Hidden debt

[Eviandoll]

My ex partner managed to get himself in debt to the tune of 40K over three credit cards back in 2012, he blamed this on the expense of his divorce, he managed, with some difficulty to get an extension on his mortgage to pay these off and he promised faithfully he would never get himself into that situation again,

Fast forward 10 years and after years of his drinking and abuse I also discovered, again that he had kept his original credit cards, maxed them out and was, again 40K in debt, at this point I'd had enough anyway and we parted, the thing that concerns me is where all the money actually went ? In the time we were together we lived a very modest lifestyle, almost frugal, never went abroad, rarely ate out (or if we did it was cheap and cheerful) and he didn't appear to be interested in gambling (he never even had an annual flutter on the Grand National) even his father quizzed me on this, the implication being that I was probably the frivolous one).

I know it's a bit silly pondering it now but a few friends have asked me and I've never actually been able to answer the question ?

Didn't you ask him? If my partner got in £40k worth of debt i'd have asked.

Drugs and/or sex workers?

He's your ex. If you don't know, how are we supposed to know? Why do you care?

@DenholmElliot1 .....I did...frequently...but I never got a straight answer and as we always had separate bank accounts there was no way of finding out that way either.

@EvenMoreFuriousVexation....my sister suggested that, but he didn't seem the type, but you never know.

Could he have spent the money on designer shoes? I saw an episode of Sex And The City once where Carrie worked out she had spent £40k on shoes.

@Watchkeys....I wasn't expecting anyone to know, just wondering if anyone could offer any suggestions, quite often people who've had similar experiences can give you a different perspectives. I don't 'care' much either, just that so many people have suggested I might to blame it made me just a bit paranoid.

@DenholmElliot1 ....this was the kind of guy who'd buy trainers from Wyndsor's Shoes and his jeans from M&S outlet, he just wasn't remotely image conscious at all.

Gambling, cocaine, prostitutes....one or more of these. I firmly believe that my exH blew a lot of money on prostitutes and gambling. He earned a LOT of money, but there never seemed to be any money in the bank.

If you know that you're not to blame, then it's silly to become 'paranoid ' about it. You didn't spend the money, why would you think you did?

Suggestions? He's clearly lied to you, so gambling, sex workers, drugs, scams, space travel... literally could be anything, regardless of what experiences anybody else has had. And what if someone suggests the correct thing - how will you know? You are literally asking a bunch of strangers how a person might waste money.

How could you be paranoid? It' literally got nothing at all to do with you.

Did he keep koi carp? They're really expensive?

£4,000 per year, £330 per month, or just over £10 per day. It could easily be a couple of expensive coffees at work and a subscription to a couple of car magazines.

Maybe he was giving money to someone else?

It was quite the scandal in my family! A cousin was similar - always broke and getting into debt yet had a good job, but it was hard to see what he was spending on. Turned out he'd got a local Spanish girl pregnant on a boys holiday when he was 19, they kept in touch and he never told anyone.
By the time it all came to light, the child was 15! He then left and moved to Spain and has been NC ever since. Shame really, I think it would have been nice to meet his family.

Not saying this is the case OP, but it's what I always think of now when money is going missing.

I got into that amount of debt without using prostitutes or gambling. No designer bags or shoes either. Just general over spending and ridiculous levels of interest on cards etc.
We did have a couple of holidays but not Caribbean AI or anything like that.
Its entirely possible.

I don’t think it really matters OP since he’s your ex

My ex was like this (but 20K) and I couldn’t honestly say that he bought anything significant. I remember looking at the statements and there honestly weren’t many purchases on there over £100. I think it was just an accumulation of over spending on general stuff. According to the DC he still has credit card debt now despite paying it off from the proceeds of the house sale. He also doesn’t have a mortgage to pay these days either! I think some people are just awful with money!

Yes that is almost exactly what I was going to say. £40k over 10 years sounds like he is just crap with money - using his card for day to day little indulgences that he can’t really afford and not paying it off. Not drugs and sex.

40k over 10 years is 4k a year, very easily spent if someone is not keeping track of their spending- if they have low wages this could have been just topping up normal expenditure, maintenance and repairs, funding debt repayment etc.

It's the interest and charges that pile up over that time, it could add up to 50% or more of what he actually spent.

@PonyPatter44 ....his parents suspected me, I know that I had no part in it.

@DenholmElliot1 ....no just a few goldfish in a bucket but that darn goldfish feed can be pretty pricey so you never know 😂😂

Thanks everyone for your responses, in answer to your comments that I shouldn't be paranoid, I guess I felt I should have been keeping more of an eye on things but I guess, as an adult he should have been doing that for himself.

This is exactly how I got into debt in my early twenties. A couple of hundred a month that I didn’t have on the little things that all add up. Fortunately I only ended up with about £4k of debt over a couple of years, but had I not wised up (and had lenders been willing to lend me more money!) I expect that could easily have become tens of thousands over a longer period.

@ComtesseDeSpair ....I managed to rack up a 2.5K credit card debt when I was a lot younger and as I could only make the minimum payments each month the interest I was being charged was stopping the whole amount reducing, I ended up working four shifts a week in a pub in addition to my day job simply to pay off the debt, and I remember screaming with delight when, a few months later I opened my credit card statement to a 'zero' balance, after that I vowed never to get into that situation again !

People in a lot of debt can generally only account for about a third of it in practice (that holiday, that car). The rest is either excess spending, or interest & penalties.

Hello - dropping in to say we've got a Q&A about debt live in Money Matters this week if that's of interest!