Can we have a support thread for people who are massively in debt?

[Nerfmother]

Because you can't talk about it in real life? We owe 44k, reduced from 60k in a year. Not including mortgage.
It's so depressing.
Dh is determined to pay it off and so bankruptcy or plans isn't an option. I do think its doable, just hard hard hard.

I'm good at tightwad cooking (that's why I'm no longer in debt! )

Managed to go to Sainsburys to buy bread, on a fast day, and walk back out having just bought the one loaf of bread. No extras.
{willpower emoticon}

Yup, list the tins and the dried goods and we'll sort you some nice warming menus

Cupboards:
2 cans of beans
3 cabs children's spaghetti
Macaroni sauce jar
Ragu tomato sauce jar
Dolmio bolognese jar
Dolmio pasta sauce with Mediterranean vegetables
2 packs spagehetti
1 pack whole wheat pasta
Egg noodles
Ramen noodles
Brown rice
White rice
Minestrone soup
Vegetable soup
Meatballs
2 x macaroni cheese
Chicken soup
Mushy peas
Garden peas
Mr mash
Baby new potatoes
Plain flour
Self raising flour
Bisto favourite
Oxo cubes
Bisto cheese sauce
12 different types of tea
Toastie bread
Bran flakes
Olive oil
Normal potatos

Fridge & freezer:

Chicken mini fillets
Chicken breast fillets
Minced beef
Bacon
Sausages
Sundried tomatoes
Pickled onions
Green pesto
Sour cream
Garlic butter
Skimmed milk
Birds eye chillies
Salsa
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Onion
Carrots
Swede
Savoy cabbage
Eggs
Cheddar cheese
Sunflower spread
Lightly spiced wedges
Green beans
A single beef medallion
3 portions frozen spag Bol and a frozen ham and mushroom tagliatelle (for DP if I'm not about - I don't like either)

Actually it's quite a lot. There's also various instant noodles and pasta packets.

Tonight I'm doing a slow cooked vegetable soup as it's a fast day.

kitty wow, great list. Will have a think about meals from it when I'm not supposed to be working!

A lot of money came in this month... and it's already been spent. My wages didn't, meaning I won't be paid until end of Feb now :( So that means just the minimum will be paid off debts, rather than being able to throw more cash at it. DH meeting tenants later to work out a payment plan from then. Can cover it for a while, but not long term.

£100 worth of buy it now stuff on ebay - fingers crossed it goes!

Aims for Feb:
get paid
end the month no more than £500 overdrawn (total for all accounts)
make £100 from ebay, gumtree, etc
not buy any clothes or make up
pay minimum off the Big Debt (this should happen automatically as DDs set up). Currently £8236, so should be less than £8k in debt by end of month too.

The money one - I've only realised that even if you can't pay it off, you can avoid making it bigger. So buy as little as possible and wait for march. In my head I keep saying 'small steps small steps'

I also have a pataks korma sauce for two and two naan breads.

I pretty much know what I'm making with those

Chubby
out of interest, did writing it down like that give you lots of ideas?

I just went to a different Sainsburys and spent a LOT more than I intended because they have things I do not normally see. Oh well. Just have to remember to eat them all!

It made me realise we're not going to starve anytime soon so I've made my shopping list for Sunday with just the essentials. Milk, cheese, bread, meat. Although we only need chicken so I'll get it on 3 for £10 and freeze some.

Kitty that's brilliant. I'm off to aldi later!
Good news, dh has told me his salary is less than I thought. So I have reclaimed the CB and am putting it in six month bonds so we can keep the interest and any part we are entitled to. £55k so maybe half? Will pay anything off a credit card after 13/14 tax year.

Hi everyone, please can I join too? Thank you OP for starting this as I am desperate to talk about our debt that has been plaguing us for years now and have never talked to anyone in RL about it. I mention the debts but don't say the amounts . I've been so stressed with it all that I ended up on beta blockers for anxiety at one stage. Apologies first that I haven't yet had the time to read the whole thread - I will but just wanted to get my story down first in case anyone has any immediate bright ideas.

We have around 40k of credit card debt (too scared to actually work out exact amount!), owe my mum tens of thousands too but thankfully not having to repay her yet (v lucky I know). All debt comes from renovating a house that went over budget. Ironically we have about 500k(!!!) of equity in the house but can't get to that without selling.... (Planning on putting house on market this year, can't yet due to having tenants in)

So, we have rented the house out and moved abroad! Rent covers the £2000 per month credit card bills, mortgage and insurance type stuff. We rent an amazing house for £600 per month in a rural part of a much cheaper country and DH has loads of work so we are absolutely fine where we are now. It's also so rural that there is hardly anything to spend your money on which helps.

