First post and some major debt help needed!!Please

gtyrel

Hi everyone,

I am new to the forum and really need help! Major help!

In September of 2010 my fiance walked out on me, have since taken on our mortgage and home. But at the same time we had a £6000 loan for a new car, which was only in my name, and we were getting married and had £2000 on a credit card again stupidly was only in my name. so i have been left with all the debt as well as all the bills now of our flat. when he walked out my first plan was to sell the car which would clear off the credit card and most of the car loan, but i have been trying since oct to sell the car with no luck what so ever. so i am now stuck earning enough to cover all of my monthly bills. I do have a good job but my career is just starting we were just begining to build our life so i am needing any advice help or anything to try and get rid of my debts as quickly as possible.

Even my food my parents are now paying most of because i am struggling to by food i have freezer food for dinner but lunches fruit veg they are having to help me with.

I have completed the SOA ( i think thats right) below thank you to everyone in advance.

xxx

Household Information[/b]
Number of adults in household........... 1
Number of children in household.........
Number of cars owned.................... 1
Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1373
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1373
Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 293
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 27
Council tax............................. 98
Electricity............................. 50
Gas..................................... 25
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 20
Mobile phone............................ 25
TV Licence.............................. 12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 60
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 30
Road tax................................ 10
Car Insurance........................... 40
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 200
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 15
Life assurance ......................... 15
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 920

Assets
Cash.................................... 100
House value (Gross)..................... 65000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 6000
Other assets............................ 3500
Total Assets............................ 74600

Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 56000....(293)......5.27
Total secured & HP debts...... 56000.....-.........-
Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
virgin credit card ............2300......35........0
bank loan......................6300......139.......5.2
Total unsecured debts..........8600......174.......-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,373
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 920
Available for debt repayments........... 453
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 174
Amount left after debt repayments....... 279
Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 74,600
Total HP & Secured debt................. -56,000
Total Unsecured debt.................... -8,600
Net Assets.............................. 10,000

MFWannabe

gtyrel wrote: »

Hi everyone,

I am new to the forum and really need help! Major help!

In September of 2010 my fiance walked out on me, have since taken on our mortgage and home. But at the same time we had a £6000 loan for a new car, which was only in my name, and we were getting married and had £2000 on a credit card again stupidly was only in my name. so i have been left with all the debt as well as all the bills now of our flat. when he walked out my first plan was to sell the car which would clear off the credit card and most of the car loan, but i have been trying since oct to sell the car with no luck what so ever. so i am now stuck earning enough to cover all of my monthly bills. I do have a good job but my career is just starting we were just begining to build our life so i am needing any advice help or anything to try and get rid of my debts as quickly as possible.

Even my food my parents are now paying most of because i am struggling to by food i have freezer food for dinner but lunches fruit veg they are having to help me with.

I have completed the SOA ( i think thats right) below thank you to everyone in advance.

xxx

Household Information[/b]
Number of adults in household........... 1
Number of children in household.........
Number of cars owned.................... 1
Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1373
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1373
Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 293
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 27
Council tax............................. 98 - do you claim single person discount? Also ask too pay over 12 months instead of 10
Electricity............................. 50 - this seems high; check comparison sites to see if you can get cheaper
Gas..................................... 25
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 20
Mobile phone............................ 25 - change to lower tariff or go payg
TV Licence.............................. 12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 60
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 30
Road tax................................ 10
Car Insurance........................... 40
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 200 - What is this?
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 15
Life assurance ......................... 15 - check comparison sites to see if you can get cheaper
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0 - need to put something in here
Haircuts................................ 0 - need to put something in here
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 920

Assets
Cash.................................... 100
House value (Gross)..................... 65000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 6000
Other assets............................ 3500 - what is this?
Total Assets............................ 74600

Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 56000....(293)......5.27
Total secured & HP debts...... 56000.....-.........-
Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
virgin credit card ............2300......35........0
bank loan......................6300......139.......5.2
Total unsecured debts..........8600......174.......-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,373
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 920
Available for debt repayments........... 453
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 174
Amount left after debt repayments....... 279
Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 74,600
Total HP & Secured debt................. -56,000
Total Unsecured debt.................... -8,600
Net Assets.............................. 10,000

Hi
I've made some comments above where you could make some cutbacks; although your soa is quite tight.
Do you have a spare room you could rent out?
What do you use the car for?

gtyrel

FREEZ wrote: »

Hi
I've made some comments above where you could make some cutbacks; although your soa is quite tight.
Do you have a spare room you could rent out?
What do you use the car for?

