Not sure what to do about our debt

whatnow2011

Hi everyone

I've lurked here for a long time but have only just decided to post about myself. I've read a lot of posts and diaries here but my situation is a bit complicated and I'm tired thinking about it now. I don't think there's anything else I can do about our debt, at least until something in my personal situation changes.

I'm a 52 year old female with 2 children, the eldest has Down's and is at home with me. My youngest is at primary school. I've been with the youngest's Dad for 15 years but we never married. Two months ago my partner told me he didn't love me and wanted to leave. I don't blame him, our relationship hasn't been good for a long time, we let things slide and paid more attention to everything else in our lives. It's me that always deals with our money and although he knew we had a lot of debt, he didn't know how much. When he found out we owed £35000 on credit cards he was very angry and upset. He's a good man and not the type to walk away and dump all this on me, so he said he'd stay and we'd try to sort us and our debt out.

We've been getting on better since then but he's never spoken about his feelings again and I'm scared to ask him in case he still says he doesn't love me. I think he's just plodding along until the debt is more manageable then he'll decide what he wants to do. He agrees he is bad with money too and that he shouldn't have left it all to me but hindsight is a wonderful thing.

The debt is mostly equally spilt, some in his name some in mine. Most of it is on 0% offers that I've juggled for the past few years but are all close to ending now and I don't think we can apply for further 0% cards as we have so many. Even if we closed some, I'm not sure it would help as it's just not as easy to get new cards these days. The ones we could close are all low limits so it wouldn't make a great deal of difference anyway. The total limit on all the cards is £66550 and we owe £35000 on them. We've never paid interest on this debt but I can see that starting now and I just dont know how we can find the extra to cover it. Our combined income varies between £30000 - £40000 depending on partner's work shifts and overtime.

If we had a normal relationship it would be easier to deal with the debt but I have to keep in mind the fact that things can change really quickly and the added stress of dealing with the debt might make him want to leave even more so I need to keep that in mind and not do anything that will make me and the children worse off. We have nothing of worth in the house to sell. We each have our own car (both are old and not worth much) but I dont want to sell one as I cant be left with no transport if we end up splitting up. We live at the end of a dirt track in an isolated area where there is no public transport, my partner needs his car to get to work and I need mine for the children and shopping. It's a lovely place for the children to live amongst nature and roam free in the fields but it's hard living here sometimes.

I don't work as I'm a carer for my eldest child so although I get carer's allowance, child benefit and tax credits I dont have any other income of my own. I've checked with the benefits agency and I am getting everything I'm entitled to. We live in an isolated area anyway so if we split up in the long term, I/we would probably need to try to sell up and move somewhere more practical but that doesn't help me now. I dont think the house would sell anyway as it's not in a good state of repair and not many people would choose to live here.

So how do I deal with the debt whilst making sure I'm not left hanging if the worst comes to the worst? I wouldn't want to dump it all on my partner but I would have no way of paying it myself if he left. I'm just not sure what to do.

psychopathbabble

Just popping in to say someone will come along with some sort of advice soon.... didn't want to read and run.

Is it possible for you to fill in a Statement of Affairs with all your income and outgoings? easy linky

It might help you to take time to fill this out properly and honestly as well. If you then post it on here, people might have some suggestions.

RAS

Welcome

The SOA is definately the first thing.

Also start thinking about what might be around the house if you were to declutter that you could sell, on amazon, e-bay or at a car boot sale?

NeverAgain_2

You are in this together, so you could do with knowing what your partner is going to do.

Is he staying or going, and if staying, is he going to play his part in reducing all the debts?

There's a fair bit of work involved if you go down the route of debt management plans and other more official instruments.

Pointless to do that work one month if your financial circumstances change dramatically the next.

beanielou

Looking forward to seeing your SOA.