However, I was really hoping we could have used at least some of the rental income to pay off some debts but at this stage, am absolutely gutted that we're not even out of overdraft yet, every month we still go overdrawn by about 4k. Sooo utterly fed up of not being able to repay anything. It's the credit cards that are crippling us at about £1100 a month doing the minimum payments.

I promise I will make the time to read the whole thread as so many of you seem to have paid off debts successfully. What I really want to know is if there is any way of reducing the interest so that we can start actually paying off without just keeping our heads above water. Some of you seem to have contacted companies who adjust your debts? Do we really need to sell the house to pay all this off? I was so hoping that by renting out the house, it would effectively pay for itself and all the renovation costs so that we wouldn't have to sell. But sadly, that just doesn't seem to be happening.

Thanks for reading if you've got this far. It's been totally cathartic to just write this down and admit to all this after all these years of horrible stress for our family

Hi debt full. Are you hoping to keep the house and pay the debt off?
Could you freeze the interest and pay off capital?
Could you remortgage?

Hi nerfmother, thank you for replying. Selling house is our last resort which we have only just in the last week come to realise that (we think) is our only option. Didn't want to sell it as it took years of stress, hard work, love etc. to actually finish it. When we realised we'd have to move and rent it out, we even had to spend thousands more just to get it in to a state for renting. Though part of me almost hates it for what it's done to us, I really want to keep it and use the rental income to pay for the debts.
Definitely can't remortgage as wouldn't be able to show enough income for even the mortgage we have at the moment.

How on earth do I freeze the interest? I've always thought that we can't go bankrupt or stop the debts as we have so much equity in the house. Is there a way? That would be amazing if you've got a magic answer for me

Other people will have direct experience of doing it; it messes up your credit rating a bit I think.

Ok, am googling it now. Think I'm past caring about credit rating now.....

Debtfull
have a look at my spreadsheets for debt - linked up thread or on their own thread on the board
they show where the light at the end of the tunnel is hiding ....

Everyone, can I recommend " National debt line". They are a free service that can advise on all situations. A lot of people on this thread have many options for reducing interest and payments, which have varied effects on credit rating. You can contact NDL for a telephone consultation and they will help with a plan.

Wow, thank you TalkinPeace, I just put in the 40k figure on credit cards.... Shocking. Has made me realise we really need to pay more than the minimum every month. But the question is how? I've so wanted to do that recently, pay off some lump sums using our rental income... But alas, just haven't managed to do it yet.
Sydlexic, I will be brave and call the NDL too. I think I just thought there's no point as they will say "sell the house"....

debtfull
lock the amount you pay at this months amount rounded up to the nearest fiver
DO NOT let it drop with the minimum month by month
you'll get through that bill a LOT faster than you realise ....

Debtful - talk to the NDL and get an idea of what your options are.

But seriously why don't you sell the house? It is just a thing, by doing it up you must have added some serious value and you say you have £500k equity. You could pay off your debt, buy a smaller do upper, save some money and start living your life again. I think its easy to get caught up in the things that are holding you back. Imagine how you want to be living, now, in 5/10 years time? Do you want to be scrimping and saving, stressed for the next 1/5/10 years? Thought not.

I would second talk ins spread sheets.
Also, am hoping this remains a lovely supportive thread so don't worry that we will all pile in on you for potentially having equity!

I don't know if this has been said but there is a brilliant book called How to Get out Of Debt, Stay out of Debt and Live Propserously. By Jerold Mundis. It uses the ideas and tools od Debtors Anonymous, a 12 step programme. It is very radical and I can't recommend it too highly.

I think some of those ideas of that book How to Get out Of Debt, Stay out of Debt and Live Propserously is summarised here:

zenhabits.net/73-great-debt-elimination-tips/

zenhabits.net/73-great-debt-elimination-tips/

Brilliant, thanks both.
I had a revelation in tesco today. But it 'instead of' not 'as well as' when applied to special offers. Cereal at a pound? Put back the one in your trolley.

So I just downloaded an app for debt management and put everything in and checked statements, letters etc and my total amount is £3557.28. There's even a debt strategy section to help pay it off 3 years early and you can add in when you've made overpayments.

I don't understand most of it but it's reassuring to see it all in one place and actually not as bad as I thought(providing I keep up payments).

Also there's one particular one I need to pay off as soon as possible so I thought maybe adding an extra £5 or so every month that I can do it would be a reasonable idea.

I won't be leaving myself short for rent and bills and food though. So it would only be when the money is spare.