What Caused Your Debt in the First Place

lynzpower

University. From going from college ( free) with part time job at Mrs Ts ( earning about 180 a week) to living in an unusual city,with no experience of budgeting on an income which is only a debt of 3k a year, which takes so much longer to pay back than spend! The attitude everywhere is "we are all in debt, debt is fully financing the next few years, but you'll get an amazing job & be able to pay it off". BUt when youve got the good salary, my behavoiur & attitude to debt was "it doesnt matter everyone has it". Got no value out of my degree at all, the job I have now is a 5 GCSEs job + experience.

What a waste of time & money!

THE_LONE_RANGER_4

me i lost two jobs due to being made redundent all with in 3 months then unemployed for 4 months,had no debt etc until then savings went debts started to slowly climb. on way to being back to normal other than not one debt ie credit card etc so golden rule dont lose your job if you do get another bloody quick

isgman

Well Paid Job... Gone.. (from £35+k to £13K) that and the fact I had a "Rolls Royce" taste and a "Ford" Income..., Kids, Wife, Grandchilderen, Me. lots of things.. guess its about the same for most of us. In one word..."Circumstance"

VP

Two things got me into debt - being a student and travelling (I went to Oz and the surrounding area for four months with OH and we didn't exactly "backpack").

I know it's my own fault and I often wish I wasn't in debt. If I had the chance to do it again, I don't think I'd have spent quite so much money whilst at uni, but I wouldn't change our trip for anything.

We also bought a house a couple of years ago, and the government now expects us to afford the mortgage on that, to save for our retirement, to pay off our student debt on our brilliant graduate salaries, to save for our kids (which I thnakfully don't have yet - they cost so much money!) and to cope with ever increasing costs of living whilst salaries aren't increasing in the same way.

The worst thing about student debt, though, is that you can't see it going down. I still haven't had my statement for the year ending 5 April 2005!! And I've been making a payment each month since then.

PaleScene

We spent what was there, didn't go too mad, but never really looked at whether we were getting best value and certainly never balanced or examined the bottom line.

Then I had to stop working and we had to learn to tighten our belts *and* to open our eyes. That was a steep learning curve, especially as we spent a while mistaking 'taking credit' for 'staying afloat'.

I now practise the Mad Eye Moody school of Constant Vigilance! with a daily banking watch and monthly spreadsheet. I'm still not very good at overviews but it makes a huge difference just to think all the time and be aware of what and how things cost us.

tesuhoha

Well it sounds as if some of us had something we really wanted and the remainder had bad luck. No irresponsible wild spending apart perhaps from Amosworks unless he/she is joking!

Amanda65

Unfortunately my OH works in an industry where he goes in and solves all the companies problems and within two years they are very grateful but decide that the next way to cut costs is to save his salary and make him redundant. 3 kids and a mortgage (with an underperforming endowment!) have meant CC getting the better of us. Fingers crossed though that 6 months after the latest redundancy he is now back in work and we have enough left over to pay off the cc. We will then budget for the next time he loses his job, and hopefully this, together with having done a thorough check on where we wasted our money, will mean we won't get into this situation again.

dinkylou

Mine, like others on here was from going to uni (about 10k) and then moving into the 'graduate lifestyle' where you forget about your debts and just spend your salary.
Trouble is, I found myself spending more than my salary.

And so when the bonuses arrived they would pay off the overdraft but I would think that as its called 'bonus' that its extra and I would treat myself to things.

I would never say that I had the 'champagne' lifestyle as I wasnt as frivolous as some people but I did spend more than I had.

That all started to change when circumstances meant that I bought a house and I really started to look hard and organise my finances. Its all been more positive from there. And now I'm on the road to recovery with all of my debt and student debt on its way out.

tesuhoha

I think my daughter is on the road to debt because she is at uni and she has no job and she has booked a trip to thailand on her 0% student overdraft. That would be bad enough but she has to live on her loan. I have no money to give her for the trip and she wont listen to me. I think once she gets a job it will be the same as all you guys; she'll move into the graduate lifestyle and not worry about her debt. She is quite good at managing her money on a day to day basis but does not really think about it.

Cantdance_2

1. Going to Uni to do a degree which I didn't end up using :mad:
2. Taking my bank's advice and getting myself a credit card at age 18, living in London!
3. Trying to constantly impress my wife by going one bigger and better with every birthday and Christmas present plus surprise weekends away for anniversary etc...
4. Buying and doing up a complete sh!thole of a house
5. Getting my first decent job and the huge payrise that came with it and believing that we were now rich and could live the lifestyle we'd dreamed of.
6. Developing expensive taste and believing only the best would do... e.g. the luxury executive VIP villa at Centerparcs rather than the bog standard one (difference being a different colour carpet!)... Tesco finest meat and veg... front row seats for concerts from eBay rather than whatever was available at the box office!
7. Gadgets and gizmos - the latest DVD player, surround system, laptop etc
8. Masses and masses of CDs and DVDs that didn't necessarily get watched / listened to
9. (I'm sure my wife won't mind me saying this...) Masses and masses of clothes and shoes that didn't necessarily get worn...
10. Next Directory - wow, a whole shop in a book! And we can have up to £3600 you say? Right-oh!


I think that'll do!

James