A thread for people trying to pay off debt?

[moneyworries8]

Would there be any interest in this?

I'll start us off. I'm 30, a SAHM with 2DC.
Our debts are:

£4,000 loan that we've been paying off for 6 months.
£2,300 on a credit card

The debt is manageable but I've had the realisation that if something doesn't change, these figures are going to get bigger and bigger. I know it's a hard time of year to start but I don't believe in "waiting until the new year!"

We could post on here for advice/support as well as sharing our successes (and failures, but hopefully there won't be many of those) with each other. I feel like I need some people to help keep me on track.

So, is anyone interested?

@Ta1kinPeace I owe about £18K. A mixture of all sorts of nonsense from payday loans, catalogues to credit cards etc... The only good thing is that everyone has frozen interest/charges & currently accepting token payments. My problem is how to increase my income so i can actually pay it off. I'm a single parent & hardly earn much as I need flexible hours

@Ta1kinPeace I agree. In fairness I only ever have 3 - a work one which fits my laptop and I have had for nearly 2 decades now. A small cross body one for my wallet, keys and phone that goes every where with me, and a capacious one that I use when I have the children and fits their medical bag (epipens &inhaler)
and general child detritus, or I use for extra layers etc if out with DP. I have probably had these at least 8 years and they cost very little so definitely good ish value for money. Am not a handbag collector and agree about “brand” pricing to a degree although when I have bought v cheap they have tended to break on me!
I am cross I haven’t staggered the replacing better though, rather than leaving everything until it is so broken I have to replace it all at once!

Oh god I’m stressed tonight. I had a massive mess with my UC last month (they didn’t pay me due to my employers cock up).
I also got emergency taxed so I only got £595 all month. I couldn’t make my mortgage payment and I was already in arrears. My attempts at repaying the arrears have failed 2 times over the last 12 months - unemployment, benefit cock ups, salary cock ups etc. And I’ve been sent a 15 days notice letter to commence repossession.

I’ve rung them immediately and stated that I am paid on Tuesday and am planning to call to arrange a direct debit and repayment plan. They’ve said they may not accept it and still proceed due to the unreliability of my payments in the last 6 months. Which I’ve stated have been due to circumstances beyond my control. Really feeling anxious and shaky.

Zoflora
Oh, that sounds utterly horrible.
BUT
Re Mortgage. Tell them to burger off with bells on.
(a) This High Court ruling www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46834533
(b) Contact your MP right now to point out that you are being threatened with repossession due to UC
(c) Making children homeless is a big no no for mortgage lenders england.shelter.org.uk/housing_advice/repossession/repossession_rules_mortgage_lenders_must_follow
(d) Threaten to bring in the press - Private Eye are a good start

You will get through this
but you need to hoik up your big girl pants and tell your lender to get real or get V V V bad publicity

and your MP will jump on this like a demon
(as they all love non Brexit case work at the moment)

Thank you that’s made me feel better at least I can prepare for the conversation on Tuesday

I’ve just registered with prolific academic as an additional income (albeit it isn’t much).

@zofloramummy it sounds like you are doing all the right things and the guidance talk has linked to all looks really helpful.
Will keep things crossed for you for Tuesday. They probably just say that stuff to make sure people take it seriously. They will know that if it went to court and you had shown you had a plan in place then they would have no chance of getting a repossession order.
That doesn’t take away how horrible it must feel to be going through this though. Sounds like you have had a very tough year.

I've taken your advice and reduced my savings and paid off the whole balance of my Littlewoods catalogue so that's an £83 a month payment I don't have to make anymore.

I have,

BARCLAYS BANK LOAN £16,400

VERY - £800
NEXT - £800
STUDIO - £105
PAYPAL CREDIT - £600

I'm going to tackle the catalogues first as they have a lot of interest on them from what I can work out.

Yup, think about how much you are paying in interest every month and try to minimise that.
The interest rate on "Very" accounts is awful for example

I know the I couldn't actually find the interest rate they claim it varies depending on your credit score.
I mistype the PayPal one as well, that's only £100 left to pay so I'll do that one along with Studio next.

Squash
If you use my Credit Card spreadsheet you should be able to work backwards to work out the rate
I'll guess it at around 40%

I'm feeling really low tonight.

This week I've been invited to attend 2 things, both of which are quite a while in the future and both of which I'd love to go to, but I've had to make my excuses. The problem is, I don't have that many friends around here and by not going to things, I end up as someone who'll just stop getting invited places with them and not part of the friendship group.

