Hi guys - advice needed for Scotland..... but from anywhere is appreciated

jimcon

coolcait wrote: »

Hiya Jim

Is there a council advice office/welfare rights office in your area? They might have full time staff, which might mean that they could see you quicker.

If you're interested in DAS you can find DAS approved advisers on here www.moneyscotland.gov.uk . If your CAB advisers aren't DAS approved, it might make sense to try to go straight to one of the DAS ones from the start?

You might be looking at paying your debts over too many years to be accepted for DAS, but there's no harm in asking, is there?

I'm not going to comment on Trust Deeds because of negative family experience - which makes me passionate and opiniated (but biased) on that topic!

Good luck!

Thanks for your words - I'll check the local council.



another point - Bankruptcy (sequestration in Scotland) would that be an option for me only?

coolcait

Hiya again Jim

If it's any help, I'm embarrassed to admit that I know the moneyscotland site pretty well. So if you want any help checking what advisers are available in your local authority area - happy to help!

I'm not sure what you mean by the last line of your post. Are you thinking about sequestration for just you, not your OH? If that's what you meant, I suppose that it all depends on whether or not you have joint debts with your OH, and whether you're a home owner or not?

jimcon

Hi Coolcait

we're trying to look at everything possible for us. Whether we both become bankrupt or whether I become bankrupt only.

we are homeowners with about 15-20k equity

we have a joint loan of £24k and a joint overdraft of £2k.
Joint mortgage too.


everything else is in my name, the cc's and cars.

basically as I'm self employed and work has dried up it looks like we are going to lose our home as we have no money for anything at the moment.

so perhaps bankruptcy is an option for me or for us.

jimcon

spoke with payplan and they will call me back

they need profit etc from my business - but my books are not in yet so can only hazard that

it's looking more and more like sequestration for me because we are really struggling to pay the mortgage this month and I've been advised that mortgage arrears effectively makes a trust deed impossible.

Taygal82

Unfortunately, with no income and the current mortgage market it does look like sequestration is you're best option in the long term. No income would mean a Trust Deed wouldn't work either.

Hopefully someone's told you about the sequestration process, in that you can't just turn up to court and declare yourself bankrupt. If you have no income and assets of less than £10k you may qualify for self-sequestration under the new legislation. If you're house value comes back at more then its a waiting game until someone takes action against you I'm afraid.

Please take heart though, it may be that you're house might not have to be sold. MAny factors come into play, falling prices, lack of buyers, martital home/family home legislation.

I'm thinking of you and you're family and hope something can be done.

Take care

dancingfairy

While you are waiting to sort sequestration or a trust deed. Don't forget you can still be shopping around for suppliers for gas/electric/ cutting your food bill etc. While they are not going to sort your problem out they at least get you used to living on a reduced budget which I imagine you will need to do once you are on a trust deed or have gone through sequestration. It might also help you to feel more in control of things. It all helps and it will all be steps in the right direction.

Firstly have you got enough food and money for food?
Try a storecupboard challenge to use up any bits and pieces you have.

The next priorities are obviously mortgage, gas, electric etc. I would imagine your credit rating will be shot anyway in sequestration or a trust deed so would it be best to conentrate on the absolute essentials and send everyelse a token £1 and a budget and explain you are seeking advice?

Is there any money you can send to cover the mortgage? If you can't pay at least if you can send them some they might see you are trying to do your best?

Hope these suggestions help a bit.

jimcon

another question

Payplan advised 2 things re saving my home if we go down the sequestration route - well it was the same thing but 2 different opinions.

if we sell the equity in our home to a relative there will be no profit in the house for the IP to realise by making us sell.

now one advisor said we had to sell the equity for a fair and reasonable amount i.e. if it's 25k we can sell it for say 17k.

the other said we could sell it for a pound.


can anyone clarify?

coolcait

jimcon wrote: »

another question

Payplan advised 2 things re saving my home if we go down the sequestration route - well it was the same thing but 2 different opinions.

if we sell the equity in our home to a relative there will be no profit in the house for the IP to realise by making us sell.

now one advisor said we had to sell the equity for a fair and reasonable amount i.e. if it's 25k we can sell it for say 17k.

the other said we could sell it for a pound.


can anyone clarify?

