advice needed on a loan

katemccully

We need to sort out a consolidation loan for £18,000 to pay off credit cards my husband and I have, but are struggling and have been declined a couple of times. Our monthly cost to pay for these credit cards is £450 which we are not struggling to pay but if we were to get a loan out over 7 years we could save ourselves about £100 a month which would help when I go on maternity leave in June.

Does anyone have any advice? Is a loan even the answer seeing as we're struggling to get one? We have a excellent credit score and don't use our credit cards at all anymore, but all we pay is the minimum payments and we never make a dent in the balances!

StuTheDon

katemccully wrote: »

We need to sort out a consolidation loan for £18,000 to pay off credit cards my husband and I have, but are struggling and have been declined a couple of times. Our monthly cost to pay for these credit cards is £450 which we are not struggling to pay but if we were to get a loan out over 7 years we could save ourselves about £100 a month which would help when I go on maternity leave in June.

Does anyone have any advice? Is a loan even the answer seeing as we're struggling to get one? We have a excellent credit score and don't use our credit cards at all anymore, but all we pay is the minimum payments and we never make a dent in the balances!

Hi Kate,

Firstly, purely from an approval perspective, you are going to need a salary of £70k plus to get a consolidation loan. This is because you have £18k of CC debt, plus you want an additional £18k loan. I know you are planning to clear the CC, but you have no obligation to, so that banks will see you total debts as £36k. So you would need a salary of well in excess of £70k for that to happen.

Consolidation loans rarely work - you'll just spend on the cards again unless you are very strict and shut them down.

You need to try and focus on the high APR cards first and throw everything you have at them. I know that wont be easy with you going on maternity leave.

StuTheDon

KingElvis

You need to drop a few forums down to the Debt Free Wannabe section, they will help you out and offer you encouragement.

You have no chance of getting a loan for that much.

BugsyBrowne

katemccully wrote: »

We need to sort out a consolidation loan for £18,000 to pay off credit cards my husband and I have, but are struggling and have been declined a couple of times. Our monthly cost to pay for these credit cards is £450 which we are not struggling to pay but if we were to get a loan out over 7 years we could save ourselves about £100 a month which would help when I go on maternity leave in June.

Does anyone have any advice? Is a loan even the answer seeing as we're struggling to get one? We have a excellent credit score and don't use our credit cards at all anymore, but all we pay is the minimum payments and we never make a dent in the balances!

There is more chance petrol prices falling by a pound then you getting that loan.

katemccully

Thank you all for your comments, doesn't suprise me to be honest. I will head on down to the Debt free forum.