The issue is, in the next 6 months, I'm going to be paying around £1000 for driving lessons & tests (intensive course) and also buying a car. We lease at the moment so we are going to stop that, save as much as we can and get a loan for the excess which will cost about the same per month as our car lease and at least at the end of it we'll own the car.

I'm just finding it hard to be the person who has to say they're skint. I'm an army wife so all the other husbands do the same job so it's embarrassing to say we can't afford it 😢

On the plus side our credit card debt is down to £1200 (from £2400) after DH got paid extra after previously being underpaid.

Still making our monthly payments on our £4,000 loan which we've made 10 payments on (I miscalculated in my first post when I said we'd been paying off for 6 months). It's a 3.5 year loan.

I've worked it out and it's a total of £3700 more to pay off between now and the end of the loan. The way I'm looking at it is that at least we've paid off more than the interest now.

Please don't take having to say no to heart, I understand how difficult it is when you are worried about the costs of social activities.

Is there any way to suggest something you could do with your friends that won't cost as much?

Paying the overpayment straight towards the debt was a great move.

@moneyworries8 could you invite people to do something else, that’s free/ low cost? Even my friends who like doing expensive spa days etc with each other are just as happy to come to mine for a cuppa or go for a walk or something

Also, everyone knows how expensive driving lessons are, so it’s fine to use that as the reason. I had zero spare money while learning to drive because I wanted to learn as fast as possible! (My son was needing lots of hospital trips and it was a total pain on the bus).

Also, I bet anything you aren’t the only one feeling the pinch. But some people would rather get into deeper debt than turn down activities. Stay strong and suggest cheaper activities and I bet loads of people will be relieved!

moneyworries
I too have recently turned down invites die to money. I could accept the invites but one of them is a day out which will cost about £70 just for me and I just can’t justify that when I want to pay down my debt. I rarely go out and would love to go but I just feel that my priority has to me my debt right now.
I am considering spending £10 a month in national trust membership though so I can take the kids out a few times a month for just the additional cost of petrol. Some things seem to be much better value for money than others.

Moneyworries
All that has changed in your friendship group is that you are paying your debts down whereas a frightening number are still adding to theirs.

Definitely suggest economical meet up excuses ....

In my NCT days we used to do a monthly "American Supper" - everybody brought one dish, everybody bought a bit of booze - and a big sociable cheap evening was had by all
and small kids were asleep in a row of buggies in the other room

Hi all, just checking in.
My budget app is really helpful, I'm checking it and my bank balances each day.
In relation to my cc I figured out if I can repay £200 a month, £100 a pay check (not including interest) it'll take me 14months, so next March. If I can repay £250 a month, £125 a paycheck it'll be repaid in 11months so before the end of the year. That has inspired me to at least try to up my repayments. It's a bit tricky as my hours are not fixed and I'm earning different amounts each month. But next month I'm working full time which should give us a bit of a cushion for living expenses for subsequent months when I don't earn as much. I'm hoping to go back to full time work next September (teacher).
I am realising that financial instability is really bad for my mental health and I'm the only person who can give me financial stability. So I'll hopefully get through the rest of the year OK and in Sept I'll be back in charge of my finances

Hi!
Can I join please? I seem to have pulled my head out of my bucket of sand today and decided to tackle my debt head on after a phone call/letter from the court bailiff etc.

Hi there SpecialAgent
Pull up a chair, settle down and tell us where you are and we'll see if we can help you through it :-)

Sorry guys, had a bit of a moment there feeling sorry for myself but I've snapped out of it! Thanks for all the advice. Social pressur is tough, but our debts getting bigger would be worse so I just need to accept where I'm at right now.

Can I just say Talk, I'm so so happy you're on here! You've given me and so many others such great advice! Thank you

Hi Moneyworries8
I know its technically your thread, but as you know I've done loads of these
and I know that a firm grasp on the shoulder from a stranger can often make the difference
Hang on in there

Thanks @Ta1kinPeace
I haven't been paying debts for forever. Single parent, low income etc etc. Got in touch with StepChange today have been advised that a DRO would be my best plan of action. My credit rating is already in tatters but can't afford a bottle of wine to drown it's self pity! My total debts are £8K which I know isn't a huge amount for some but I'd have to sell both kidneys to improve things to be able to pay anything significant and to stop threatening letter/bailiffs/phonecalls etc