Any help you can offer appreciated

SeaSmart

Any advice that you can give me here would be greatly appreciated. I am a man in my 30's with a wife and two kids (one 4 years the other 8 months). I earn 30k a year but my wife doesn't work and stays at home looking after the children (this is both our choice as we do not want the children in childcare)

We are struggling at the moment big style. I have extended my overdraft twice in the last couple of months and it is now at 1700. We have 3100 on a credit card plus a 95k mortgage. Mortgage a side out debt is almost 5k and unless we do something it is going to get worse as we are struggling month to month. My wife wants to train as a teacher so the idea is to change our mortgage to an interest only for 5 years then switch back once again to a repayment and also borrow and exsiting 5k to clear the debt. Once my wife is qualified then the income coming into the house will be a whole lot greater than it is now. It will effectively mean an extra 20-30k a year. This will then go some way to paying off the mortgage a lot quicker by way of flexible payments. Its a long term plan but at the moment I can't go on extending my overdraft just to pay the monthly bills. She could go back to work but at the moment she wouldn't earn a great deal and we would probably be about £100 a month better off but the children would be in childcare which is not what we want.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Wonder_Girl

Could you post a SOA so we can make suggestions on cutbacks/savings?

I can't offer any advise on your mortgage though as it's a minefield to me

SeaSmart

Sorry for being an idiot. Whats an SOA?

MrsTinks

State of Affairs

for a guide look here at SS's thread about how to do it

Wonder_Girl

Sorry that's my fault i shouldn't use Jargon

MrsTinks

Don't mean to pick holes in your plan here but a few things you need to consider: Can you afford to live for another 5 years without your wife working but infact studying which I have never seen as being the cheapest thing to do
What will you do if she doesn't complete the course or isn't able to take up this profession? What in other words is plan B How will you pay back the mortgage if she doesn't find a job?
5 years is a long time t be out of work even if it is for training. I don't mean to sound patronising but 5 years of studying is a HUGE commitment from all 4 of you. Make sure you are both prepared for this.
Don't get me wrong I think we need more teachers and they need a higher pay and better conditions etc and it's great that this is what she wants. But you need to have a back up plan and I think that although £5000 worth of debt isn't much (plus the mortgage) then it's obviously causing you to struggle - show us the figures and let's see if we can easily cut some corners for you and THEN decide on how to proceed

One last thing... And all us DFWs would probably agree on this - DO A BUDGET! and stick to it The soa will be a huge step for it but carry it on with a meal planner so you cut down on wastage of food and impulse buying

And good luck

SeaSmart

No no tine thats great this is what i'm after input. I will do the SOA but at the moment am at work and havent got all the info to hand. Need to do it tonight.

lynzpower

Great- well we'll look forward to having a look later.

I do agree about the plan, the other thing is while she is at college, childcare costs money too, and this would need to be factored into a new budget later down the line.

BIg welcome to you

lisa_75

tine wrote:

Don't mean to pick holes in your plan here but a few things you need to consider: Can you afford to live for another 5 years without your wife working but infact studying which I have never seen as being the cheapest thing to do
What will you do if she doesn't complete the course or isn't able to take up this profession? What in other words is plan B How will you pay back the mortgage if she doesn't find a job?
5 years is a long time t be out of work even if it is for training. I don't mean to sound patronising but 5 years of studying is a HUGE commitment from all 4 of you. Make sure you are both prepared for this.

I agree. If your wife isn't working due to not wanting to put children in childcare, that is fine, but studying to be a teacher is a huge commitment, almost as much as a full time job, especially when you are on placement for weeks at a time. Also the children will need to be in childcare full time as even if she is home more during non placement weeks, you can’t pick and choose when they go to childcare. I have to keep my kids in childcare even when I am not at uni the odd day as I will lose my places.

My friend is training to be a teacher, it is very stressful. Her children are 10 and 12 and she still struggles. I can’t imagine what it is like with younger children. I think returning to study is great, I did it myself when my children were school age, but it is a lot of work. I know people think getting a degree is easy, but it isn’t and you have to spend many hours studying at home as well as attending lectures. Also with a professional degree, such as teaching, there are the weeks of block placement to consider. My friend leaves the house at 7.30am when she is on placement, luckily she has a neighbour to watch her children, and often doesn’t return till 5pm.

I don’t want to put your wife off, but childcare is still a huge issue when you are studying. Maybe she could get in touch with the mature students society at her local uni and have a chat with some mature students to see if it for her.

Good Luck

themaccas

Hi congrats for signing up here and welcome to the forum, I think you have been given some really useful info so far. I completely understand you wish to not put your kids in childcare and for your wife to stay at thome until they are older but....here is the thing, can you afford this 'luxury'? We have 3 kids ranging from a teenager to a toddler and I would love to be a stay at home mum like I was when our oldest was born but in reality we can't afford it and I am working and using childcare for 4 days a week at a cost of £450 per month. There aren't many who can afford to stay at home to look after their kids, I went back to uni to get a professional qualification when our middle child was 6months old, 3 years with no income and excessive childcare costs greatly added to the debts we now have and now we are working hard to pay them off.
Whether your wife goes back to work or back to uni is something you will both have to decide together, it sounds like she may well have to if you can not survive on your single wage. It's a difficult decision all round, good luck!

kickingkay

hi i tend to agree with the others, ive been in the education industry for about 5 yrs now and i have 3 children i have seen lots of NQT's and lots of my collegues have wanted to become teachers it has taken some of them years to be able to get onto the teacher training course,
there are several ways to do it nowa days but a phone call to an appropriate uni will answer lots of questions you may have.
now my youngest is 17 months and i went back to work when he was 6 months i have a fantastic childminder who is reasonably flexible to my needs however its the summer holidays and although my children are home i still pay a retainer fee to her to hold his place next term,
hope it does work for you i really do,
is there no way you can change your mortgage and pay off your outsatnding then when lil ones a bit older your wife can think about training, its just it is going to be expensive and mentally draining and if money is tight now and stressfull it will be worse
sorry dont sound very encouraging dont mean to be, make sure you have explored all avenues first xx