To feel suicidal about mortgage/interest rates

[mortgagequandary]

I am sorry if this post upsets anyone but my mind is constantly occupied with the fear of losing my house. [PART OF POST REMOVED BY MNHQ AS WE DON'T ALLOW MENTION OF SELF-HARM/ SUICIDE METHODS]

But I don't know where to turn and can't tell anyone in real life . I wake up every morning and feel hopeless. I am too scared to do anything but I wish I could go to sleep and not wake up

I am terrified of losing my home and not being able to provide suitable accommodation for my children. I have been here 13 years ago when I was evicted from a rental as a young single mum and the fear and shame about not being able to even provide a roof for your kids is awful. I was lucky enough to get a small council house which would not happen now, this made me able to save a deposit and 7 years ago we bought a tiny house. I then moved to a slightly bigger house in 2019 but it's just still modest 3 bed terrace - I was told I could borrow over 100k more but I stayed sensible

We don't have any kind of flashy life. We live paycheque to paycheque. Between me and H we have 5 jobs. I work about 40 hours in 3 pt jobs and he has a main job and an evening job. Since last year when rates started to rise I have used every spare penny I have making overpayments. I have now paid about £5500 but still got 103k owed so feels pointless and not enough as I don't think will make any difference to what my new payments will be

I have a year left now til my fixed ends. and I feel like that will be it then, I won't get to keep my house

I am worth more dead to my family because if I died my mortgage would be paid off and then my husband and kids would always have a home .

I agree with others that you are hugely catastrophising this. My mortgage owed is the same as yours. I am older than you, one income (single parent) and it's currently stretched over about 24 years, taking me up to 70. I have much less equity in mine also. I take a very pragmatic approach that this is a very long term and elastic debt that can be manipulated with over payments or increasing the term as needs dictate. Right now, needs might dictate you stop overpaying but that's fine..you can resume doing that in X years when rates come down and if they never do, you downsize upon retirement with your sizeable equity. Get some solid advice and figures and, with respect, give your head a wobble. Talking about leaving your family without you over this is a huge overreaction. What does your DH think about it all?

You have lots of options
Increase your mortgage term
Change to interest only
The fact your currently over paying means you already have some extra to go against the mortgage.

Hello again everyone. As we previously mentioned, we were going to remove the thread as the opening post contained mention of methods of suicide/self harm; something we don't allow on our talk boards, as advised by the Samaritans.

However, the OP has now been in touch to say that the replies on the thread from other MNers are very useful. To avoid cutting off this support when it's obviously very much appreciated by the OP, we've now edited the opening post. We're also going to move the thread to our Mental Health topic so that the topic can continue there.

As we previously posted, you can find further guidance in our Mental Health resources. You can also go to the Samaritans website, or email them on [email protected]

Thanks all and best of luck with everything, @mortgagequandary - please do let us know if we can do anything further to help

OP nothing is as bad as you think it is. You can’t worry like this for a year, please speak to someone in real life (even just the doctor if you’ve no one else).

Imagine if it was your DH saying these things about you all being better off without him. It is NOT TRUE. The kids would be absolutely devastated and never get over it. I would rather have my family and be struggling over anything material.

On a practical level, suicide would invalidate any payment anyway so they would still not get anything and you’d not be around either.

You’ve done absolutely amazingly to pull yourself out of the life you had against all the odds. Whatever happens, you won’t be going back to that place.

You have had lots of good financial advice but I just want to emphasise how out of proportion your feelings are in relation to your actual situation. Please take care of yourself and get some support xxx

You're not worth more dead at all. Financial is not the only form of worth and it's the least intrinsically important.

I too am struggling to see what you are so worried about but I get that you are very worried and I think that might need tackling first. I get that overpayments are admirable but they don't seem necessary at such a difficult financial time.

You need some rest and maybe some counselling - use the overpayment money for therapy, money well spent! What does your DH think of the way you feel?

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/mortgages/mortgage-overpayment-calculator/

This is useful to compare savings vs overpayments - and work out the effect of overpayments.

There are other tools that help work out how much more the monthly payments might be at different interest rates
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/mortgages/mortgage-rate-calculator/

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/11/more-homeowners-to-benefit-from-governments--support-for-mortgag/

This might help if you do hit problems

Plus this is what they've agree with 75% of lenders - easy switch to interest only and extending the term.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/chancellor-agrees-new-support-measures-for-mortgage-holders

There's no guarantee but they think interest rate will peak first quarter of 2024 so if the fix ends after that should be better.

