My SOA - bitter reading......

louise3965

well done zarazara for not being in debt. You also win todays smug award for stating the obvious to people posting on the DEBTFREEWANABEE board for help.

speirsro

zarazara wrote: »

There's over £43,000 available to spend [net income]. This is a huge amount. Its more than double what me and my family have per year and we are not in debt. For goodness sake,cut the cards up ,stop living above your means,save up for things and just dont have it if you dont have the cash. Holidays,TV's,lots of clothes etc are not necessary.

Zarazara - how dare you comment when someone is looking for help, advice, and a friendly ear.
I understand bertman may have a higher income, and debt - but he's here for the same reason as pretty much most of us.
Sometimes it does help to be so truthful - but the background may be different to just "living above your means".

Oh, and well done for not being in debt. If it happened to you and you needed advice, let's hope we're all as understanding as you!;)

t4mof

bertman wrote: »

The Halifax did say though that by going onto a interest only we would damage our credit file further - is this true?

I feel like we are finally doing something positive though - but I am still nervous of putting the mortgage onto interest only...

I've had my mortgage on interest only since I got it in 1998 and have had thousands of pounds worth of credit thrown at me in that time so there should be nothing to worry about.

I'm aiming to clear my credit cards while interest rates are low and I'm not paying much on my mortgage and then will aim to clear my mortgage within 15 or so years. Look at it as a short term option to help you clear other debts.

Good Luck!

miss_missy

zara firstly well done on not being in debt, its what we are all aiming for and no matter what our incomes we come here for support

i for one think that bertman has already done great and that we should all try and help

have you been in debt? did you get help? if not thats great and i hope you never have to come asking for help with debts, but if you have just think how you felt admitting to the mess you got yourself in and hopefully all the kind and helpful replies you got

many of us have overspent and messed up big time and sometimes we need to hear the truth but i think we need to becareful how we word things it doesnt take much to be friendly and offer support and if we cant we dont need to post a reply

oh and well said speirsro

bertman

zarazara wrote: »

There's over £43,000 available to spend [net income]. This is a huge amount. Its more than double what me and my family have per year and we are not in debt. For goodness sake,cut the cards up ,stop living above your means,save up for things and just dont have it if you dont have the cash. Holidays,TV's,lots of clothes etc are not necessary.

Hi ZaraZara,

Yes, I agree we have a very good income and we are lucky in that respect - But - the reason we are in so much debt is that a business we had got into trouble, all our stock, lease etc. had to go on credit until we managed to sell (and believe me we lost out big time on the sale, we just had to get rid to get us out of contracts).

We haven't used credit or cards for over 6 months and are starting to get our lives in order now - hence asking for help....

I guess you were just having a bad day

Cheers everyone else, I do value everyone's advice.

BTW - Got the final accounts done for the business - and landed a nice £600 bill......:mad:

incesticde

louise3965 wrote: »

well done zarazara for not being in debt. You also win todays smug award for stating the obvious to people posting on the DEBTFREEWANABEE board for help.

There are a few people on this board who seem quite resentful of some poster's income and post something along the line of "You make £x a month you shouldn't be in debt".

I realise the debt free journey is a bloody tough one but sniping at people isn't going to make it any easier....

Must say though, bertman, your reply was very classy

:T

HellsGranny

Well done Bertman.

Cheers, HG

bertman

Thanks Hellsgranny.

Well - I wrote to the Halifax offering to pay £300 per month, the card has £14400 on it, I went over the credit limit after they allowed me to pay £125 a month but kept putting the difference on the balance along with £24.00 of charges for 4 months. They wanted me to pay £1018 to bring the card back within terms.
I got a letter today telling me to go to either Payplan or CCCS so that they can put forward a reduced payment plan again.
This is the only card or loan that I have problems with I am up to date on everything else. This could mean everyone gets less??
I will ring them on Monday to see what advice they will give me.

rubydoiwannabee

bertman wrote: »

Well, went to the bank yesterday, they tried to sell me a consolidation loan, it was refused in the end... But I bit the bullet and decided to put my mortgage onto interest free for 12 months. This scared the s**t out of me to be honest, they really did lay it on the line that we won't be paying off any of the mortgage just covering the interest. It will though free up £400 each month, this will pay off at least one card and some of another which are the ones with the higfhest APR (34.9%).

Hi, first of all welcome and well done for getting this far.

I wanted to comment on this part of your comments specifically. My husband and I moved the whole of our mortgage over to INT only about 20 months ago so that we could free up £300 per month. It was the difference between us keeping afloat and going under, and it has helped enormously.

As of TODAY we made our first step back into repayment and transferred 60K back onto repayment. Baby steps...

Our credit rating is excellent and fully intact and hasn't been affected at all. However, I was advised today that if we were to ask to change back (e.g. change the repayment part back to int only) we would now have to go through a credit check and apply for a new loan. So things have obviously changed over the last year and a half or so.

Hope this helps.

cameron1

Bertman

Dont feel the need to justify or explain your debt. People get into these situtions for a variety of reasons. I am in debt to the tune of £36000 and i can assure you it is certainly not through any fault of my own! I imagine the colapse of your business was probably soul destroying and the added factor of being left in debt has made it that much harder.

So actually, good on you for being proactive in taking steps to get things under control rather than waiting for a "solution" to fall in your lap. You have really put some thought into your budget and it looks like you have committed yourself to getting you finances on track. Yes it will be slow, but at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

But irrespective of whether the debt could have been avoided or not, the purpose of this forum is for people to offer productive advice and support. Not criticism.

It takes courage to admit you are in a mess and ask for help. An " i told you so" or "its your own fault" attitude is simply un-helpful and counter productive.