Advice please- loan consolidation

Shoegal174

Hi All,

Any advice would be much appreciated as I really am feeling like Im stuck in a vicious circle at the moment. I need to consolidate my loans, credit cards and overdraft into one loan but this is proving to be similar to finding money that grows on trees!
I currently bank with Barclays and have done since 2001. I have four credit cards, two loans, one a graduate, one personal and an overdraft- the latter all with Barclays. I am not proud at all that I have accumulated so much debt, and it took three years to open up to my partner and tell him about it, who is unbelievably understanding and wants to help. We are planning to get married next year and really want to start a family soon after; but my outgoings are threatening to hamper all "big" plans.

I have tried on two occasions to go to barclays and ask them to consolidate. They have declined- I therefore signed up to credit expert, searched my credit report and my rating is "fair". However the company I work for had computers stolen with personal data on, a year ago, so they put a lot of the staff, with our permission on the CIFAS register- but would this affect any loan decisions at all? It was just in case of identity fraud protection.

Also when I spoke to a customer services agent at Barclayloan, he was very helpful and advised me that due to the fact my income was not meeting my overdraft limit and I was constantly in the red, or had been for the past 11 months, this wouldnt help my cause. He advised me to move some standing orders and direct debits to go out later, as at least this would put me in the black for a while and therefore my account activity would look improved. I know this may seem obvious, but my overdraft is authorised and I thought would actually help my case to consolidate as in hello Im constantly in the red due to the massiveness of my outgoings!

My partner who banks with Santander then advised me to speak with them about a loan and taking my accounts over to them - but they also declined, I received a letter yesterday. However they also advised that I could speak with UCC Plc who are apparently "highly regarded in the finance industry" I have posted a separate thread asking if anyone has heard or had any dealings with them and if they are ok etc.

But this leaves me back at square one. Where I have the majority of my wages being swallowed up by an overdraft, loan and credit card repayments, also life getting busier by the minute with weddings, parties, christenings, family birthdays etc to have to save and buy for. Aswell as everyday living costs, I feel that I will never get out of this massive hole, or even start to save for our wedding unless I became a hermit.:o

Any advice much appreciated please, many thanks. I do plan to be debt free in five years!:)

Tixy

Hi

Sounds like you are probably overcommitted and if you are then realistically nowhere will lend more to you. And keeping making these applications won't be helping at all.

How much debt do you owe compared to your salary? How much have you been applying to borrow to consolidate.

Rather than look at consolidation (which sounds like its not an option anyway) then I would suggest it might help to post up a statement of affairs showing your full financial situation. People might then be able to advise other ways to make your finances easier or to free up more money to pay off your current debts quicker.
http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html

RAS

Hi

Two recent applications for credit - both refused - will be wrecking your credit rating anyway. Three applications in three months will really make a mess of it.

Post up your SOA and lets see what the full situation is. Can you add the limits of your credit cardsd as well as the APRs and the date the loan is paid off.

Shoegal174

Thank you for replying! Ideally I would want to take out a consolidation loan of approx £17000. I know it doesnt appear to be the best option, and due to my outstanding debts I might not be able to, however for me, to just have one set payment coming out each month instead of seven, plus rent, internet, car insurance and mobile phone bills etc would be such a help. I can't move my credit cards around, to get a better deal, nor can I rearrange the loans etc, so unfortunately it does seem like my only option- I have not missed a payment on anything so far.

Shoegal174

Hi RAS

Thank you for responding. I know, it is a vicious circle and thats why I just dont know where to start. I dont want to keep applying anymore as I know this impacts negatively on my credit score. I am currently up to my maximum limit on all cards, totalling £6000. I have one Egg, Virgin, MBNA and Barclaycard. Apologies I dont have the APR details to hand, but the Virgin and MBNA cards are quite high, approx 22% I think. It might have to be that I just keep on paying; try to reduce my overdraft and once I stay in the black from payday for longer than a week, in a few months time I might be able to re-negotiate with Barclays. (my bank and who my loans etc are with).

Other options are that I sell my car (which has no outgoing finance etc at all on it) and buy something cheaper, use the extra to pay off my overdraft, or possibly get a second job!

RAS

Hi

A couple of pointers - if any of the credit cards have recently increased their APRF and you have not spemnt anything onnthe card since, you may be able to close the account and revert to the old lower rate - worth it?

