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.

aroomofherown
triage the debts by interest rate
and yes, the debt to your Mum sadly comes last : but when you tell her what you have acheved, the interest will be payable in champagne and a nice meal

Thanks Talkin that is now my next job!

Welcome aroom x

Thanks Talkin and MGN.

I've already set up DD on the others thanks to your advice on this thread Talkin. I wasn't sure whether to knock them all out evenly but I'll try to lay off the highest rate first with every spare penny I have.

Er, pay off

Hello new people

Hello Nerf - it's so good to have a place to be honest about money.

I'm so excited this month - if nothing surprising happens, then we are on track to throw an extra £300 on our cc this month!! We have 4 birthdays and 3 mothers days to buy for next month though - so it won't be quite as great next month... even if they do only have a £10-£15 limit on presents!

Morning all, nice to see lots more people on the thread and some more good stories. We had a nice day yesterday with dh's family and managed to only put £10 diesel in the car! We did spend £16 on McDonalds on the way home as we were all starving and it was a treat for the kids. Today we are having a lazy day - our only one of the holidays really. If the sun stays out we will go to the park with scooters/bikes but we'll take drinks/snacks with us and the parking is free.
The dc have lots of ideas for todat - Wii marathin, board games, jigsaws etc so should be a fun family day.

Well done on the extra money Bumbolina! It feels great doesn't it? I have just realised that either this m onth or next I finally pay my last payment to HMRC. They overpaid us CTC about 3 years ago even though I informed them of the changes and we have been paying it back ever since. It's only been £14 a month but nevertheless it's another £14 I can throw at the debt!

Thanks Abbylou. Sounds like you've got a nice day planned - I love a free day!

I suppose one of the "perks" of being a teacher is that I have so much sodding work to do over half term that I've hardly been anywhere.

I'm over at my parents so that DS can play with nephews whilst I work. I did part with £50 at the supermarket paying for some meal stuff for everyone on Weds, but NSD for rest of week and should be NSD tomorrow too.

Hi All, hope you dont mind another new person joining in. Reading this thread this morning has inspired me to be more proactive with dealing with debts. Last October me and DH almost entered into an IVA but DH was not keen so we are trying to sort our debt out ourselves, although I have had some help with Citizens Advice about mine.

I owe £4040 to various catalogues and that also includes my overdraft. DH has about £9000 on loan and credit cards. Plus our mortgage in currently on interest only. The difficult thing is DH does not talk about money and buries his head in the sand but im going to have to force a discussion. We keep our money seperate but we are married so i see it as any debt is shared.

I feel like i am a lot to blame for the debt due to the fact that when we bought our house 8 years ago i was working full time (earning the highest salary of the two of us) and due to health probems, for the last almost 4 years I have been a SAHM. I hope to return to work by the end of the year.

I have managed to stop all interest on my accounts and am paying back much lower payments, i have nothing left after paying this and my share of the bills, DH overspends on silly little things, like newspapers etc. on paper we should have a little money let every month but in reality it just isnt happening!
This thread has been the kick up the bum i needed to start a spreadsheet, start looking at cutting bills and to get our money issues out in the open with DH.

I seem to have waffled a lot, thanks to anyone who reads this and wish me luck talking to DH tonight!

thewildones
welcome aboard.
Have a look at my spreadsheets : ready written and free to download
and then yes, start triaging those debts downwards

If we want to think about remortgaging at some pint is it a bad idea to ask for interest to be frozen? I'm guessing it is?

Have downloaded one of your spreadsheets Talkinpeace, will start inputting once I've spoken to DH.

Hello new people!

Dorito - I hear you about working in half term! Marking, marking, marking for me this week

A week until payday for me and I have almost managed to NOT use my credit card - I have one card which is a mega high interest one and the DD is set to pay off in full each month. It is supposed to be for emergencies only and had a £200 limit until they up'd it to £700 in November.

This month the full payment is a hangover from Xmas - almost £300. So I paid this in full and have not used it

It is tight but I have £30 in my food pot, £40 in my petrol pot, and £50 in my purse. So I think I can just about make it without respending on that card. I also have £107 from my sales to put towards my new TV but I don't want to dip into that.

Day out with kids tomorrow which was paid for on a groupon in December, going to the supermarket to get snacks and if they are lucky they can have chips and a sausage for the chippy on the way home - no meals out for us!

Nerf - there is a chance that if interest is reduced the card providers will start reporting your account as "arrangement to pay" which is as bad as a default. But they might not. Santander put me on 0% interest but report my account as up to date as I pay over the minimum. Barclaycard put me on 6.7% and report as "AR" and MBNA put me on 3.95% and put a "Debt repayment plan" marker on the account.

Hey all Ive been absent for nearly a week (work related) so loads to catch up on! Still to do my budget/update for this month, so will be back with that in a bit in the meantime:-

Pixiestix, dont beat yourself up were all on journeys and have to accept that sometimes circumstances might interfere with our well laid plans. Are you keeping well? How long now til BabyPixie joins us?

KinkyDorito result on the MOT, well done! 500 to one of your cards is a fantastic result! Im paid monthly too and get really twitchy between pay days its a good sign though (I think) that were in the zone lol I do budget for treats, 20 per month which goes into my envelopes account.

