carefully how to reduce this and preferably pay it off. This will mean some significant adjustments to your lifestyle from what I read.

As some people have mentioned adding it to the mortgage will be infinitely cheaper, or a personal loan.

Adding it to the mortgage won't be cheaper as you'll be paying it off over 20 odd years . The lack of understanding of financial matters is rather disturbing tbh, this is one of the great myths of modern society. The cheapest thing is likely to be to transfer it to a 0% rate and get it paid off asap. If you can't do that then a personal loan.

Adding it to the mortgage won't be cheaper as you'll be paying it off over 20 odd years

Not necessarily. Most mortgages have the option of an overpayment percentage without charge.

Do you spend £750 a week on your food bill too?

Yeah it's about discipline though isn't it? Out of sight out of mind once it's on the mortgage. I agree you could theoretically manage it if you stay on top of finances but this isn't what got the OP into this situation. There are also often set up fees for new/ shifting mortgages as well which are an additional cost. I am of the mindset that a mortgage pays for your house and then you pay if off asap without adding Caribbean holidays and poncey tiles along the way.....

You have made me feel better about the 4k I owe if nothing else

I think you need to sit down and talk to your DH about what has been put on the card and why . You need a plan to pay it off asap .

I think the other thing that no one has mentioned is that dependent on income level it may not take that long to pay off. DH and I have gross household income of 100k and if we planned carefully we could pay that off in a year. On MN we aren't even that well off in comparison to many..... Also it might be that he has the money elsewhere to pay it off that is gaining interest. Stocks and Shares ISAS have paid up to 20% interest in recent years, perhaps he has chosen to keep the money at 0% on a deal or something. The OP needs to talk to him and plan based on a true assessment of their finances.

Who puts bathroom tiles on a credit card? confused

Well we would and I find nothing odd about it, but our credit card is automatically paid by direct debit every month, and would always be covered by adequate funds.

What I do find strange about the OP's situation is that if they can afford to pay the £25,000 off now, why didn't they do the automatic "pay every month" system all along?

Well, this doesn't make any sense to me. The monthly payments on a sum like this must be massive, so, if this is true (and I have my doubts), you must have decent incomes to be able to furnish such a debt. if that is the case, why wasn't this good income used to pay for these things in the first place, rather than putting them on a credit card?
Also, having had credit card debt myself when I was young, if you pay the minumum monthly payment on a large debt for a long time, the credit card company begin to worry whether you actually have the means to repay the whole amount, and will start asking questions.
In addition, if you have a card with such a high credit limit, you usually have to prove you are a good payer. The companies don't just increase the credit amount willy nilly. By the sounds of it you are not good payers, so how did you get such an astronomical credit limit?

You need to get your husband to log on to each of the credit agencies and review his report IN FRONT OF YOU. There may well be more debt you don't know about. You are heavily in debt and the time has come to get serious about sorting it out

Entirely depends if you can afford the debt or not.

By definition, if it's a debt, you CAN'T afford it.

I am surprised that posters are surprised that you can £25k on a credit card. It doesn't mean you should.

‘Cutting up’ your card doesn’t really work if you mainly use it online, as so many places can store your card number ‘for your convenience’. PayPal, Amazon accounts, all that sort of thing can really add up, even if your physical credit card is in the freezer.

That is a high credit limit for one card, DH and myself have a few credit cards which we always pay off in full as Martin Lewis would say. We use them for absolutely everything as we get points and gift vouchers with them. All the credit limits are between £6k and £14k.

Maybe if you only pay just above the limit, they keep putting it, or perhaps OPs DH is a high earner so then gets a v high limit

“Who puts bathroom tiles on a credit card?”

We put everything on a credit card and it’s automostically paid off by DD, every month. We get cash back on the card for everything we spend and every January we get hundreds of pounds: free!

However this obviously only works if you pay everything off, every single month!

We pay off our credit card in full every month. When we get our annual statement it is £25000. Everything apart from utility bills and insurance goes on the card. Approx £ 9000 of this is business expenses (diesel, hotels, meals etc). So could the OP's credit card include such expenses.

By definition, if it's a debt, you CAN'T afford it

That's not true! Debt is owing money, it doesn't necessarily mean you can't afford the repayments. In fact the best way to improve your credit rating is to take out a credit card, use it and then pay off the bill. While you are amassing debt on a credit card, then pay it off promptly, you are a good debtor. Similarly with a mortgage.

The OP and her DH could be classed as wreckless spenders, racking up massive cc debts to the tune of "25000" (assuming GBP or USD) esp as the OP was seemingly oblivious when her name is also on that debt. It's irresponsible spending that gets people a blackened crediting history that can stick on their record for years and can prevent employment.

There’s nothing wrong with credit cards, but there is with debt you can’t service....

You need some professional help to sort this out asap. Debt Dr type thing. Sounds like your DH is in denial.
I would increase the mortgage & never use credit cards again.

I would increase the mortgage

Bad idea!! Mortgage companies are not a debt consolidation service.

The OP should not be encouraged to lie about it, which they would have to in order to seek approval.

They need to face the music and take responsibility for what they owe not try to sweep the issue under the carpet and defer the problem to another day.

There is no problem at all if you can afford the repayments.

toolazy
If you think that have you reported the thread?