Hi, in response to your red comments, my council tax is single person now i had actually paid enough for the whole year so my last council tax payment was in Dec i wont need to pay again until april. My electricity is really high but i have managed to build up some a large amount of credit so i was trying to keep this going as long as possible until i got so broke i had to reduce it.

My mobile phone contract doesnt finish until november this year so i think i am stuck i am not sure what i can do with it. oh and my £200 travel is to get to work each month i live about 50 miles from were i work, so thats why my buses cost to get there. i actually never get my haircut mainly because i see it as a luxury i cant afford, when i get money for my birthday i will treat myself to a haircut which is about £18.

then the £3500 asset is my engagement ring, its valued at £6000 for insurance but we spoke to a jeweller who said £3500 is roughly what i would get for it if i sold it.

the car only gets used for weekend use, i cant afford to use it for my work which is why i was trying to sell it but i have had no luck selling it.

thank you for your comments hopefully my extra info helps

MFWannabe

gtyrel wrote: »

Hi, in response to your red comments, my council tax is single person now i had actually paid enough for the whole year so my last council tax payment was in Dec i wont need to pay again until april. My electricity is really high but i have managed to build up some a large amount of credit so i was trying to keep this going as long as possible until i got so broke i had to reduce it.

My mobile phone contract doesnt finish until november this year so i think i am stuck i am not sure what i can do with it. oh and my £200 travel is to get to work each month i live about 50 miles from were i work, so thats why my buses cost to get there. i actually never get my haircut mainly because i see it as a luxury i cant afford, when i get money for my birthday i will treat myself to a haircut which is about £18.

then the £3500 asset is my engagement ring, its valued at £6000 for insurance but we spoke to a jeweller who said £3500 is roughly what i would get for it if i sold it.

the car only gets used for weekend use, i cant afford to use it for my work which is why i was trying to sell it but i have had no luck selling it.

thank you for your comments hopefully my extra info helps

Are you able to pay lump sums off the loan? I would seriously consider selling the engagement ring; there's no point having it sitting in a drawer if you are struggling.
Consider selling the car to a dealer; just make sure you are not completely ripped off. You won't get as much for it as you would if you sold it privately but at least it would get rid of it. Doing these 2 things would enable you to become almost debt free.
Do consider changing the council tax to 12 months instead of 10 from April
It is nice having credit on your electric but we pay for exactly what we use each month; better in my account then sitting in their bank account. How much do you have in credit?

stupot_99

you could sell the ring and clear off the cc and reduce the loan amount, or try and get an early settlement figure for the loan as it has interest on it plus its the higher cost p/m. i know it might be hard to part with the ring but its a valuable asset.

slummymummyof3

If you have paid your council tax up to April, have you considered using that money towards the credit card so that you are paying off more for a few months at least.

Is it worth selling your engagement ring......a tough decision to make I expect. It would enable you to clear your credit card and perhaps some off the loan (or perhaps keep the remainder as an emergency fund??)

gtyrel

Hi everyone, thank you for your comments.

Selling my engagement ring really is the last resort and i no it makes sense to do it i just am really not ready to do it, its obviously only really been 3 months since we split up, and i no i need to get over it but i am just finding it hard to sell the ring.

I have tried some car dealers and they are all saying they arnt buying cars the now they would only take it if i was trading it in for something else which obviously i dont want to do. With the car the only option i can see left is that "we buy any car" website and from the price they gave me they really were ripping me off. But i kinda think if its all i can get i might need to.

