In some trouble!!

JimmyTheWig

Beatle_Ray wrote: »

where will i find the APR quoted for the credit cards

Your credit card statements should show this info. It might show the monthly interest rate rather than APR, but that's fine. If you can't find the rate at all then it can be worked out from what interest you've been charged and your balance. Just post the details on here and someone can calculate it for you if you're not confident to do it yourself.

also the other thought I had was that would the credit card companies reduce the interest on the cards if i phoned them up and asked for a better deal and if i did this would it go on my credit score.

Worth a try. While you are there, if there are any cards with spare credit limit on them, ask how much interest you'd pay if you did a balance transfer. Don't ask for an increased credit limit at this point, as this would go on your credit file for probably little gain.
Again, come back here with any figures and we can suggest your best route.

I'd certainly say apply for a 0% balance transfer card. If successful it will be well worth the credit search. If not, you haven't lost much. With your outstanding debt you may not get a decent limit, or even anything at all, but it's worth a try.
The other option is a low rate life-of-balance transfer deal. This would probably work out better for you.

But I would say sort out your spending before you do this. The worst thing you can do is apply for new credit and then spend on it because you "need" something. Your first priority is to work out a budget and stick to it.

Beatle_Ray

Thanks Jimmy,

I'm really determined to reduce this greatly, i have complete control over my spending, just need to get the wife to do the same, she is not extravagant by any means but essentially my out look is that i dont need to spend anything unless its absouteley necessary, i look at every single penny i spend, look to reduce and get the best deal on everything else and will look at all the credit card statements tonight to check the APR rates and see what can be done,

Thanks

Beatle Ray

Beatle_Ray

Hi All,

I had a look at my APR's yesterday, some listed it annually and others monthly, at a glance here are the figures

Egg 1,385 monthly
Nat West 1,019 monthly
Halifax 28,96 annually
Mint 1.873 monthly
CITI 2.495 monthly and 29.9 annually
MBNA 1.8735 monthly
Barclarcard 22.9 annually,

Can someone look at these are make them all annually or monthly percentages and make some sense of it and also importnatly which one i should target first and the one oafter that,

Thanks

Beatle Ray

JimmyTheWig

Ok, lets stick with APR.
Note that the annual rate given for Citi _isn't_ the APR. I'll assume other annual rates are.

Using http://www.stoozing.com/mon2yr.htm to convert, I get the following order...

34.41% - Citi
28.96% - Halifax
24.95% - MBNA
24.94% - Mint
22.90% - Barclaycard
17.95% - Egg
12.94% - Nat West

So pay off the minimum on each card and start paying everything you can off the Citi card. Once that is clear, turn your attention to the Halifax card, and so on.

The good news is that the card with the highest interest rate is the card with the lowest balance. Why not set yourself a realistic but reasonably harsh target to pay this one off.

Spirit_2

Go to the website whatsthecost.com and try their snowball calculator to see how quickly you can pay down your debts by prioritising highest interest first.

Also to avoid frivolous spnding try the demotivator tool on MSE.

Two little things that help and motivate me.

Good luck