To wonder if we have a lot more debt?

[Noseytoday]

We have £7k of debts, mixture of major house repair work, holiday, getting pregnant much quicker than expected and so not having long to save for maternity leave. We are now focusing on paying it off each month and its going down but it really stresses me out. My DH isn't as worried, he thinks a lot of people probably have similar. Does this sound fairly normal or not?

There is a thread in money matters which advocates direct debits for your debts, not the minimum, as that will take far longer, but more than the minimum, as said above

we have no debt. I think mortgage is fine as everyone needs that to buy a house. I wouldn't pay for car finance unless interest free ( our last one was). Any kind of debt stresses me considerably. I always pay off my credit card bill monthly. I think it just depends what kind of person you are really as to how stressed you get about it. In my line of work I deal with cancer patients who suddenly get ill and their income drops and they often have debts and nothing to fall back on and no critical illness insurance etc and often only one of the couple working. I'd never want to be in that situation.

After divorce I find myself in debt for the first time. I'd always been debt free aside my mortgage and good savings.

I've managed to clear most of the credit card debt but still owe family £3000 which helped me buy my house. And owing anything stresses me out no end. I long to return to the days where I had rainy day money. But it rained.

I think if it’s coming down then that’s the main thing. There is no ‘normal’ amount of debt that makes it ok or not ok, but if it’s unmanageable to pay it off and causing you stress then that suggests it’s getting out of hand.

I have about 3k on 0% credit cards left over from doing my postgrad, and I honestly cannot wait for it to be paid off. It’s taking such a huge chunk of my salary paying it off every month and I hate it ☹️ But it got me the career that I wanted so I can’t complain too much!

We don't have any debt (apart from mortgage/ student loan), but I have in the past, had up to £10k at various points (after uni and after our wedding). I don't think its a huge issue if you are actively working to cut it down, just don't let it creep up/forget about it.

If you've been doing major house repair surely you are an owner occupier and have some equity in your home? Is your 7k of debt net or are you just looking at what you have outside of your home equity and mortgage? It isn't normally ideal to have debt outside of your mortgage because it tends to be at a high rate of interest, so paying it down fast is wise. But it's a mistake to look at that debt in isolation from your whole financial situation.

Regardless of whether the debt you have is "normal" or not, unsecured debts are expensive and worth putting some effort into trying to drive down ASAP.

No debt, just the mortgage, and I have 3 years annual salary in savings.

I know people that owe a lot. I hate being in debt but this year has been a tough one and I had to use a credit card, I owe £2500 and it is causing me stress as I have never had to borrow before. I know a lot of people owe a lot more.

What's your income like?

We have £9,000, all on (monitored) 0% interest, all being overpaid - renovation, necessary furniture. The car is not getting replaced any time soon! I am not generally comfortable having debts, but we could pay them off immediately if we needed to. I don't use a credit card month to month, and wouldn't get a loan for anything other than a need.

No debt-only the mortgage which should be paid off in 8 years. No student loans either which I count ourselves lucky for!

We bought the car outright (second hand, but new to us and the cost of our extension went on the mortgage. We have one credit card which gets paid off monthly-I only really use it to get the Tesco points!

Are people counting student loans in their debt amounts?

My husband grew up very poor and saw his mother miserable having to borrow money just to be able to feed 7 children. Because of this he refuses to have any debt whatsoever. We only had a mortgage for a few years. I accept that this is very unusual.

We only have our mortgage. We did have car finance which was paid off. And DH has a small amount remaining on his student loan. I think we are quite unusual among our friends though (mid 30s) most seem to have loans, car finance, credit cards etc.

I am sure that you already know that you should only take out loans for essentials, so borrowing money for holidays is not a good idea.

We cannot decide if you have a lot of debt unless you tell us what your income is, but as long as you have a plan to pay it off, then that is the most important thing.

Joint income is £72k. One child in childcare which takes a lot. We can pay between £400-£700 off a month depending on circumstances. It is all on, as pp above said, 'managed' 0% ccs but I do worry that those deals will just disappear the next time we try to shift it

Just a general question for people on this thread that always confuses me - why do some people have debts but then acknowledge that they have enough savings to clear the debt but choose not to? Surely in the long term you are just going to paying out more in interest that what you have to? And once the debt is cleared surely it's a lot easier to build up savings again quickly because you won't be making repayments each month?

Yes I know the holiday was silly and that won't happen again. I realise this was a pointless thread as yes there is no safety in numbers etc. I am just having a worried day so it's on my mind

Debt free and no mortgage here. But we live like paupers, drive old cars and have cheap holidays. I'm 63 and trying to save enough to enable me to retire before my state pension age.

We save for stuff we need, although between us we have credit cards that give us £26k of available credit.

I'm often horrified by how much debt clients have. A client on benefits racked up £12k debt in a year. I think it's criminal that people on very low incomes can get more credit than they will ever be able to pay back.

We only have our mortgage, we've just renovated most of our house and paid for a wedding, but I am very very debt averse it makes me feel itchy. We want the kitchen replaced and could get it on finance, but I'd rather save up and pay for it rather than take finance. This has worked well for us as I found out I was pregnant earlier this year much quicker than anticipated (fertility issues) if we'd gone ahead with the kitchen like lots of people encouraged us to do we'd be in a less comfortable situation for my mat leave.

Just a general question for people on this thread that always confuses me - why do some people have debts but then acknowledge that they have enough savings to clear the debt but choose not to? Surely in the long term you are just going to paying out more in interest that what you have to?

In our case the "savings" are in the form of shares for the company DH works for, which he gets as part of his bonus. They're growing in value well, and the debt is interest-free, so it doesn't make sense for us to sell unless we really need to.

no debt no mortgage and savings but low income and dont pay for transport (bus pass) so even though a single parent we manage ok

but im not extravagant either

example,i would like and to some could do with a new kitchen (ive seen some pics on here of others)but cant justify it and dont want to use my savings,daft i know but i do get a great deal of comfort knowing im not in debt and have a back up

i also have mental health problems so this is important that im in control

Just stick to your plan and try to park the worries.

KitKat1985 it’s purely psychological. People feel safe with savings as they see it as a safety net, while ignoring that while they’re in debt the savings (if they’re a similar amount) are cancelled out. It can be useful to start saving while paying debts off purely as a psychological measure to get out of the ‘what’s the point’ mindset and have savings to fall back on instead of accruing more debt, but on the whole it doesn’t make any sense mathematically.

Especially as the interest accrued on the savings is never gonna be more money than the cost of debt interest (rare situations where the debt is at 0% excepted).

The thought of debt makes me extremely anxious. I have no mortgage (thanks to a big profit I made on a property 17 years ago and a redundancy payment), no car loan and no credit cards. I earn an average salary now so I'm lucky I can afford for my DDs and I to live without worrying about money too much. I'm skint most of the time, though!

7K sounds like a lot but when I think about it, we have about 2K in loans, 2 x student loans and car finance so we have a lot too!

Between DH and I excluding the mortgage we have about 25k including two car finance and a loan that we took out for Home improvements. It’s manageable and although I’d prefer to have no debt it doesn’t keep me awake at night or anything as it’s in keeping with our level of income.