I think your catastrophising - if you are managing overpayments currently the hike up won't see so bad later. Plus overpayments add up over time - even small ones not that I think yours are small.

I think you may need to talk to GP - see if HRT or anti depressants would be appropriate.

OP - you have done incredible things in your life that you should be proud of. You have overcome so much and will do so again. Gently and with love to you I would suggest;

• seeking some support / someone to talk to through the GP or charities (including MH charities) to try and get and shift your lens a bit and make this feel a bit less dreadful
• you have a gift in a niche role that you love. Pour yourself into thinking about how to scale it. Leaflet drops, reviews - whatever
• speak to your lender and ask about your term - short term, that might take the pressure off you - even a couple of years - with a view that you overpay as you can
• this is a bit weird, but I’m a huge believer in facing down the worst case scenario and minimising it. This is the worst case and in that case we’ll xyz and come through it. Make this a practical conversation with yourself.

Also, you’re smashing it with a £103k mortgage at 44 - you have done so so well. Rates will stabilise and your increase should be relatively small. Good luck OP

I promise you - you are not worth more dead. Your children having their mum with them is worth more than anything.

Ensuring your mental health is OK is more important than anything else currently. You have time to sort out the mortgage, there are options (as others have already said)

Book a gp appointment just had telephone appointment with my GP got told no point having test as they can be inconclusive but sounded like I was said I could try hrt for 3 months see if that helped. Had not expected that question so now got to call back for another appointment. They may do the same to you I waited over 6wks for that phonecard appointment too.

so basically at the end of term you need a new mortgage for £103,000 approx over 15-17 years
15 years means it is paid off when DH is 67 and retiring
at present the best instant access saving accounts are paying 4% if that is more than your current mortgage rate ( posibly 2.3%) put your overpayments there instead of in mortgage so you might only need to borrow 100K in 6 months
at 6% over 15 years the payments according Martin Lewis site are £844 a month
at 7% £899
going down to 5% £791

Your numbers look ok and less than if you were paying rent.

Pretty sure someone will view you as an acceptable risk with those numbers.

a quick check on Martin lewis suggests that a 100k mortgage on 250K house over 15 years would cost roughly £790 a month at approx 5.8%

I worked in Debt Recovery for one of the major Banks, for well over a decade. I did Debt Recovery and Mortgage Debt Recovery. I echo what a PP said, do not bury your head in the sand. When a Mortgage falls in to arrears, I can tell you hand on heart that the LAST thing the Bank wants to do is to evict you. We explore every single avenue before that is even considered. This includes suspending your payments for a few months, to help you get back on your feet, it includes lengthening your term until age 70. Staff will try EVERYTHING to speak with you and get the payments down to what you can afford. The single biggest cause of eviction was when the customer would refuse to answer letters or take our calls, because they left us with no options. And in many cases, we had been trying to reach these people for TWO YEARS before giving up.

For a few years, I was the Executive Assistant to the Head of the whole Department. Every single eviction case was brought to him for sign off, and he would read the file from cover to cover, to make sure that staff had done everything they could have to avoid eviction. It is taken VERY seriously. It is not a good look for a Bank to be turfing people out on to the street.

You are 44, so you could lengthen your term to 26 years. That's for starters. You have a very small mortgage balance compared to most people. Your LTV is good. As an experienced Bank Manager in this field, I would be amazed if your case ever led to eviction. It's entirely salvageable.

It isn't "a little dramatic" it is a mental health issue. My guess is that many people across the country are in a similar situation.

Yes with all these headlines on any issue there’ll be people who suffer with mh

Op hang in there, it’s not a failing but it sounds you can be ok

I've not read full thread but first thing you should do is talk to whoever the mortgage is with and explain you feel suicidal and what you are concerned about and its very likely they will find a way to help. I used to work in banking and there is flexibility and repossession is very much a last resort for them and usually only when the person is refusing to talk with them or pay anything or inform them of anything.

But you also need to not be so hard of yourself, your worth is as a person not a house. Even if the worst happens and you lose the house there will be another one. Life insurance will also not pay out for suicide. I would recommend counselling. I don't recommend hrt as I have breast cancer and I would likely be dead if I had been given it but I find swimming helps me a lot. There may be a better way to do overpayments now too or a way to re fix now.

