hate it when people are shocked

midlander81 wrote: »

Well I never expected to get so many posts! It's been interesting reading through them all and if it's taught me anything it's that there are so many different attitudes towards debt.


I haven't found any of the posts judgemental and I can see everyone's point of view.

I wish you all the best in your future with your debts.

Why are people so shocked that you owe 40k on a 70k salary. I think you fell into the trap of we earn a lot, so we can spend a lot, then poor budgeting and money management on pay day has seen the debt increase.

I also think that when you earn such a salary there are a lot of non-decisions to be made for example why would you not buy what you perceive to be the best food from the nicest surroundings, why would you not go to the best gym ( I know OP said they didn’t have gym membership this is just an example!) Why would you not go for a new car every few years, or go on nice holidays or buy good presents for people. It is when you have a low salary you have more decisions to make, to get the most out of your money and to make it last.

Why is some bragging ok, but other so called bragging isn't? When you mentioned your joint income to me it was putting your debt in to context, I owe 40k but because we earn 70k if we exercise some control and prudent measures and we should have this licked, yet to some you were bragging about your income. Apparently it’s ok for certain people to brag about how they've fed a family of 15 on the grand total of £3 a day for the last six months, and how they've used the potato peelings the chickens didn't want to make a huge vat of soup out of, that will last a week, of which the left over dregs can then be used to clean the bath out with. Before anybody decides to make comment in reference to this I am a Mr Money Moustache follower. I just find it annoying when someone mentions a so called high salary it is considered distasteful, yet the opposite is ok, not everyone has the time or the talent to live a pared down lifestyle.

For some reason people think that people on high salaries have some sort of responsibility to people on lower salaries to spend their money wisely, and live within their means, and they have no excuse to be in debt.

I remember a thread about a man from a poor working class background that had pulled himself up from his boot straps and was earning a salary similar to yours. His problem was he couldn’t bring himself to spend as he was worried about running out of money. The responses were people telling him, spend this, spend that, you’ve earned it, you deserve it, your lifestyle should be at this level because you earn at that level etc etc. There was no thought to his long term plans, maybe he wanted to retire early, maybe he wanted to give more to charity, most of the advice was spend now and spend quickly. I also remember a thread where someone had asked if 14k of debt was bad if it was all on 0%, most of the responses where it’s ok, you’re not paying any interest and well done for getting it all on 0%. This was even when the OP said that if either they or their partner lost their job they would struggle to make minimum payments. People do expect people to behave a certain way based on their income. I also think some people are envious that you had 40k available credit, that you can afford the £1300 repayments you are making (granted that £1300 is someone else's entire monthly salary but it’s all relative) and that your salary is 70k so once you made the decision to clear the debt it won’t be a long and painful journey.

It’s almost as if people want you to have a bad/harrowing debt-free journey as a further punishment for being in debt on such a salary. My debt-free journey was difficult but that was my choice because I wanted to escape debt quickly.

Also at what point do you start worrying about being in debt on such a salary, certainly 15k of debt isn’t going to worry you as much as it would worry someone earning 20k a year. You are paying down the debt now and that’s all that matters. Good luck on your journey may it be as easy and pain free as possible, quite possibly the most painful part has been this thread!

Quote from James_B.
"Christian" does not mean "nice", and many nice people are not Christian.
Unfortunately for Christians and fortunately for nice people you are right.

I suppose it depends on how you feel about the debt. Are you comfortable with 57%?


After tax on my salary, I was coming out with 19k a year- but I owed 12k. That is 63%, a huge amount. I thought because I 'earned' 26k it wasn't so bad, but it really impacted me and my lifestyle, and next month I will be out of debt.


Upon reading about debt, I heard that you should never be more than 10% of your salary in debt. I think that whatever makes you feel comfortable is right- now, I don't want any debt on my name whatsoever.


Whichever way you look at it, you're going to have to make some lifestyle changes- that's the bit that's going to hurt.

I worked in a mortgage department of a bank for many years, and saw people applying for remortgages, so they could add their unsecured debts to the mortgage.

I left this employment 5 years ago.

Up until the time I left, £20000 of unsecured debt was commonplace, £40000 was not unusual, and there were extreme cases where there was £100,000 of unsecured debt.

So the size of people's debt never shocks me, because I've seen it all before

misskl wrote: »

I suppose it depends on how you feel about the debt. Are you comfortable with 57%?


After tax on my salary, I was coming out with 19k a year- but I owed 12k. That is 63%, a huge amount. I thought because I 'earned' 26k it wasn't so bad, but it really impacted me and my lifestyle, and next month I will be out of debt.


Upon reading about debt, I heard that you should never be more than 10% of your salary in debt. I think that whatever makes you feel comfortable is right- now, I don't want any debt on my name whatsoever.


Whichever way you look at it, you're going to have to make some lifestyle changes- that's the bit that's going to hurt.

Excellent post