End of tether

DramaQueen29 · 6 December 2006 at 3:42PM

Hi all,

Now i remember about 7 years ago talking to a friend who had £3000 of debt and thinking 'wow Im never going to let that happen to me!' How wrong was I .....

Ill try and be short but its a long story .... I moved in with my partner 2 years ago, he had debts due to uni etc and his creditors have not been kind, none have stopped interest or sold the debt on so his debt has literally doubled.
I had very little debt apart from a car on HP which i later took out a lower interest loan to pay off. My partner got made redundant and I couldnt afford to stay at Uni so when a job offer for him came up in the south of england we jumped at the chance however relocation costs did mean taking out a loan. His job was well paid and it meant he could go on a payment plan and all hunky dorey for a bit anyway...

We were renting a house from a friend ( bad idea) anyway we had to get out and the rental prices in the south hit us like a brick, we took on a house which we could well afford but then my partner was made redundant again due to company take over.

I was working but couldnt afford the rent so took out 2 more loans ( yes i know it was silly but at the time we didnt think he would be without work for long) Anyway we had to move out of this house as we couldnt afford it, loose a couple of thousand deposit and find a rat infested chicken house.
I could just about afford the rent but we were still £300 short a month so this is where credit came in again. We sold everything we had inc my car and for cheapness i got a motorbike meanwhile my other 1/2 trying desperately to get work, any work.

8 months down the line it we obvious we couldnt afford to stay in the south we had two months left before all money had dried up so we decided to come back up north, no money, no jobs, stupid possibly but we couldnt survive any longer so something had to be done.

I had a set budget for the move but due to a wheel clamping ( parking at our old house to get mail!!! and appeal refused!) and my motorcycle being stolen, the money drain started gurgling again.

Anyway to the point, We have ebayed everything we have, moved north and have a nice cheap house and both looking for work in earnest.

I wont put a monthly buget down yet as neither of us are working its a bit of a stale time especially coming up to xmas.

Adding insult to injury:: ( hope you havent fallen asleep yet)

my last employer overpaid me, but i wasnt given a payslip and only found out by email when i hadnt internet access. They are now asking for the full £600 back immediately anyone know where i stand on this?

It got spent as my direct debits swallowed it up without me knowing until i got this email and checked my bank.

My bike has been written off and Im only getting £100 for it

due to excess etc - worst thing was i had sold it for a profit before our move and the lady was picking it up 2 days after it got nicked

We have put in for benefit claims but hoping to be working asap however even this will take 2 weeks and we are having to scrounge food from my parents.

We Still have a huge council tax bill left from the south which has to be paid before 15th Dec no leeway ( weve sold the last things of any worth to cover this). My previous employers are also dragging thier heels with my jobseekers form and p45 due to the overpayment.. can they do this?

Our last rental agency is saying theres loads of things wrong with the house we left, and thier saying that they will be taking a lot of our deposit, we know full well it wasnt that bad but cannot get a straight answer from them, a wise woman told me the other week - never pay your last months rent... i see her point now .

( Im whinging at this point as you dont need to know most of that, but it feels good to write it down)

My debts are about £40,000 unsecured only a small part of this was for my car the rest was on moving, interest, and living, I have come to agreements with most paying about £2+ each but obviously this cant go on indeffinately.

My partner 's are about £65,000 unsecured but he had to come off the repayment plan due to the redundancy, citizens advice were very helpful but none of creditors aknowleged his letters apart from 2 which he has payment plans with now, done by himself not through a third party.

Why do they not aknowlege his letters? and keep pilling on the interest? Ive been fairly lucky most have stopped interest but one or two are stuffing it on at a rate of knots.

We are trying hard to keep afloat but legacies from the south just keep on popping up, we are supposed to be getting married next year but obviously need to sort out this mess pronto before even going there.

Im trying to budget weekly but finding unsuspected bills keep cropping up.

I better stop now as i think this post is getting far to long for anyone to read without getting bored :rotfl: i will read through the forum for help and advice.
We have both learnt hard lessons from the last two years but lessons learnt.. can we have a break now please?!?!?!....

JGWT8M · 6 December 2006 at 4:00PM

Welcome to MSE, and welcome to the Club.

Somebody else will go into further detail I hope, so all I'll say is post a SoA and the fine people here will try to help the best we can.

One thing jumped out at me, the house you are living in now, do you own it or is it rented? I'm in a similar situation apart from my debts were incurred trying to prop up a failing business, and I'm now working towards Bankruptcy, at first it was the last thing I wanted to do, but considering what I owe, it's the only sensible way to deal with it, might be for you too if you don't own your house, have any major assets and there isn't a clause in your tenancy about BR.

Best of luck.

