sticky situation

glimmerofhope

Hi
Is the car ins correct? £132 per month on an £800 car. Your car expenses are over £200 per month.

If you didn't have clothes and entertainment for 1 month you would be able to clear the bottom two debts, then month 2 ground rent and specsavers....this may help get the ball rolling.

Maybe also keep a spending diary noting everything you buy...cups of coffee, papers etc

mya_may

I moved away and rented my house out, we are now back in the same area so are trying to get the tenants out as it would be cheaper to live there. I feel awful evicting them though. I don't want to sell mine as we still need somewhere to live. And if we can move back it saves about £150 a month on the rent alone.

I don't quite know what the car is worth, I think that is what we paid but they had ours too, its probably worth more, it's about 7. We are in a really bad area and OH has points which is why the insurance is high and there isn't a job description that is low cost that is still pretty accurate.

I think a spending diary is a good idea, I was reading about it on another post. I don't actually know that we spend what we do on clothes, it was just a guess on what I could think that we had bought. The other place our money goes is cigs, OH gave up and started again but he won't tell me what he smokes now, it was costing nearly £400 a month.

I have been sorting the house today, I have £40 to put in the bank. Some foreign money but I don't know where to change it back. Some winning scratch cards, unfortunately only a couple of quid and a few other bits and pieces I don't know what to do with.

I was going to pay the parking fine and the ground rent this month then the smaller debts the months after. I haven't actually made any agreements with the debts, except two, do you think they will still chase me if I start paying such a small amount?

BitterAndTwisted

Why have you got so many council tax bills outstanding? Those are the ones you should really be worrying about. C Tax debt-collectors have more teeth than the other kinds.

turbo.jet

I think you have listed mortgage twice?

mya_may

I didn't realise there were that many. A lot of letters weren't opened, the less money we had the more bills seemed to come in. That's why I was only going to pay £5 to each, one will finish next month so the money from that is going to the higher one, then when the smaller ones get paid off I can add to the others.

I should get £200 next week for some work I did, then should get up to that each week as I start a new job. Should I just use the money this week to get rid of some of these?

dancingfairy

Hi - well done to starting to get a grip on things. What I would say is try and sort out the housing situation. At the moment it appears that your tenants are building up arrears - you need to sort this out before it gets any worse. Also don't worry about them you need to sort out your situation. You might find it useful to go over to the renting section on here and ask for advice about getting the tenants up to date on rent or evicting them. It really is a good idea to get advice because the tenants may be more aware of their rights than you are and if you don't go about serving notice in the right way on the right dates you could be stuck with them for a lot longer
When the place is empty (not necessarily the day you want them to leave) then you can decide whether to rent to someone else or move in yourself.
In terms of the debts what state are the council tax debts in? have they gone to bailiffs? are they thinking about an attachment of earnings? Also what's happened to this years? has it got a liability order yet or not?
df

mya_may

The tenants just stopped paying until their housing benefit was sorted but there was 6 weeks between them stopping and even handing the form in. They had notice which has long gone and aren't doing anything to leave.

This years council tax is behind which is why it is £180 but I haven't had demands or letters from them, I did ask if I could spread it to march but they told me I'm pushing it making a payment in february.
I'm trying really hard to keep these bills for where we are now up to date, I sorted out all the papers and letters and have a big pile of who needs paying.

I have extra things to sell but feel so sentimental about some of them, for really no reason

dancingfairy

so were they on a 12 month contract with a 6 month break clause? did you give them the required 2 months notice to expire at the end of a rental period? is their deposit preotected with one of the schemes? does it cover the arrears? Also why are you being asked to stump up 175 to take them to court? surely it's not that much? Also what sort of notice did you serve? are you going for grounds 6,8 or 13? I believe they are the most common - you really need free advice from over on the renting board to see what option are available to you. Are they now on a rolling contract or still in the initial contract?
In terms of the council tax - it might be best to prioritise this years rather than the previous years arrears - this is because if the council get a liability order against you for this year it will bump the cost up by about 80 pounds and that's before the bailiff costs although it obviously depends on whether the others are on arranagement and whether the bailiffs have ever levied on any of you itmes (cos if they have and you stop paying then they will seize the item(s) in question.
df

dancingfairy

If you are getting 200 pounds I would pay off the court fine (so it doesn't get worse) and the ground rent plus any extra on reducing your council tax arrears.
df

mya_may

I've not had any bailifs, just court fees, two of them have doubled with fees.
Its a parking fine, I couldn't pay it in the first 14 days so it has to be paid tomorrow.

The deposit is protected, it doesn't cover the arrears, they are about twice as much as the deposit. I gave a notice from a form, they are out of the assured tenancy and have just been on a monthly tenancy. The notice period expired, I keep waiting for them to sort out the arrears but they won't so I don't feel I have any other choice. The notice was for the last day of their rental month. I read on one of the landlord forums it was £175 for the court order and another £110 if they still don't go. It was a section 8 grounds but I think the notice I sent didn't specify just told them I wanted the house back.

I am making my current bills priorities so I don't end up even worse