Rock Bottom - Near £30k of Debt - Now to Tackle it

TheLostSheep

One other thing I have thought about is that I am possibly not doing enough about the outstanding amounts owed…. I have hit a bit of a wall there. Possibly I am needing other options, so if anyone can suggest anything that’d be great.

Done thus far:
Set up other Bank Account
Sent Final F&F proposal to Lloyds re Credit Card
Looked at ways how to save money day to day and longer term

I have:
Spoken with National Debtline and aware of options. Not really wanting to consider the DMP with a Debt arrangement scheme as it will impact upon me for 6 years in the future. I want to sort this in under 4 years.
Aware of Ebay – shall do a bit of that.
Don’t think 2nd job is something I’d consider at moment.

Obviously there is the whole thing about possible redundancy and a fixed amount of £26,000 tax free. As with my life previous, “gambling” on a job maybe is not too wise. However F&F’s to all creditors, finding a job would leave me with a surplus. Maybe too much risk here? That seems my quickest way out.

Choc-addict

Hi there,

Just wanted to wish you lots of luck, been in your shoes and it's hard to tell your partner things like this, especially as you don't know the reaction you'll receive. I never hid it from partner but didn't tell him extent until I knew we were more of a perm thing.

Anyhow, few suggestions....

1. Get all debt onto lowest possible aprs for now - if possible??
2. Start a spending diary - this helps a lot with impulse spends if you have to write it down you'll think twice about spending. It's also a good way after a month to see where your actual spending lies.
3. Get on that bike!! Even if you don't sell car it'll cut your petrol costs for a while until you feel more settled
4. Have a look at payment a day thread (sorry not sure of the link) but it's good and has helped loads of people get a large amount of debt down, becomes addictive too, even if you can only pay 1p per day to card with highest interest it'll all help!

You are doing so well already and it's clear you want to sort this, i'm sure with a bit of help from the lovely people here you'll be just fine. Try and get OH on board pehaps with a bit of meal planning i.e. shopping with a list, knowing what meals you will have to ensure that you don't overspend on groceries etc. Batch cooking is good too i.e. chillis and spag bowl that is cheap to make and can last for a while or be frozen.

Good luck! x

coldstreamalways

I used to love it when I could cycle into work, now it's 35miles and public transport is rubbish but I used to do 9 miles each way and have a shower in work. Love overtaking all the cars, especially in the snow!

Once you get used to it you won't regret it and think of the money!!!!!

Verbatim

ex and would be ex-gamblers support thread

This thread has been a bit quiet lately but I'm sure you could pm some of the leading lights for some support.

TheLostSheep

Verbatim wrote: »

ex and would be ex-gamblers support thread

This thread has been a bit quiet lately but I'm sure you could pm some of the leading lights for some support.

Been posting on there already mate. Cheers.

missworks2jobs

How's it going?
Just to let you know me & hubby were in very similar situation although we had a mortgage on our house (well it was a flat). We sold it, and handed my car back to the finance company - it was extreme but not worth the stress battling to try keep the flat when we could release so much money in it. We're just about heading back to square one (approx £12k left to pay - must check our progress actually). We're now living back with parents which isn't ideal but it saves us the rent/mortgage to throw at the debtors to keep them quiet.

Its a horrible prospect but could you downsize or move in with friends/family for a bit?

A good group of friends & family can really make the difference, we had friends offering us their spare room, childrens piggy bank funds and family offering to make us tea everynight so we didn't have to buy groceries.

You could do that - go round a friend/family's house for meals, that way you still have your social life of catching up with them (plus its a free feed). Even if you repay the favour once a week (or however often) its sometimes cheaper to buy in bulk and cook one big meal rather than lots of meals for 2.

If you can't cut your costs any lower have you tried increasing your income?
Second jobs (a paperround or leaflet delivering might be easy with all the cycling you're doing), bootsales, ebay are all options. Selling unwanted or things you dont use in local papers etc. Are you crafty? You could make things in your spare time and sell them on or recycle them for yourself so you dont have to make new. Just some thoughts.

Best of luck

TheLostSheep

missworks2jobs wrote: »

How's it going?
Just to let you know me & hubby were in very similar situation although we had a mortgage on our house (well it was a flat). We sold it, and handed my car back to the finance company - it was extreme but not worth the stress battling to try keep the flat when we could release so much money in it. We're just about heading back to square one (approx £12k left to pay - must check our progress actually). We're now living back with parents which isn't ideal but it saves us the rent/mortgage to throw at the debtors to keep them quiet.

Its a horrible prospect but could you downsize or move in with friends/family for a bit?

A good group of friends & family can really make the difference, we had friends offering us their spare room, childrens piggy bank funds and family offering to make us tea everynight so we didn't have to buy groceries.

You could do that - go round a friend/family's house for meals, that way you still have your social life of catching up with them (plus its a free feed). Even if you repay the favour once a week (or however often) its sometimes cheaper to buy in bulk and cook one big meal rather than lots of meals for 2.

If you can't cut your costs any lower have you tried increasing your income?
Second jobs (a paperround or leaflet delivering might be easy with all the cycling you're doing), bootsales, ebay are all options. Selling unwanted or things you dont use in local papers etc. Are you crafty? You could make things in your spare time and sell them on or recycle them for yourself so you dont have to make new. Just some thoughts.

Best of luck

It's going Ok (well it's not really given relationship issues and around £29k of debt) but I have worked my socks off in spare time to try and address what I have done wrong and how to try and fix it. I am going to summarise where I am at with things on my Debt Free Diary at the end of the week.

The weekend is going to be hard as I am missing out on stuff I had planned to do, but I've just got to accept that i guess.

I don't want to consider bankrupcy, IVA, DMP etc at the moment as I want to fight these problems and see if I can start to fix things without it affecting my credit rating. I destructive, embarassing and shameful what I was doing. It's now time to try and fix it.

TheLostSheep

I'd say 2nd jobs, moving out of house are the two "extreme" solutions that I am aware of but have not yet considered. I reckon that through Ebay/boot sales, could generate maybe £100 per month to start with.

silentguy

Hiya!

I recently found myself in a similar situation, although not quite as bad. 6 months ago I realised that I had accumulated debts of around £17k. I have now managed to bring it down to about £10k.

Well done on admitting it to your girlfriend. That was something that I was never able to do, and infact not admitting it destroyed my relationship and we went our separate ways.

I can however vouch for every penny counting. I live 10 miles from where I work. Although I didn't actually sell my car I did start cycling to work, to save on the daily fuel. Not only did it save me money each day, but I have now found a great new hobby that I love and I have also started to get a lot fitter too!

Just one thought - if you are thinking about buying a bike, you should definitely consider the governments 'cycle to work scheme'. It allows you to buy a better bike, without paying for it up front, and the cost is simply deducted from your wages monthly, before tax. - So everyone wins!

dancingfairy

A couple of thoughts from me:
1) you appear to have counted internet services twice on your soa - once under joint costs and once under your personal costs.
2) If you enter into a payment plan with Lloyds tsb won't they then default you as you are breaking the original agreement? what you are in effect doing is a form of self-managed dmp. Personally I think a dmp would be a good way to go anyway with you making offers based on what you can afford to the creditors.
3) you could try cycling a few times to work and see how it goes and then see if you can do it or really can't manage without the car before making a final decision.
df