Debt Advice

Gordon_Hose

kellbing wrote: »

i cut his hair lol so he doesnt have to pay that we dont go out very often maybe 1 a month if that id say we spend about £20 oncea week on a takeaway but he also does like to gamble on a weekend.

He needs to stop gambling really! It's all about priorities, and he's already starting to struggle.

The money he spends on gambling could be put towards his payments.

kellbing

tbh i have no idea how much he gambles. Is there a way to work out how much more he would need to pay on top of the min payment to try and get rid of some of his debt?

missworks2jobs

kellbing wrote: »

i cut his hair lol so he doesnt have to pay that we dont go out very often maybe 1 a month if that id say we spend about £20 oncea week on a takeaway but he also does like to gamble on a weekend.

That might be where its all coming from....

a takeaway with all the sides for both of you can easily add upto £20 per week (£80-£100 a month depending on when the weekends land in that month)

say two £10 bets on a weekend (£80-£100 per month)

one big night out £30 for drinks, £20 for taxi (£50)

thats £250 already. If he buys a coffee every day at work (or a sandwich thats £2-3 a day which again over the month works out at £90) small things can easily mount up.

I'd get him to keep a spending diary - write down every little thing he buys or keep all the receipts and add them up, just try it for a week to see. I bet it'll be quite scary when you look at it.

kellbing

thinking about it now it is obvious that money that is going on gambling when to make him truley happy in the long run he needs to put that money into the debt.But i find it hard to speak to him about money because he gets v easily frustrated

MFWannabe

kellbing wrote: »

tbh i have no idea how much he gambles. Is there a way to work out how much more he would need to pay on top of the min payment to try and get rid of some of his debt?

You really need to ask him the question as this could be a big problem; although he might not admit it to be at first. If he's serious about paying off his debts then he needs to stop gambling immediately. You sound like you are willing to help him with sorting out these debts so he needs to be completely honest with you.
there is a link on here somewhere to a snowball calculator which helps you to calculate how long it will take to pay off. Someone may be able to post you a link.
I think you really need to sit down with him and go through all bank statements and credit card statements and loan agreements; you need to know the APR's so you know which ones to tackle first
Also consider selling the car if it is worth 4k and just getting a cheap runaround for now; say for 1k; that would leave 3k to pay off debts; but make sure it's paid off straight away before any thoughts of spending any!

kellbing

thanks missworks2jobs i will suggest this to him and hopefully we can go from there.

MFWannabe

kellbing wrote: »

thinking about it now it is obvious that money that is going on gambling when to make him truley happy in the long run he needs to put that money into the debt.But i find it hard to speak to him about money because he gets v easily frustrated

Is that a way of him stopping you from asking? If he sees a future with you then he needs to tell you. If he's serious about paying off debts he needs to tell you everything. Good Luck x

kellbing

FREEZ wrote: »

You really need to ask him the question as this could be a big problem; although he might not admit it to be at first. If he's serious about paying off his debts then he needs to stop gambling immediately. You sound like you are willing to help him with sorting out these debts so he needs to be completely honest with you.
there is a link on here somewhere to a snowball calculator which helps you to calculate how long it will take to pay off. Someone may be able to post you a link.
I think you really need to sit down with him and go through all bank statements and credit card statements and loan agreements; you need to know the APR's so you know which ones to tackle first
Also consider selling the car if it is worth 4k and just getting a cheap runaround for now; say for 1k; that would leave 3k to pay off debts; but make sure it's paid off straight away before any thoughts of spending any!

thank you we have only recently got the car on finance so i dont know what our options are in regards to selling.But i will look into this.
I will try to hunt out some statements for his cards and see what the apr is for them all. Thanks again.

Pollycat

Hi
I think the most important thing right now is to get him to be honest about where his money goes every month - not to give him a hard time about it, but so that you both know where he is at financially at this moment in time.

Once you do that, you can see where cuts OUGHT to be made - and I'd say that gambling should probably be the first thing, assuming he spends a fair bit. If it's only a couple of quid on the tipster's favourite that small amount is not going to make that much difference, but if it's £30 or £50 a week, then there's the money he should be throwing at his debts.

As I said earlier, he needs to start a spending diary - BUT to make it work he HAS to be honest.

Tixy

kellbing wrote: »

tbh i have no idea how much he gambles. Is there a way to work out how much more he would need to pay on top of the min payment to try and get rid of some of his debt?

You need to find out the APRs on the debt and then have a look at the snowball calculator. http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx
Put in the debts as they are at the moment and the APRs and start by putting in the £478 shown on the SoA as the amount he can afford to repay. That will tell you how long it will take to pay all the debts off if he only pays that £478. Then change it so its shows him paying off say £600 per month and see what a difference that would make to how long it takes and the total amount of interest overall.

But as others have said he needs to be committed to spending less on entertainment etc to be able to really start clearing these debts.