Thebluedog I try not to dwell on how I/we got into the situation, focus your energy on how youre getting out of it DP has a considerable commute every day too so hes under orders to only get petrol at Tesco lol

Welcome AbbyLou, your plan sounds spot on! I love good spreadsheet too lol great result making good use of your Tesco vouchers! I got 23 last month but have put them away for emergencies! How are the clothes sales going? Ive dump Ebay in favour of local FB selling page. The monthly shop doesnt work for me I meal plan and budget weekly, and if I run out of money, I run out, no top ups! Some weeks are easier than other though I must admit and I will stray from my meal plan if I find some bargains/reduced items. Any food budget I have left over at end of the week goes towards CC1, even if its only a couple of pounds

Well done reducing the OD puffylovett. An emergency buffer/fund is an excellent idea. Mine is currently 500 but will add to this once CC1 is paid off in March. Isnt it funny how kids pick up on your situation my DS knows looking at a toy if its expensive (so he knows it would be a birthday/Christmas treat!)

Kazzawazzawoo how is the pre-sale decluttering going?

Welcome Burma never too late for this party! Its good that youve had a shift in focus make the most of it! I know it may be hard to focus on it for times that seem so far ahead, but it will help keep you organised and in control

Bumbolina welcome! Its great that your husband is on board with you, I know there will be more than me who are envious of his buy in! At last month Id repaid a princely 1% of my total starting debt lol 300 extra to your debts for the month is a great result, well done!

Ishesingle welcome to you too, sounds like your organised! Keep the new TV as your motivator!

Winterlover hello! Dont be disheartened paying back 20 per month is better than 20 more debt keep at it! Have you done a full budget to see if you are able to make any savings elsewhere that you could throw at it? As TalkinPeace says, even just an extra quid or two could make a huge difference over time. Tracking your progress so far will be really good to keep you motivated.

Ellietrying sounds like you are doing similar to me with weekly food budget and the envelopes system how is it working out for you?

MamaDuckling hello to you too! How are the sales coming along?

LucyLasticBand welcome!

TalkinPeace glad were giving as much to you, as you do for us youre a star x

MyGoldenNotebook welcome! Can I be a pain and get you to double check that the Standing Order and Direct Debit details are the same for your repayments? Only speaking from experience some Banks use a collection ac to take in all the DD payments which they then credit to your account (hence it might not show as a credit on the same day it debited you)

Aroomofherown welcome!

TheWildOnes welcome! How has chat with DH gone?!

WHOAH! Epic post lol ...

Thanks for the advice MumtoFergus - I will check that!

Having a NSD here in the form of cosy day at home, after a busy week of castles and mountain walks a go go.

Gosh reading some of your posts I must be a very slack teacher as have done no marking yet - though I will be working most of tomorrow. It's so hard with tiny ones at home I find. I always go in early to do work in term time and stay late but do little at home (apart from summer hols when I do a good week) Ahh ... teacher guilt! All part of the fun I guess

This is such a lovely thread I have to say and thank you so much for the warm welcome.

I've not confessed our debt yet - here it is gulp...

£2k OD although they never seem to charge us more than about 40p a month for this facility so not too worried about that one for now.

£6k on credit card down from £16k a couple of years ago. We've sent the card away to a friend's freezer and only use if for proper emergencies. We pay £350 per month off it (£100 of that is interest) and hope to increase that until it is gone.

£10k bank loan which was actually part of the CC debt transferred into a loan - pay off £600 per month and will finish paying it next spring which will be great.

£2k accountancy fees bleugh. Paying £500 per month and another two months to go.

Mortgage is hideous - £333k on interest only . Fair bit of equity in house and when loan and other debts paid off we will start to properly overpay as only paying a few hundred a month on it which just about covers the interest - keeps me awake at night it has to be said.

No store card or outstanding utilities etc.

We can cope with it on a month to month basis but it's the mortgage that really gets to me - we have 17 years left and no real plan as to how to pay it back.....

I've cut back massively, no more clothes, frivolity, food from Aldi etc but it does all feel a bit like a drop in the ocean.

Children are at a lovely age (one is 9 years old and twins of 11) where we want to take them on nice holidays - I'm sort of prepared to be in debt for holidays and then when they don't want to come with us more worry about paying it back. Crap idea I'm sure but I have this complete live for the day attitude which has kept me in debt (but having a great time) most of my life.

No-one in RL knows about this except me and DH - most of my friends are great with money and a couple of them are mortgage free which I find amazing and am a little bit of their good sense.

I know the holiday thing is pathetic and everyone will be horrified at how stupid we are .

omg that was far too long - sorry !

Thanks isshesingle. I think I need to keep going until September when dh will have been working a years. We've agreed to review things then.

So, February update from me paid on Thursday, money for DDs/SOs transferred, along with my envelopes money and 500 to CC1. Emergency Fund down 160 for DP MOT which I will repay when he gets paid and repays me! Roughly half of this weeks food budget left to do me til Sunday, confident I will have some left over which will go towards CC1.

CC1 currently 1121 (but interest still to be added) aim to repay this in full by end March.
CC2 3630 (interest free, minimum payment)
CC3 5079 (interest free, minimum payment)
Loan 7679
Mortgage 89961

And as at the end of the month, I will have repaid 3% of my starting debt balance ... woohoo! Lol ...

Burma - I totally hear you on the holidays, I was the same right up until October last year. I paid approx 2k for a week in the sun, and when we got back DS said 'next time, can I just go to visit Gran?!' So, no more til I've paid down a significant proportion of the debt ...

Burma, can you not transfer your 6k credit card to a 0% card? Sorry if that's a totally obvious thing you've already explored..