P.S. Renting from a friend, worst thing we did too, nowt wrong when we moved out, but they still took 75% of the deposit for repairs, Solicitor told me because it was an unregulated industry, it wasn't worth fighting it.

lynzpower · 6 December 2006 at 4:24PM

in terms of getting your deposit back , you may well have a case- this needs to be taken via the small claims track, as I presume its under 5k

Yes, an SOA is vital once weve seen that we can take it from there

iolanthe07 · 6 December 2006 at 4:43PM

I agree with JGWT8M that bankruptcy may be the best way out for you - your situation seems very difficult and you have had some bloody awful bad luck. Take professional advice first, though. Hope you sort yourself out soon and can get married next year.

melaniec_2 · 6 December 2006 at 4:52PM

HI

I don't know for sure but some years ago I heard that if you were overpaid and it wasn't your fault you are not obliged to pay it back.

With this in mind I didn't repay an employer that claimed they had over paid me they did send a couple of letters but i ignored them, they should have done their job right. As i said I'm not sure if this is correct in terms of law but nothing else happend. At the time I could afford to pay it back but it was the principle.

In your case you simply can't pay it so don't.

It also sounds to me like bankrupcy is the best solution for you guys, with the best will in the world with those figures it will take tens of years to pay it back.

Good luck and by the way I moved to the south from the midlands and it went tits up, short story I broke my foot and never recovered, the people were horrible to me and I just hate it here the only reason I stay is because of my BF but I've persuaded him to move so hopefully in the new year he'll sort his job out and we can escape too.

Take care and look after each other.

lavidaloca · 6 December 2006 at 5:01PM

Others with a lot more advice to offer will be along shortly I know. I just wanted to say don't worry about not having a P45 your new employer will give you a P46 form to complete and put you on the emergency tax code until all is sorted out so you'll just pay a bit more tax per week/month and then a refund when it's all sorted if you don't owe tax from any previous employment. Good luck to you in finding jobs and sorting your finances out. You'll feel a lot better when you get some positive advice from others on here who have been in the same boat.

DramaQueen29 · 6 December 2006 at 7:36PM

JGWT8M wrote:

Welcome to MSE, and welcome to the Club.

Somebody else will go into further detail I hope, so all I'll say is post a SoA and the fine people here will try to help the best we can.

One thing jumped out at me, the house you are living in now, do you own it or is it rented? I'm in a similar situation apart from my debts were incurred trying to prop up a failing business, and I'm now working towards Bankruptcy, at first it was the last thing I wanted to do, but considering what I owe, it's the only sensible way to deal with it, might be for you too if you don't own your house, have any major assets and there isn't a clause in your tenancy about BR.

Best of luck.

P.S. Renting from a friend, worst thing we did too, nowt wrong when we moved out, but they still took 75% of the deposit for repairs, Solicitor told me because it was an unregulated industry, it wasn't worth fighting it.

We are renting, deffinately cant afford to buy, Theres no point in me doing a SOA yet as we have no income but i will if our claim goes through or we get jobs.

Ive decided to do all communications with work in writing so Im covered

thanks for your supportive comments everyone:D

Little_Miss_Winner · 6 December 2006 at 9:03PM

HI,

Welcome to mse. I have read your story and really feel for you both.

But the bottom line is this between you you owe £105,000.

Even with very, very well paid jobs, and after all direct debits, and costs of living etc. You would need to earn huge amounts to make anysort of dent in the amount owed. You didnt say what you do for a living?

I know your not working at the mo, but when you both are what sort of figure do you think you would be looking at to pay off each?

You must have an idea of the sort of work your'e both after. Based on this info, how long would it be before you have cleared £105 k ?

It's a lot of money.

Folk on these boards will give you loads of advice, the key is to keep posting, and stick with it. The only way is up as they say.

Hugs
pot
x

DramaQueen29 · 6 December 2006 at 9:11PM

Together we would normally bring in about £57k a year but my other 1/2s been out of work for a bit and looking at a career change so this could lessen a fair bit.

We have had several letters from credit agencies offering to 1/2 debts etc if we pay within 3 month installments etc - Im hoping to be able to do this with some of the smaller debt - when both working again. The good thing is ( if there is one is most of the debts are small so possible to do this with, theres only 1 loan which is mine at £18k which is more difficult however interest has stopped on this and payments accepted.

We also might consider a IVA when in work but have been told to be careful with these although it would mean we could be debt free in 5 years.

At the moment its stasis until we have jobs and what jobs we get obviously will dictate what we can do.

gettingitsorted · 6 December 2006 at 9:23PM

i would haft to agree that your circumstances at the moment would lead me to think that bankruptcy would be a viable option for you,have you thought of contacting payplan the cccs or national debtline the links to there sites are at the top of the page .

DramaQueen29 · 6 December 2006 at 10:17PM

yep as said my partner was with CCCS but they then dropped him saying he had to go on IVA after 1 year however then he was made redundant, I am on a DMP but after he lost his job things went awry for a second time and decided to go it alone as the cccs have given me lots of help and advice on doing so.

TBH i am going to do all i can not to go bankrupt i dont think emotionally i couldnt deal with it

End of tether

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