If you do the SOA that Tixy linked to, you can also run a snowball to see how long it wold take to clear your debt and how much paying say £10 per month more would affect your debt free date and total interest payments.

DVardysShadow

Shoegal174 wrote: »

Thank you for replying! Ideally I would want to take out a consolidation loan of approx £17000. I know it doesnt appear to be the best option, and due to my outstanding debts I might not be able to, however for me, to just have one set payment coming out each month instead of seven, plus rent, internet, car insurance and mobile phone bills etc would be such a help. I can't move my credit cards around, to get a better deal, nor can I rearrange the loans etc, so unfortunately it does seem like my only option- I have not missed a payment on anything so far.

On these boards we don't generally recommend consolidation for a number of reasons. There are some fairly good reasons to consolidate in certain circumstances - but your reason above is not the least bit convincing. Also, if you have a loan, rather than acard, you put yourself on a treadmill of having to meet a fairly hefty repayment schedule - this in turn causes some to use the cards again to cover shortfalls on the loan - and before they know it, they are in twice as deep, with most of their original debt as a loan and another debt pile just as big back on the cards.

Numpty_Monkey

If you find it difficult to direct debit payments , set up a sepperate basic account (Coop cashminder springs to mind), set up a payment for the monthly amounts from your normal account when you get paid, into the newly setup bills account,

Shoegal174

Thanks you all for the tips, I shall look into.

Thanks DVardyshadow for your response. I know a lot of people seem averse to consolidation, as it increases the time of paying off the debt etc and also because you may be tempted to spend again on credit cards that have been paid off etc, but believe me I have had enough of credit cards to last a lifetime, I have cut them all up and they are staying that way! If I had paid everything off with the one loan there is no way I would be rushing to get myself back into further debt.

My partner and I think it would be the best in the long run, for me- but only if I can get a loan at a decent APR rate and for the maximum of five years- which my longest loan is running for at the moment.

Thanks all again for the advice much appreciated.

Mrs_Jojo

Post that SOA and perhaps clever people will be able to suggest some ways to cut costs and get the debt down.

Shoegal174

WIll do Mrs Jojo, thanks!

Monthly Income Details
Income from Employment (after tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,400.00
Income from Self Employment (before tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
State Pension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private Pension / Annuity Payout. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Benefits (Inc. Child Benefit/Tax Credits & Income Support). . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Income From Savings & Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Gifts From Family / Friends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Monthly Expense Details
In Your Home
Mobile Phone(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35.00
TV Licence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Internet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15.00
Home Phone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cleaning Products/Cleaner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Garden Maintenance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Household Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Electricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Gas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Council Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Overdraft Cost. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Bank Account Fee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.00
Home Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage/Rent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150.00
Plumbing/Boiler Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage Life Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage Payment Protection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Life Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Food and Household Shopping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50.00
Drinks for Home . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Motoring & Public Transport
Petrol/Diesel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45.00
Parking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.92
Car Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.00
Car Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Rail/Bus/Taxi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Breakdown Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Debt Repayments
Credit Card Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220.00
Hire Purchase Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Personal Loan Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 502.00
Car Loan Repayments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Savings & Investments
Pension Payments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Buying Shares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mini Cash ISAs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Lump Sum Saving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular Saving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Family
Pet Food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School Meals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pocket Money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Nappies/Baby Extras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Laundry/Dry Cleaning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Children's Travel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Baby Sitting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Childcare/Play Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pet Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Travel Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Entertainment
Satellite/Digital TV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Family Days Out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cinema/Theatre Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Books/Music/Films/Computers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Big Days Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.33
Shopping for Fun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Pet Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Hobbies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18.00
IT/Computing (eg Anti-virus etc). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
DVD Rental. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Drinking Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Eating Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Clothes, Health & Beauty
Complimentary Therapies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Optical Bills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Haircuts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15.00
Dentistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Beauty Treatments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.08
Healthcare Cashplans. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Dental Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private Medical Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Fitness/Sports/Gym. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18.50
Work Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.67
New Children's Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
New Clothes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Education & Courses
University Tuition Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Your Courses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Big One Offs
Funeral Expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Wedding Expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Sofa/Kitchen/TV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Birthdays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13.33
Winter Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Summer Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41.67
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Odds & Sods
Newspapers & Magazines. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Tax & NI Provisions (self-employed only). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular Charity Donations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.00
Meals at work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.67
Smokes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Coffees/Sandwiches/Snacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Total monthly income. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,400.00

Total monthly expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,345.17

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