Debt Free by 40 Debt Diary

oakdale_minx

Two years.

You are scary you know ZTD with that new photo!

ZTD

Well, what you could do is put the extra on the mortgage to pay the loan off. If you're sure you can trust youself to not do it again without the pressure of the monthly re-payments.

Unless the penalty for the loan is approx 10% or over, you'd be best paying it off straight away and taking the hit, rather than salting the money away until the penalty ends (been there - got that T-shirt).

HOWEVER: It may be worth your while getting a bog standard mortgage with absolutely no penalty for over-payment. You can only pay a max of (approx) £700 on your loans before hitting the penalty - this may cost you more in the long-run, depending on how much money you can throw at the mortgage (been there - got that T shirt).

You can save the excess in a savings account, but you won't beat 5.69% after tax...

How much can you afford to pay off your debts pcm?

ZTD

oakdale_minx wrote: »

Two years.

You are scary you know ZTD with that new photo!

Still not happy with it. The background melts into the hair too much. Still looking for another in that theme, but 80x80 pixels isn't much...

oakdale_minx

ZTD wrote: »

How much can you afford to pay off your debts pcm?

If I stay in my current job? My take home (without any AQA) is £1735.

The essential outgoing money (Council Tax etc) totals £300.00 not including food. So if I say £200 on a very extravagant month, that is £500 outgoings.

Then I have my AQA money on top of that going back into the bank. I'm averaging about £450 a month.

So all the money left can be paid onto the mortgage and anything else moved into the savings account.

Of course, if I lose my job it is a whole different ball game. I will have £16,600 in the bank from the redundancy payment plus the money left over from my back pay etc.

I will have to pay the mortgage and the essential outgoings and food by earning money on AQA until I get a new full time job, or take a part time job and top up as needed with AQA so the essentials are paid.

ZTD

oakdale_minx wrote: »

If I stay in my current job? My take home (without any AQA) is £1735.

The essential outgoing money (Council Tax etc) totals £300.00 not including food. So if I say £200 on a very extravagant month, that is £500 outgoings.

Then I have my AQA money on top of that going back into the bank. I'm averaging about £450 a month.

It may well be worth just getting a bog-standard one (without early payment penalty) since you could put £1200 on it with standard pay, and about £1600 with AQA. Time for you to use a spreadsheet but by my back of the envelope calculations, you would save so much more in interest doing it that way than by going for the fixed (discount) rate/10% overpayment route.

oakdale_minx

problem is I don't have the luxury of choosing from a wide range of companies because of the CCJ.

I was a bit naughty and I used a whole of market mortgage advisor who said the best two were First Active and the Abbey if I wanted 3 years fixed, but the arrangement fee for the Abbey was over £1000 and after he did the calculations it ended up being more expensive over time. I then applied directly to First Active, bypassing the advisor (I don't know why I did that, I just felt happier dealing directly myself).

I do think though it will end up being a 'no', so I'm not going to get too hopeful yet.

The CCJ is a bit of a pain really because I've learnt my lesson about spending and getting into debt and it isn't the amount which is a problem that i'm currently paying, it is the rate I want to escape - and to get back onto repayment.

Ah well, I'll see what happens when I get the application pack. I'll send everything off and wait for the outcome. She said a decision usually takes 2 working days maximum.

My only other concern was that although all my unsecured debt is paid off and i've closed down virtually all the accounts, my credit reports won't have caught up and it might look as if I owe money on my CC's. I said that my other commitments are zero - which is true, but it might look as if I am lying if they can see old balances which haven't been updated. Also, the last balances were paid off within the last 3 months and they want to see 3 months worth of bank statements.

ZTD

oakdale_minx wrote: »

problem is I don't have the luxury of choosing from a wide range of companies because of the CCJ.

Doesn't matter. The companies you've already spied out will do a bog-standard product. Just check the fees and any penalties.

The "Putting the milk out" fee.
The "Licking the stamp" fee.
The "Blowing our nose" fee.

etc...

ZTD

oakdale_minx wrote: »

My only other concern was that although all my unsecured debt is paid off and i've closed down virtually all the accounts, my credit reports won't have caught up and it might look as if I owe money on my CC's. I said that my other commitments are zero - which is true, but it might look as if I am lying if they can see old balances which haven't been updated. Also, the last balances were paid off within the last 3 months and they want to see 3 months worth of bank statements.

It'll be fine - they'll be used to the fact their information isn't up-to-the-minute accurate. Besides if you owed (for example) £200 to Halifax and there is a payment in your last 3 months of statements saying "£200 to Halifax", even a fairly blunt tool in the box (and gawd knows - there's loads of them) will probably grasp the significance.

At the worst you will be asked to provide more information.

oakdale_minx

I don't mind providing all the information they ask for, I don't know what it is with mortgages, I always suspect the worst, decision wise, although I keep thinking that I must surely be a near prime potential customer now rather than sub-prime.

Good news today though - Cruella goes on holiday after today and I don't see her for two weeks!!!

beanielou

Gosh you have been busy!
Good news about no Cruella for 2 weeks!