Have you looked at if you are working most efficiently for your pay. No one could say that you're not working really hard. But things like if toy switch a three day a week office job for a two day a week nhs cleaning job or HCA job you would be on a way higher hourly rate. You might be way past this and earning loads but there are ways of working smarter not harder.

Sorry I missed out the key part which is ON THE WEEKEND CLEANING OR HCA job

I don't know if anyone has already mentioned this, but a consideration is to stop overpaying. Hold on to that money, put it into a savings account and then use it to pay the increase to your mortgage when the time comes. If you can currently afford your mortgage payments it doesn't make sense to overpay and be left with no wiggle room to accommodate the future monthly increases.

It's easy for people to say not to worry - but you really shouldn't worry. I know there are thousands of people in the same position as you which means that both the Mortgage lenders and Government are probably going to have to offer more help in the future.
You are doing well to make overpayments as this can easily help cover any increase in your mortgage even it means you won't make overpayments for a little while.
When talking to your lender there are a few questions you can ask them. Such as if you keep the term the same what will your payments reduce by as you have overpaid £5k? If you maintain payments how much will mortgage term reduce by? Can you switch to interest only mortgage in the interim? Can you extend the term of the mortgage from say 25 years to 30 years?
Your fixed term has another year to run and a lot can happen in that time. In six months time you can begin to look around at mortgage deals in preparation for the new fix. You are causing yourself unnecessary stress and worry when you don't need to - yet!! Time enough for that nearer the time. You could save your overpayments that you are making so that you have money in the bank for any future increases. You have room for a lot of flexibility and mortgage terms are for a long period of your life and your house is your home - you need to calm down and think things through carefully and talk with your DH about the best way to handle things.
Your family love you and need you and if you need help to cope with your crippling anxiety then you can see your GP or self refer to Mind Matters which is free.

40 hours isn't insane but spread over 3 jobs, 3 different mindsets/travel times that's bound to take a lot more toll than one job with similar hours.

I agree with this. You would be much less tired with one ordinary job rather than trying to build a business from home that might pay off in the future when people have more money, and working other jobs to support this. I would get a normal job and return to the other thing when times are better (or not, if it involves flogging beauty products).

@mortgagequandary your bank won’t take your house without exploring every other option. They all have to offer the extend the term and offer interest only. Both of these will dramatically reduce your monthly payments and can help offset the increased interest rate on your monthly payments.

Both of these things will increase the total amount of interest you pay over the life of the mortgage but will give you breathing room until things get better financially and you can remortgage to more standard terms again.

I’d call your bank now so you understand what your options are and what your payments will be if you need to extend the term and/or go interest only so you can put your mind at ease.

I agree that you should stop overpaying the mortgage and start banking that money. You have overpaid by an average of £450 ish each month. If you can stick that in a bank for a year you have the £5500 to hand to subsidise you mortgage if needed or if you get another big car repair bill to pay it.

Having savings might help your mental health and anxiety too.

You need to think about what you can do for your health and wellbeing. You are struggling with your mental health and not sleeping well. A risk to you, your health, your family and your finances is you burn out or have a breakdown.

Despite good potential for your self employed work perhaps now is not the right time? ..the economy etc. If you get a job you could get set hours, a predictable salary, holiday pay and sick pay. I work three overnights a week in care (I'm fortunate to do this with a local authority that pays a night enhancement) and earn 20k+ a year. It would be more if I applied for/got a senior post or did overtime regularly. You are really working too hard/too many hours for your earnings.

Why not look for something Mon-Fri and keep the self employment for a Sat strictly 9-5?

You need to look after yourself. You can't pour from an empty cup.

If you're on a cheap fix it's almost certainly worth sticking the money into savings instead, as savings rates are on the up. Even an easy access account can pay more than 4% (we have a 4.36% instant access one), and if you are doing small regular payments, you can get regular savings accounts where you pay in varying sums of £250-500 a month that are giving 6+%. Then when your term ends, you can use that money to pay onto your mortgage to bring down the LTV and get a better deal (or have it there to subsidise you).

We are fixed at 1.7% till 2026, very fortuitously, so any extra money we have is being ploughed into savings as we will end up much better off this way than overpaying on a low mortgage rate. General rule is: put the money where the interest rate is highest. At the moment, that's not your mortgage.