BritPilot flying to debtfree heaven

Cerisa

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 3333
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3333

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 1731.6
Secured loan repayments................. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 128
Electricity............................. 90
Gas..................................... 49
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 38
Telephone (land line)................... 19
Mobile phone............................ 10
TV Licence.............................. 12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 38 - Cancel This
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 433 - This seems excessive. Where do you shop?
Clothing................................ 167 - Definitely unnecessary, if you must have clothes, buy them from ebay or charity shops
Petrol/diesel........................... 160
Road tax................................ 23
Car Insurance........................... 52
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 20
Car parking............................. 20 - could you nix all this by using a bike/public transport?
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 94 - Might be worth getting a pre-paid certificate?
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 8
Buildings insurance..................... 16
Contents insurance...................... 13
Life assurance ......................... 233 - Cancel This
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 21
Haircuts................................ 21 - Get your hair cut at colleges, or do it yourself.
Entertainment........................... 50
Holiday................................. 83 - No holidays while your in debt. It's that simple.
Emergency fund.......................... 92 - Don't bother saving while you have debt.
Total monthly expenses.................. 3621.6

Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 350000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 6000 - Sell
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 356000

Secured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly.. .APR
Mortgage...................... 258912...(1731.6)...6.99
Total secured debts........... 258912....-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly.. .APR
MBNA...........................13712.....22....... .22.49
American Express...............117.......5.........18.8
Mortgage (Unsecured)...........28636.....0.........6.99
RCI Finance....................3123......143.......8.9 9
Honda Finance..................14250.....212.......0
IF Loan........................6947......214.......8. 39
Barclays Select Loan...........14607.....194.......9.61
Loan from friend...............5000......0.........0
John Lewis.....................1669......83........16.9
Egg Green......................13909.....278.......17. 9
Egg Blue.......................4691......93........16. 9
Capital One....................788.......23........24.94
RBS............................12928.....202...... .18.32
Total unsecured debts..........120377....1469......-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 3,333
Expenses (including secured debts)....... 3,621.6
Available for debt repayments........... -288.6
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 1,469
Surplus(deficit if negative)............ -1,757.6

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 356,000
Total Secured debt...................... -258,912
Total Unsecured debt.................... -120,377
Net Assets.............................. -23,289

slummymummyof3

Also look at cashback sites for things like your car/contents/buildings insurance etc (topcashback.co.uk, quidco.com, cashbackkings.co.uk). Your wife definately needs to go and get a job....does she have a profession at all or is she unskilled? At least if she starts working you can then start using her entire salary to knock down some of these cards as well as cutting back on some of these very high outgoings you can start to make a dent.

BritPilot

hypno06 wrote: »

Hi, A dmp may not be your only option - and indeed, if there seen to be no surplus (which is what your SOA suggests) then it may not be an option at all, or at least more difficult to set up.

If you wife is willing and able to work, then a full time job would help to balance those books.

I know absolutely what this level of debt feels like - I have been there and done that. But whilst only one of you is earning, and you do not have children to work around, it seems to be the most obvious way of minimising that shortfall.

any shortfall then can be made up with cutting back, ebaying, and generally embracing the MSE way of life (believe me!).

Remember, that a DMP trashes your credit rating for 6 years. In that time you will find it difficult to obtain credit for anything - in fact it is usually a condition of your DMP that you do not obtain credit. Whilst this may not be an issue in the short term, it certainly has to be something you need to be aware of.

You need to also address what it is you have spent that money on - is that spending something that has naturally come to an end (eg doing a house up), is it everyday spending, keeping up with the Jones', some sort of addiction (eg gambling or shopping) etc. There is no point in tackling it from the outside if you are not tackling the underlying cause as well.

Hope that helps!

A large amount of the money was used to do the house up and is at an end absolutely and there is no other spending problem apart from liking good food.

I agree that something has got to give and I wont be going on holiday or spending further on the house.

A DMP is out of the question 'cos of the credit trashing and doing more work may be one way of getting me out of this mess.

The other thing is what can I do to rearrange my credit cards and loans?

RAS

Hi

You might be able to do more work, but what sort of tax will you be paying???

If your wife works even very part-time, the first £5,000 is free of tax and Ni contributions. So that is like you earning £8K or even more if you are on a higher tax bracket.

blackclouds

Hi Brit

Fellow newbie here, as others have said any reason wife cannot get a job even p/t to help with paying this off as you need to up the income. If most of the debt is on housey things you are both benefitting from them so only fair if she is fit and able.

I have been in 2 relationships where I tried to be the provider, guess what Im now on my own with a shed load of debt and bust business.

Regarding love of good food, me too ........ however I make everything at home myself, eat good tasty food and if I spend more than £1.50 per portion on my main meal I get cross with myself.