Hiya Jim

If you're seriously thinking about bankruptcy, please be very careful about selling the equity in your property. This could be seen as 'gratuitous alienation' which (if I understand correctly) is pretty much a posh way of saying that you deliberately tried to put assets out of reach of the trustee before going bankrupt.

You might be able to argue a case for accepting say £21,000 rather than £25,000 (for a quick sale, m'lud). £17,000 rather than £25,000 would be rather harder to argue. 1p rather than £25,000 would be (I reckon) an impossible case to argue.

If you're talking about a relative buying out the equity AFTER you're bankrupt, then the final decision would lie with your trustee. But I'd reckon that he/she would be thinking pretty much along the lines of the above.

There's also the question of HOW you would make yourself bankrupt (if that's what you opt to do). If you've got property, then you can't take the Low Income, Low Asset route. So do you have any way to show that you're 'apparently insolvent'? Have any of your creditors served you with a charge for payment, for example?

There's info about all of this on the Accountant in Bankruptcy website, but I'm afraid I can't get it to open tonight to look for it, grr! But this is the address: aib.gov.uk

Good luck!

iwanttosavemoney2008

jimcon wrote: »

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1400
Partners monthly income after tax....... 650
Benefits................................ 208 what is this benefit?
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 2258

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 585
Secured loan repayments................. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 132 this seems high are you paying arrears? is it over 10 months? if so ask it to be paid over 12
Electricity............................. 59 so high check comparison sites to get a better deal
Gas..................................... 54 same as above
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 13
Mobile phone............................ 60 check you are getting the best deal for you martin has a guide http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/phones/mobile-phone-cost-cutting
TV Licence.............................. 11.48
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 21 cancel and get freeview
Internet Services....................... 30 check you are on the best deal http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/phones/cheap-broadband
Groceries etc. ......................... 300 cut back use http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.html?f=33 as much as you can
Clothing................................ 50 this will have to stop til you can afford it
Petrol/diesel........................... 170 use the car less or get a more fuel effiecent car
Road tax................................ 20
Car Insurance........................... 20 check comparison sites to get the best deal
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 25
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 360 is there another option for example can granny/ grandad look after child a few days?
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 10
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 10 again check you are on best one
Contents insurance...................... 10 see above
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 20
Haircuts................................ 45 student night you get your hair done much cheaper with a qualified stylist there in case things do go wrong
Entertainment........................... 30 sorry if you can't afford it dont do it
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 2035.48

Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 120000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 0
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 120000

Secured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 88000....(585)......5.9
Total secured debts........... 88000.....-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Lloyds TSB Mastercard..........15550.....350.......19
Marbles........................5750......96........21.9
RBS Gold.......................3950......86........19.9
car payment....................4500......132.......5
Car payment....................3500......97........5
RBS Overdraft..................2000......25........0
RBS Personal loan..............20600.....377.......0
Halifax........................3500......65........0
Total unsecured debts..........59350.....1228......- the others will be better at the unsecured debt

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 2,258
Expenses (including secured debts)....... 2,035.48
Available for debt repayments........... 222.52
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 1,228
Surplus(deficit if negative)............ -1,005.48

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 120,000
Total Secured debt...................... -88,000
Total Unsecured debt.................... -59,350
Net Assets.............................. -27,350

.

My comments are in red

Verbatim

There was also a thred on here by someone who'd gone BK explaining how to make it most likely that you won't lose a house. One tactic was delaying the court hearing and I think allowing arrears to increase to reduce the equity as much as poss. I'm afraid I can't remember who possted this as there was quite a bit more but someonde else might remember??? In anycase have you posted on the bankcruptcy sub board?