Repossessed - 06 Jan 2009, 22:35 on BBC One

neverdespairgirl

PasturesNew wrote: »

My last house had the previous owner's choice of kitchen - and that wasn't new. I was there 7 years and never changed a thing. It wasn't great, but it had cupboards to put things in and some kitchen top for doing whatever you do on a kitchen top ... and it had a sink for washing up things.

The kitchen in our flat was pretty cheap, I think, and put in in 1996, a year before we moved in.

It's fine. It has a floor, fridge, freezer, washer-dryer, dishwasher, sink, shelves, cupboards, cooker, oven and sink. Yes, it's a bit worn in places, but we've declined the LL's offer to replace it, can't be bothered with the hassle.

seven-day-weekend

We have two houses, one in the UK and one in Spain.
Both have quite old kitchens.

In the UK house, which we have owned for 30 years, we did upgrade the kitchen about ten years ago, we bought a few decent cupboards and worktops from a clearance warehouse , used an old butler's sink that was being chucked out of the Chemistry lab in my husband's school, and my husband made units to fit the places the standard shop-bought ones wouldn't. Total cost, I'm sure not more than £500.

The Spanish house when we first saw it had a stainless steel sink and a couple of 1970s cupboards and worktops, it was perfectly serviceable so we have left it as it is.

I actually can't begin to see what you can put into a kitchen and have it come to over £10k.

Didn't see the programme, but it looks as though it was just done for sensationalism and not to show the plight of someone who is in danger of losing their home through losing their job or becoming ill. That wouldn't be such good telly.

caveman38

wageslave wrote: »

I couldn't understand why their wives were being so farking nice to the useless lumps they were married too. Only the builder seemed willing to actually get off his ar*e and work.
If you were hiding in my spare room pretending to be a financial adviser while my kids`home was being repossessed I'd be in there with an axe.
This, of course, may well be why I am single.

Fair point, but none of the wives worked either did they. Only when faced with repossession did one of them get the butchers job.

Francesanne

Woby_Tide wrote: »

I was getting ready to throw my fancy plasma screened Amstrad Dialler through the telly (Ok I don't really own an Amstrad).

Turned into such a pointles program really, sympathy levels dropping and dropping. Most has already been said by others

Couple 1) "They talked to us like trash" - well owing lots of money and turning up at court having put zero effort into trying to plead leniency and providing a plan to try and pay it off may have meant the courts were a bit entitled to treat you as chancers.

Couple 2) "I've even had to take a job" - A job, god forbid, maybe you should have thought about that a few months/years ago. The fact he was advising others was the starkest point of that, does give an insight into how some will have gone the same route(not saying all FA are anything like that)

Couple 3) Stupidity in the work they got done, at least the bloke was actually man enough to be working all hours he could to try and solve the problems as best he could. Then he carried on smoking and another Emailer whent through the TV

No mention of the wives working (couples 1 & 3) thought that would have been the 1st step when trying to keep your home. Wife 2 worked part time for £200.00 a week, which sounds very reasonable to me plus the child benefit they would have been receiving for 7 children. Some people deserve very little sympathy. If I'd been the council offical getting a blasting from that very rude man (No.l couple) they wouldn't have even been offered a caravan to live in.

nickmason

About 30 years ago my parents moved to a run-down old house in Dorset (sign on gate into courtyard - "No carriages or dogs" )

After about 10 years, they eventually decided to install - not quite central heating - but a fancy wood burner to provide some flexible heat at one end of the house replacing an old solid-fuel aga. Took a sledge hammer to it, and it all went to scrap. :ooops:o

They never did get around to replacing the kitchen at the other end - although my father did buy my mum a baby belling when she'd had enough of the kitchen aga (again solid-fuel, entirely dependent on the wind. Gales meant hobs glowing like orange orbs).

Moved out after 20 years, when my father was no longer agile enough to rebuild the wall that blew over in a gale. (To the cottage next door, which means that every time I'm in their garden I can see the rickety old place, except that it's since been done-up twice - double glazing and everything - and is now a shadow of its former quirky glory).

:sad:

one day I'll get it back.

jcr16

i did watch this. I did feel for all families involved but a part of me kept think they could of done more to not get into that situation.

why had none of the wifes saught employment apart from 1. the guy who had the mortgage business, why did he not get an evening job to help ? could maybe a couple of the children got a weekend job and maybe given the parent a % ( not sure ages but they all looked teenager age) how about renting out a bedroom ? giv eup the mortgage business all together it clearly wans't working.

The couple who had 2 daughters wife with panic attacks bloke couldn't read or write properly. I'm sorry but when he said there's not alot i can do i can't read or write properly. i'm sorry but if he wanted to he could of learnt. his wife maybe could of helped teach him. their are course. you see people with no legs learn to drive a car. why because they WANT to. he could drive , what about being a taxi driver, bus driver. if you want to get a job but your skills are limited you can learn. why did the wife not get a job. i understand she had panic attack's. i've never had them but my mum did although i not sure to the full extent. but if she didn't want to loose her home then she should of thought about an evening job. they had 4 bedroom's , rent a room. out. ok so i wouldn't nessarily want a stranger in my house. but the extra maybe £40 /£50 a week i would do it.

the last couple. i don't undertand how after all those remortgaes the house still didn't look that well done , and he was a builder/sparks etc so no way would it of cost that much. but again , why did she not work? she could of even doen ironing from home or something. but her children weren't babies so both in school. supermarkets can often get hours to fit around.

i know it easy for me to say these things when i'm not in their situation. but looking at it i can't help but feel they could of avoided loosing their home's. maybe seeked advice sooner.

sorry if i souns harsh , just opinion.