Good luck

Horace

It is possible to eat good food on a budget.

I buy all my meat at the local butcher - when I have extra money from my challenges, I go and have a spend but never spend more than £20 and with that I can buy NZ lamb chops (I hate british ones), aged topside of beef, rib eye steaks, packs of large chicken thighs.

I get my veg at the local market garden, or I will take myself to a local farm (or even my mum's garden). I bulk cook and freeze what I can't eat that day. The rest of the stuff is bought in Lidl.

I always make a list when I go shopping and if I don't buy everything on the list then tough it has to wait until the next time I go and I have to do without.

Before anyone says anything - I get £60.50 a week JSA and I pay all my bills, credit cards and a little over £120 towards my rent (the rest being paid by HB). I am also in the process of setting up my own business so my credit cards have had a bit of a hit lately with buying things like letterheads etc.

My credit cards are all 0% interest ones:j which helps. It is hard but you can do it with a bit of effort and ingenuity. I ebay and carboot too. Lately, I have started bartering - my typing skills in exchange for services, food etc.

Good luck.

tyllwyd

BritPilot wrote: »

...I agree that something has got to give and I wont be going on holiday or spending further on the house.

A DMP is out of the question 'cos of the credit trashing and doing more work may be one way of getting me out of this mess.

The other thing is what can I do to rearrange my credit cards and loans?

With the figures you posted, I can't see that rearranging your debt is going to help at all, because you are spending £290 more than you earn each month before you have even thought about paying them. Can you do a revised budget which covers all your living expenses and leaves something over for debt repayments, because if you can't, then I don't see what option you have except a DMP/IVA/bankruptcy or moving house to downsize and release equity.

(About the life insurance - is this instead of a pension? Because if you have a work pension, it might provide a lump sum & income for your spouse. Just a thought.)

Edited to say - about doing more work - you've got your income down as £3333 and your deficit as £1757 - which is more than half of your current monthly earnings. If more work is available, how much extra are you likely to be able to earn?

ltm07

Hi, just stumbled across this thread & can see that many of you have given good advice to BritPilot on how to reduce his outgoings. Please don't take offence to this, but I don't think that people should be telling the guy that he shouldn't take a holiday. I agree that maybe £80 month to budget on a holiday is too much for a guy in his situation, but in my opinion the advice that he should be given is to budget less for a cheaper holiday, rather than not have a holiday at all. From my own personal experience, I have found that cutting back too much just to be DF quicker & missing out on things made my OH & I want to quit the whole DFW journey, but allowing ourselves that bit of slack means that we are slowly clearing our debts, whilst not missing out at the same time. Obviously everyone is different & some want to tackle their debts alot faster than others, but we have found over the last 3 or 4 months that we have struck the right balance & are alot happier than the first few months when we were trying to clear our debts as fast as possible.

WorkingHardDFW

Hi BritPilot and welcome

You've already been given lots of sound advice ref cutting back your outgoings and increasing your income. Making ends meet to use the old fashioned phrase must be your priority at present. The most obvious way is for your OH to bring in some income to bridge the gap as well as cutting back where ever you can.

I note ltm07 point about not cutting back drastically. I would agree to a point however I guess its about how you get to where you are in the first place. For us our £52k of debt was some overspending on nothing very spectacular month after month .....

When our LBM came on it did so slowly and its took us about 4 months to realise how deeply in we'd got and another six months to learn about changing our spending habits to start to make progress. Even nearly a year on we are still learning.

What I am trying to say is that its what works for you. Closing the income outgoing gap is number 1 priority whilst trying to understand, really understand, how you got into debt. Only then can you change.

There are some fantastic people on the boards with loads of wonderful advice, its never dull!!

Zulu_Dawn

Hi there Britpilot

I can totally empathise with your situation.

My serious point is that you need to recognise that you are in serious trouble. Your current situation is completely unsustainable and you will not be able to meet your payments in very short order unless you tackle them ASAP.

There is already lots of sensible advice on here so I won't repeat it. I suppose my key point is that this debt will not go away. Just the interest on your unsecured debt is soon going to be over £1,000 per month. You can't afford to pay anything currently. Therefor unless you can seriously increase your revenue or decrease your expenditure (to the tune of £1,800) your situation will continue to deteriorate.

At my worst my unsecured debt was greater than yours. I had to accept the situation I was in, contact CCCS, reorganise my debts and change my lifestyle completely. That said I am so grateful I did and life has never been better. I still owe a lot but virtually every penny I repay reduces my debt further. My ability to borrow has been limited but frankly I never want to borrow again so why should I worry.

Best wishes with your challenge and well done for posting. It is the first step.

ZD