Been refused!!

maforduk

Hi all,
807.37 What I get paid
60.00 Credit Card
30.00 Electric Bill
48.09 NTL (Broadband for online bannking etc and Telephone)
54.29 Sky Digital (TV, going down to £15 soon)
72.00 Council Tax
207.00 Rent
2.16 Overdraft Draft Protection
23.00 Water Bill
152.85 My Loan
57.00 Coal
60.00 Petrol (approx)
200.00 Shopping (approx)
54.67 Dfs (Direct Debit) Sofa
39.83 Car Ins - AA
410.00 Paid in from wife account
416.71 Balance at the beginning of Jan '06 (Stupid bank charges are killing us!)
(Overdraft limit of £270)

---

846.13 What my wife gets paid
45.98 Wife's Loan
110.00 Choice - Catalogue
410.00 What wife pays into my account
540.00 Balance at the beginning of Jan '06
(Overdraft limit of £500)

What can we do, we can't change credit cards to 0% or anything as we keep getting refused. After getting the report, we only have one late payment on there. But because I didn't know that, we now have alot of credit checks against us! Any help or suggestions please?

Thanks

GettingThere_2

Hi maforduk :hello:

Is this all your outgoings? Just looked through the figures and it appears that you should have £436.63 left each month after shopping... Is there any way you can throw any of this this at some of the debts to bring them down? Just a thought ...

h4nym

Hi Maford

Some questions for clarification:

1. Are your bank accounts in credit? If so, why the bank charges? And why the Overdraft protection?
2. Do your loans also have Payment Protection Insurance? if so, kill immediately!
3. NTL is incredibly expensive at £48 - change to BT and get a cheaper broadband package - there's alot more competition on the BT platform.
4. The credit card that costs you £60... what's the balance on it?
5. What are your other loan balances?
6. What are the APRs that you're paying on each loan?

Answering 6 will help you to prioritise your repayments.

Strikes me that you have enough spare cash to be able to reorganise your finances sufficiently to be able to get out of any mess reasonably quickly...

All the best

H

maforduk

GettingThere wrote:

Hi maforduk :hello:

Is this all your outgoings? Just looked through the figures and it appears that you should have £436.63 left each month after shopping... Is there any way you can throw any of this this at some of the debts to bring them down? Just a thought ...

Yeah, everything seems to happen every month!
e.g.
November - 2nd Wedding Anniversary
December - M.O.T. (£40 and it failed, plus repairs & another £40 for it to get M.O.T.'d again)
January - Washer/Dryer broke

maforduk

h4nym wrote:

Hi Maford

Some questions for clarification:

1. Are your bank accounts in credit? If so, why the bank charges? And why the Overdraft protection?

No, where livin off our overdrafts and sometimes over them, hence the charges (£25 a charge)

2. Do your loans also have Payment Protection Insurance? if so, kill immediately!

No, no protection!

3. NTL is incredibly expensive at £48 - change to BT and get a cheaper broadband package - there's alot more competition on the BT platform.

NTL is the cheapest after i'm constantly looking for better deals

4. The credit card that costs you £60... what's the balance on it?

£2700 limit with £2660 used.

5. What are your other loan balances?

Mine = £4,120.17

6. What are the APRs that you're paying on each loan?

unsure at this time, will have to check, i wont be able to get a lower rate loan as i'm getting refused.

Answering 6 will help you to prioritise your repayments.

Strikes me that you have enough spare cash to be able to reorganise your finances sufficiently to be able to get out of any mess reasonably quickly...

All the best

H

Thanks for looking at this and replying.
just noticed this ha ha ha - funny looking group hug! :grouphug:

h4nym

OK - so it will cost you £300 to get back within your overdraft limits. That still leaves you £150-odd to live, let alone the "surplus" on your wife's finances.

Have you tried getting your overdraft limits raised? They will normally be quite happy to do that if you're under your limit - but don't even try if you're over your limit. Is it really that difficult to avoid spending £300 between you?

On the bright side, your anniversary won't be coming round for another 10 months, and your MoT is sorted for another 11. And I know the feeling on the washer/dryer - ours decided it wouldn't work any more until we'd thrown £135 at an engineer to fix it a couple of weeks ago too!

Again, my instinct is that your situation needs little more than a little belt-tightening to resolve. Between you, your wife and a bit of facing reality, you could be "in order" within a month or so, and on the road to debt freedom shortly afterwards. Again, with a degree of belt-tightening you could be debt-free within a couple of years, and still leave yourselves time to save for a cracking celebration of your 5th anniversary!

Kind regards

H

maforduk

Thank you for your help but I left out pre-school fees that I pay for my 2 and half year old, also my one month old daughter EXPENSES!

h4nym

OK - set out a full statement of affairs - for the pair of you, together with the APRs on everything you're paying interest on.

It'll help you understand your situation, and will ensure that everyone on here will be able to help as much as needed. That way you get your group hug!

Kind regards

H

Xbigman

You need to do a full budget with everything on it. There are lots of bits getting added on each time you post. No criticism intended but this is a sign of poor budgeting. Also your yearly expences should be saved for. You have an anniversery every year and you know when it is. Likewise car/house ins, xmas and birthdays are all known about in advance. Things like the MOT you should allow extra for, say £150 each year and carry over any underspend to the next year. As for your anniversary, agree a spending limit with your wife, say £20, and both stick to it. You just need to put more thought into the presents you buy. Having an emergency fund is a good idea but if you are in debt then keep it small until the debt is cleared. £50 can go a long way in a crisis as long as you are prepared to go without something for a week or two.
Good luck.
Regards


X

bank_of_slate

Hi Maford.

Have you sat down with your wife and done a full SOA with all aprs on it?

The APRs are very important as that will help you to prioritise the things that need paying first.
Check out the snowball calculator (will look for the link in a minute unless someone beats me to it)
Also, have you shopped around for cheaper electric?
Your £200 approx suggests that you don't keep track of your grocery expenditure.
Try writing a shopping list and meal planning to keep the cost down.
To be honest, it looks like with a bit of clever planning and re-shuffling you will be sorted out fairly quickly!
Keep posting, you'll get lots of support on here.
...Linda xx

maforduk

bank_of_slate_and_nazi wrote:

Hi Maford.

Have you sat down with your wife and done a full SOA with all aprs on it?

The APRs are very important as that will help you to prioritise the things that need paying first.
Check out the snowball calculator (will look for the link in a minute unless someone beats me to it)
Also, have you shopped around for cheaper electric?
Your £200 approx suggests that you don't keep track of your grocery expenditure.
Try writing a shopping list and meal planning to keep the cost down.
To be honest, it looks like with a bit of clever planning and re-shuffling you will be sorted out fairly quickly!
Keep posting, you'll get lots of support on here.
...Linda xx

I'm renting from the council so I think the Electric maybe fixed - not sure!
Our finances are getting better but their still not good! I think it's the will power I lack to see it through, there's alway's something.