WTF?_2

jcr16 wrote: »

i did watch this. I did feel for all families involved but a part of me kept think they could of done more to not get into that situation.

why had none of the wifes saught employment apart from 1. the guy who had the mortgage business, why did he not get an evening job to help ? could maybe a couple of the children got a weekend job and maybe given the parent a % ( not sure ages but they all looked teenager age) how about renting out a bedroom ? giv eup the mortgage business all together it clearly wans't working.

The couple who had 2 daughters wife with panic attacks bloke couldn't read or write properly. I'm sorry but when he said there's not alot i can do i can't read or write properly. i'm sorry but if he wanted to he could of learnt. his wife maybe could of helped teach him. their are course. you see people with no legs learn to drive a car. why because they WANT to. he could drive , what about being a taxi driver, bus driver. if you want to get a job but your skills are limited you can learn. why did the wife not get a job. i understand she had panic attack's. i've never had them but my mum did although i not sure to the full extent. but if she didn't want to loose her home then she should of thought about an evening job. they had 4 bedroom's , rent a room. out. ok so i wouldn't nessarily want a stranger in my house. but the extra maybe £40 /£50 a week i would do it.

the last couple. i don't undertand how after all those remortgaes the house still didn't look that well done , and he was a builder/sparks etc so no way would it of cost that much. but again , why did she not work? she could of even doen ironing from home or something. but her children weren't babies so both in school. supermarkets can often get hours to fit around.

i know it easy for me to say these things when i'm not in their situation. but looking at it i can't help but feel they could of avoided loosing their home's. maybe seeked advice sooner.

sorry if i souns harsh , just opinion.

Caught it on iPlayer after reading all the comments.

The show certainly tried to present them in a sympathetic light but there must have been a lot of stuff left unmentioned. As you say, the builder who got a nice semi-D with a big garden under 'right to buy' for 40k but obviously MEWed it all the way up to 150k because 'it needed some work doing'. Yeah, right. They got given a great house for next to nothing and ended up throwing it away.

The 'Mortgage Advisor' who seemed to be a prime example of the sort of person who just can't handle money. Yet he was busy 'helping' others into the same boat. Even when he moved the family into rental it looked like they were going to miss one of their first rent payments. And why did he dither so long about going BR - seemed like an obvious course of action from the start. All he did was drag it out and make things worse for everyone concerned.

I had a bit of sympathy for the bald bloke who couldn't read or write properly but that evaporated when he started threatening the housing officer over the phone and saying he would come round to the office to sort him out.... and earlier when he said that if the judge had been curt to him 'on the street' he'd have hit him.


I did feel sorry for their kids though - not their fault that their dads lead them up the financial Swanee.

Definitely they found cases from close to the extremes but I don't think that the people shown were that atypical of a lot of families in debt. The bottom line is that no matter how low interest rates are there are plenty of people out there who simply took on levels of debt that they couldn't possibly repay.

Any

Hi,
I also watched this on Monday and after it finished was wondering what other peoples opinions are - thank god I found this thread! I thought that I am the only one who thinks that there is no reason to feel sorry for these people and thought I might be a bad person!!

a/ I also noticed the jewellery, cars, playstations etc etc and not working wifes - and I thought - ARE YOU KIDDING ME? The way the program was made it made me feel that I should be sorry for those people - and I just couldn't be.
b/Why they didn't go and do SOMETHING? Bar job, cash job for mates? Only one of the guys did - the other two were clearly loosers.
And how about sell stuff? It wouldn't gain much, but it would put the repossesion order lead time back a bit and give them more time to find job!

When I moved in with my then partner, now husband - the house was a mess. So did we go out and mortgage mortgage and mortgage?? No, I thought - if one of us looses a job, we couldn't afford to pay more then we are paying now. So we saved and THEN bought new carpets, new TV, new floor and next is coming new bathroom. Once we saved up. My car is 14 year old, but my hubby is changing jobs so I won't sign myself into HP - what if the new job won't go well? I better wait until he is settled in - if he is then to loose the job the redundancy payment will mean we have time to sort ourselves out. For example.

As for the children - believe me, this won't hurt them. The other way round. I believe I am the way I am (responsible with money I mean) because my mother did exactly what these people did and I told myself "I will never put myself and my family into such a risk, NEVER!"

Thrugelmir

Of course have enormous sympathy with the families shown in the show.
However, if these people are representative of a large number of mortgage holders I would be genuinely surprised. My comments regarding the individuals have been covered in previous posts.

What the show illustrated is the financial illiteracy in this country. If similar people have borrowed money to play in the buy to let market. Heavan help us!

The housing market over the boom years has been nothing more than a giant pyramid scheme !

Any

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Of course have enormous sympathy with the families shown in the show.
However, if these people are representative of a large number of mortgage holders I would be genuinely surprised. My comments regarding the individuals have been covered in previous posts.

What the show illustrated is the financial illiteracy in this country. If similar people have borrowed money to play in the buy to let market. Heavan help us!

The housing market over the boom years has been nothing more than a giant pyramid scheme !

Hi Thrugelmir,
I agree with you on the financial literacy and the pyramid scheme.

Unfortunately I DO believe that the show was represaentative of large number of mortgage holders - I see it around me every day!!!
One of my ex co-workers couldn't afford properly her mortgage last year due to her husband loosing a job. But they still found it necessary to buy to EACH of their children Nintendo DS for Christmas and Wii!