FREEZ - as of October my gas and electricity were about £120 each in credit, i don't know what that is now at after such a bad winter.

slummymummyof3 - I had thought about just using my council tax money to pay towards my credit card, if i cant get rid of it before then. my original idea had been to save that money as a wee emergency fund, in the hope that i would of got shot of the car and used that to pay off the credit card.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions, i think i just feel like i have no idea what to do next and thought i would try all of you guys for some much needed inspiration! xx

dancingfairy

Hi - according to your SOA you have 279 a month spare to put towards your debts. You might want to do a spending diary to identify where this is going. As you have paid your council tax in one lump sum you presumably also have the 98 a month spare from that as well to put towards the debts?
Also if you have about 100 credit with gas and electric I would claim it back and pay off one of the debts - if you keep your dd's at the same amount you will be building that credit buffer back up with them again.
I think you just need a wee bit of organising and getting things straight in your mind as you should be able to manage based on your figures.
Good Luck
df

Katie-Kat-Kins

Your SoA says that you have money spare at the end of the month, so you should be able to use that to pay extra off the credit cards and reduce those payments. If you don't actually have money spare then do a spending diary to find out where it is going.

There is no point having large amounts of credit on your gas and electric when you have debts, you don't earn any interest on the money, the energy company gets the benefit of it and you pay interest on your debts in the meantime. I would give them an updated meter reading today and if you are still in credit despite the bad winter I would suggest that you reduce you DD a little. That money can then be used to pay off your debts.

I would question whether you are best using public transport to get to work while you still own the car. £200 a month is a lot of petrol and you are keeping the car taxed and insured now anyway, you might be better off using it until you sell it and saving your bus fare. Do the sums and see how it compares.

I can see that you are going to have a few months off paying your council tax, use the money you save to pay off your debts a bit. The more you pay off now the lower your future repayments will be. I wouldn't worry too much about building up an emergency fund at the moment, you would be better getting rid of the debts. If you had a real emergency you could sell the engagement ring or the car. As you haven't defaulted on any debts you could probably also get credit in an emergency. You can build up a proper emergency fund slowly by putting a small amount away a month.

I would see if you can reduce your mobile contract and reduce some of your expenses by shopping around for the cheapest deal and plough all spare cash into getting rid of that credit card debt for now. Use the snowball calculator to see how much you can save by paying off extra. Also check out whether you can make over payments on your loan.

I think you can get through this even if you can't sell the car, in fact I don't think you need to sell it if you don't want to.

You could also try to pay off early by raising extra money by ebaying some of your junk or doing some extra work (avon or something would fit round your job).

Most immportant though is the spending diary, you need to identify where that surplus money is going!

gtyrel

dancingfairy wrote: »

Hi - according to your SOA you have 279 a month spare to put towards your debts. You might want to do a spending diary to identify where this is going. As you have paid your council tax in one lump sum you presumably also have the 98 a month spare from that as well to put towards the debts?
Also if you have about 100 credit with gas and electric I would claim it back and pay off one of the debts - if you keep your dd's at the same amount you will be building that credit buffer back up with them again.
I think you just need a wee bit of organising and getting things straight in your mind as you should be able to manage based on your figures.
Good Luck
df

Hi, yes the £279 isnt really realistic, i have another £60 that goes on waxing each month, i need another £30-£40 spare for emergency work lunches that i cant avoid going to (normally i just try and not eat lunch) then another £37 i have to hold back for the months that have longer weeks as one of my bus tickets is weekly. so really i have about £142 left that covers any random bills, any time spent with friends and i normally try and pay more than the minimum credit card payment.

I just wasnt sure what bit to put those all in, thank you tho for your ideas i think i will contact the gas and electric people.

Katie-Kat-Kins

gtyrel wrote: »

Hi, yes the £279 isnt really realistic, i have another £60 that goes on waxing each month, i need another £30-£40 spare for emergency work lunches that i cant avoid going to (normally i just try and not eat lunch) then another £37 i have to hold back for the months that have longer weeks as one of my bus tickets is weekly. so really i have about £142 left that covers any random bills, any time spent with friends and i normally try and pay more than the minimum credit card payment.

I just wasnt sure what bit to put those all in, thank you tho for your ideas i think i will contact the gas and electric people.

You need to put all that stuff into your SoA to get an honest picture.

I would ditch the waxing and do it yourself at home £60 a month is extortionate! Especially as if you are skint you aren't going out much or going on holiday and you are single. That is a lot of money toward paying off that credit card!

I would not bother with work lunches out for a while, or limit yourself to a certain amount a month. You can normally get out of these things. And as I said previously, while you have the car is using the bus really economical? You should be able to get a true monthly figure for your bus tickets for your SoA by multiplying the weekly cost by 52 and dividing by 12, do it that way and you don't need to worry about months with more weeks in.