Stuck in a 1 bedroom flat - is there anything we can do?

southernscouser

I'm a little confused. You say the mortgage takes up 3/4 of your husbands pay, which at £750 means he would take home £1,000 a month but earning £23,500 a year should be nearer £1,500 assuming no deductions for pensions, health care etc. :undecided


Also have you tried posting on the DFW board. They'll be able to help you reduce your outgoings and offer tips for making a bit of money doing things like clickthru's, free bingo/scratchcards etc.

Essexgirl81

southernscouser wrote: »

I'm a little confused. You say the mortgage takes up 3/4 of your husbands pay, which at £750 means he would take home £1,000 a month but earning £23,500 a year should be nearer £1,500 assuming no deductions for pensions, health care etc. :undecided

I'm going by what my hubby says he's earning and what he's paying out for!

I know that the mortgage is £750 per month because I used to pay half of it until I had our daughter.

carolt

Have a look at the Debt Free board for advice on managing your finances as best as you can.

I agree - the figures do sound a bit odd.

If you do pay for childcare, you'd get help towards the childcare costs from childcare tax credits. And once your child is 3, you'll get free childcare for 15/hours a week - from 2 in some areas. Maybe you could childcare-swap with a friend with similar-age child? Working half a week each, looking after 2 kids the rest? Or even both become childminders - then the govt will pay you to look after each other's children! Could even do this with a family member, I believe.

It is one of the great ironies of our age that the govt will give you money to pay someone else to look after your child but none if you actually want to spend time with your own child.

Loopy.

cupid_s

Essexgirl81 wrote: »

I'm going by what my hubby says he's earning and what he's paying out for!

I earn just over 25k. I pay student loan repayments and pension contributions and pick up 1422. So surely he must be earning more than 1000 per month.

Also I'll second getting an evening job. Even 2 evenings a week (in a pub for example finding these hours is not that difficult in my experience) would really help financially.

RAS

I wouold be inclined to try and tough it out until your fix is up and your penalty no longer applies.

Do come over to DFW, do a Statement of Affairs, see here http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html and we can point you to things like up you income etc.

One factor though - if you go out to work part-time, you do not pay NI or tax, so every £1000 you earn is like a £1400 pay-rise for hubby.

gerkin

Flats are at risk of losing upto 60% of their value. We are talking 2 bedroom flats here. Your flat might be worth about 60K by the end of this year. Selling up now and cutting your losses seem the best option at the moment.

carolt

But I'm not sure you CAN sell if you're in negative equity? Do the lenders not make you repay the missing equity first?

The OP may not have any options.

puddy

if you can sell now without going into negative equity then you should think about this, BUT

firstly the idea of moving in with your mother, who clearly has other stresses and will be affected financially by you moving in with her, may not be a good idea. no matter how good a realtionship you have now, it will have to be miraculous to stand up to you lot all moving in, her still caring for your sister, the general strains of life etc, its not impossible but im not sure its that practical.

secondly, you couldnt rent your flat out whils tliving with your mother because then you would be paying the rest of the mortgage of 251 and the 400 to your mum for her rent, putting you at only 100 better off each month, not much point.

thirdly, i absolutely agree with those who are saying, try if you can to stay put. when it comes to the end of your fixed rate, you dont need to 're mortgage' as such, you just agree to go to the lenders variable rate, they are very low at the moment so you will be much better off. you could use the living room as your bedroom, putting a sofa bed or whatever in there when your daughter gets to about 2. until then, its fine for her to share your room.

lastly, the child care thing just needs some working at (im not dismissing how challenging that is) but you could get some weekend work, some evening work at supermarkets, some online work, some part time work which may have creche facilities etc. that way, you could (almost) double the family income and make it much more bearable for you while you ride this out.

ps, i know what you mean about the maintenance charges for flats, mine is also around the 1200 pa mark and its driving me mad.

good luck, but i really think you need to try to be extra creative with ideas of how to make it work for now and stay where you are

barnaby-bear

Essexgirl81 wrote: »

Trouble is......where can you find work as a Scientist (Chemistry) in the South-East that isn't contract work? Two of his friends have recently been made redundant from their jobs and they worked in the same sector for much larger companies.

GSK, JM?

But if one/both of you have science degrees try tutoring. So few science teachers or the ones teaching it have degrees in health/sport/environmental sciences that there is huge demand for tutors esp. chemistry as all the wannabe doctors need it... it's easy work in the evenings/weekends £25-30 an hour and it can be quite rewarding...

shirlgirl2004

I doubt you'll get what you paid for your flat. The problem is that it's a relatively new estate and there are loads of similar flats and houses. I'd expect to pay less than that for a 1 bed in Chelmsford which is generally more desireable than Braintree.

Have you tried either Tesco of which there is one very near you and another large one not so far? As already suggested bar work, cleaning, ironing anything that will bring in extra cash will help to keep you going. Is there any possibiltiy that you could earn more money than your husband?

Looking after children is hard at the best of times and being cramped desn't help but it looks as though staying put is going to be your only option.