Girlfriend in too much debt....

beer_tins

Can you look at her contract for the flat? Even if it is a fixed length contract, it is not unusual to have clauses e.g. either party can give 3 month's notice after 6 months, or one month's notice after 1 year. Well worth checking. I live in London myself - in zone 3 - and pay a fair bit less for my mortgage each month on my 2 bedroom maisonette. She can definitely find a 1 bedroom place in a less desirable (but not horrible) area for under a grand. Even if it's just until she gets back on her feet.

Also, the phone deal may let her downgrade her package after a certain time (usually 3 or 6 months).

arambol

Yes, I've checked the contract/ lease. It's an odd one. It's a 2 year lease with out a break but option to renew afetr year 2. So there is a break clause but not till after the 2nd year.

Landlords wanted this (security of a tenant) and my girlfriend was happy (at the time) to commit for 2 years as she didn't want to move every year.

beer_tins

arambol wrote: »

Yes, I've checked the contract/ lease. It's an odd one. It's a 2 year lease with out a break but option to renew afetr year 2. So there is a break clause but not till after the 2nd year.

Landlords wanted this (security of a tenant) and my girlfriend was happy (at the time) to commit for 2 years as she didn't want to move every year.

Ah OK. Shame. An unusually strict contract then. Guess she'll have to sit tight for now by the sounds of it if she wants to avoid the costs of cancelling.

arambol

Just checking all the options.....

Adding it up she owes circa £40k. She won't be able to get a new or extend her existing unsecured loan to cover it as the maximum is £25k I believe. Is a secondary loan of £15 possible/ allowed or can you only have one unsecured loan?

anniestar

Hi I haven't read all of this thread (sorry will do later) but re the cat food.
We have 6 cats all of who are on a dried diet. James Wellbeloved/Royal Cannin due to health conditions(and them being seriously spoilt) I spend about £65 per eight week cycle.

However we also have recently started to buy COSTCO own brand dried cat food. (After reading various threads about the quality of it and taking advice from own own vet)
It is FANTASTIC:j Very high quality and very reasonable. Our lot adore it and it is fantastic for sensitive tums. With the VAT included it costs £15 odd(can't find our last reciept sorry) for 11 kilos(25lbs)
.
That might be the downside for your G/F ie storage but other than that it is fantastic.
I wouldn't hesitate to reccomend this.
Hope this is of some use.
Good luck.

Charco_2

Do you mean for a consolidation loan?

You need to sit down and think long and hard about this type of thing!

So long as it's affordable it should be ok but for my tuppence worth, by the time you've factored in all the various savings that can be made she might just be better off facing her debts as they stand! Little things like moving as much of the debt onto lower interest rates might help but juggling like this involves a certain amount of conentration too!

bunny999

I know she is tied in to her lease at the moment but she should start to think about moving to a cheaper area. Lots of places are way cheaper than Belsize Park.You can rent a flat in Walthamstow for about £700 a month. It's got good transport links - Victoria line and would save her several hundred a month. Have a look at rightmove. Flats to buy start at approx £130k. You gf needs to stop living beyond her means.

arambol

Loan from the bank to cover just her credit cards at a more reasonable rate.

Keep the 25k natwest loan and take a separate £16.6k to cover her cards.

arambol

I've also put her laptop on ebay and it's sale price will go straight to the Virgin card.

RAS

arambol wrote: »

Loan from the bank to cover just her credit cards at a more reasonable rate.

Keep the 25k natwest loan and take a separate £16.6k to cover her cards.

Hi

As a general rule consolidation is a very poor idea. Apart from the fact that the monthly cost is lower, it usually requires longer to pay off the debt and costs MORE in total because the payments stay the same instead of reducing over time.

The other factor is that 85% of people who consolidate then rack up more debt. Ask a lot of folk on here who have done just that and often doubled their debt before having a real LBM.