Best Advice?

RyanDebt22

Hi can anyone advise me on the best thing to do here, most of this is interest free however I'm finding it difficult to manage. I am on a good wage around £2200 per month -£1000 bills. A lot of this debt has accrued from unexpected bills and holidays, and probably loving to excess. Should I consolidate it all or just focus on paying it off as much as possible. The Dave bill is money that was lent to me for my house deposit. Any advice is greatly appreciated!

£-03,700 Natwest Credit Card
£-02,871 Tesco Credit Card
£-02,600 First Direct Credit Card
£-02,373 Dave (Father-in-law)
£-01,650 Halifax One Credit Card
£-01,503 Safestyle Windows
£-00,970 Natwest Overdraft
£-00,850 Barclaycard Gold
£-00,481 First Direct Overdraft
£-00,432 Barclaycard Platinum
£-00,384 ASDA Credit Card
£-17,814 Debt
£-63,874 Mortgage
£-81,688 Total

Tixy

Hi and welcome to the forums.

Its quite difficult to advise without knowing more about the debts, interest rates and your finances.

Can you afford the monthly repayments on the debts currently (if you are no longer spending on holidays etc). Have you worked out a detailed monthly budget of whatyou have coming in and going out on living costs before debt repayments? and then looked at what you have left for debt repayments? Are you paying just the minimums on your debts or are you paying more than the minimums?

If so then if a good proportion of it is at 0% then ideally you don't want to move that/try to consolidate anywhere else.

grumbler

What does mortgage have to do in this list?
What's "£-17,814 Debt"?

CherlokHomes

grumbler wrote: »

What does mortgage do in this list?
What's "£-17,814 Debt"?

The Mortgage is 63k and without that his other debts are 17k

To the OP 17k is not that hard to knock out in 2-3 years if you cut back on a few things.

Try and get as many debts at 0% as possible and those you don't get 0% hit them with all you can manage.

redpete

What do you mean by "difficult to manage"? - finding the amount you have to pay each month or organising the payments to so many creditors?

You need to go to the Debt Free Wannabee board for the best advice. You also need to explain the interest rates on each debt and the minimum monthly payment on each debt.

You will also be asked for a Statement of Affairs (SOA) that details your monthly income and outgoings. When you provide this you will be advised to cut down on mobile phone and satellite TV contracts, look for cheaper utility, phone and insurance deals, pay rates over 12 months instead of 10 months and shop for cheaper groceries. This will release money with which you can pay off the most expensive (highest interest) debts in turn (snowballing).

Debt consolidation is unlikely to be recommended because of the temptation to spend on all those credit cards once you have paid them off with the new loan.

Finally - avoid those unexpected holidays and excessive loving.

iAMaLONDONER

RyanDebt22 wrote: »

Hi can anyone advise me on the best thing to do here, most of this is interest free however I'm finding it difficult to manage. I am on a good wage around £2200 per month -£1000 bills. A lot of this debt has accrued from unexpected bills and holidays, and probably loving to excess. Should I consolidate it all or just focus on paying it off as much as possible. The Dave bill is money that was lent to me for my house deposit. Any advice is greatly appreciated!

£-03,700 Natwest Credit Card
£-02,871 Tesco Credit Card
£-02,600 First Direct Credit Card
£-02,373 Dave (Father-in-law)
£-01,650 Halifax One Credit Card
£-01,503 Safestyle Windows
£-00,970 Natwest Overdraft
£-00,850 Barclaycard Gold
£-00,481 First Direct Overdraft
£-00,432 Barclaycard Platinum
£-00,384 ASDA Credit Card
£-17,814 Debt
£-63,874 Mortgage
£-81,688 Total

Getting a 0% balance transfer would help make the credit card debt more manageable

[Deleted User]

iAMaLONDONER wrote: »

Getting a 0% balance transfer would help make the credit card debt more manageable

Problem is, the OP says most of the debt is interest free already, so would make little difference.

As redpete says, he needs to reduce his excessive loving and put that money and effort towards his debts.

bengal-stripe

RyanDebt22 wrote: »

A lot of this debt has accrued from.......probably loving to excess.

Is that a Freudian slip? - If yes, you can always try celibacy!:A

iAMaLONDONER

Deleted_User wrote: »

Problem is, the OP says most of the debt is interest free already, so would make little difference.

As redpete says, he needs to reduce his excessive loving and put that money and effort towards his debts.

True, however it's an important thing for him to make sure that the debt stays at 0% for as long as possible!