To repay or not to repay?

J24092012

Hello all,

I am new to all this and would thoroughly appreciate any possible input as there is so much information I don't know what to believe and what not to believe.

In 2007 as a young naive 18 year old student I ran up a £3250 overdraft on my Halifax student account thinking I was having a wale of a time and not thinking much of it. I later went abroad to live completely forgetting about this account and letting it default in early 2009. I moved back to the UK in 2014 more grown up and responsible with my wife and two young children and am currently working. We would love to buy a house and have saved up a deposit to do so. The question is that I have looked on my experian credit report and seen that this default will be wiped out in about 14 months time. I would be more than happy to pay off this outstanding amont in full as I am in a financially suitable position however I have read that even if I do pay off this amont it won't make a difference to my mortgage application and will be seen as black mark anyway? Is this true? I am also scared that if I contact the lender, the default will update and will be stuck for another 6 years on my credit file, is this possible? As surely in this case I would be better off renting for a year and then applying for a mortgage when this information has disappeared. I am in no way trying to avoid paying this. It was my stupid error and remains my responsiblity, however I am concerned with the fact that even if I do pay it off I am going to affected by it. Thank you very much in advance for any information provided.

Thrugelmir

Without a few years electoral roll history you may struggle to obtain a mortgage.

juvy

I think you must repay. According to Thomas Jefferson, Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.

wrkactjob

Have a read of these forms on how long things stay on your credit file and what statute barred means.

Sign onto the electoral role and it sounds like that in 14 months time you will be in a better place to apply for a mortgage.

J24092012

Hello, thank you for your replies. I have spent the week tracking down the people I owed the money to (by the way I find it strange that I was passed on to at least 4 or 5 different companies. I would have thought they would make it easier to repay my debt but getting in touch with right people took a while) in any case I have paid off the balance in full and although I know that I have a minimum of 18 months renting ahead of me before I can think about applying for a mortgage, I feel a lot better knowing that I am now totally debt free. I guess I just have to build my credit profile, as apart from that debt there was absolutely nothing on it.