Is there a better way of paying this debt off?!

Angelgirl14

Hi, I was just wondering if anyone could give me some advice on my debt situation - I would be incredibly grateful!

I currently have 3 sources of debt:

A £1250 overdraft which is currently interest free and will be for the next 3 years

A loan from sainsburys that I originally took out for £4000, I have 4 years and 6 months left of monthly repayments of £91, so in total have £4904.82 left to pay until it's paid off.

A loan from tesco that I originally took out for between £4500 and £5000, which I have 4 years and 4 months left to pay monthly repayments of £107, so a balance of £5550.48 still to pay.

So each month I'm paying £198 towards repayment (while having the overdraft sitting there as well) and with my current salary and rent/bills etc it's just really not living me much to live on - I certainly can't save anything or pay for anything other than food/some socialising etc. t's just really depressing to think that I'm going to be in this situation for another 4 and a half years. I completely accept that I got myself into this situation, from overspending and borrowing to cover this and getting myself into a downward spiral, and I really want to get it paid back, but a lot of it was also built up during periods where I was ill so it's just getting me down that I'm now in the situation I am with this much debt. I also see others around me saving for property deposits / travelling / car etc yet I can't see myself being able to save until this is paid off, which seems such a long time away, and I also haven't taken out a pension yet as I feel like it's more important to pay off debt first, but this concerns me too.

If anyone could give me any advice on whether there are better ways to be paying this off / what they would do in my situation I would be really grateful! Thanks :-)

Swampy3k

Hi there Angelgirl, are your loans fixed or are you able to make overpayments/under payments/ settle figurements?

I would suggest you post a SOA (http://www.stoozing.com/calculator/soa.php) which would allow posters to make suggestions on your finances on where you could possibly cut back etc e.g. "if I cancelled my Sky and gym membership i'd save £85 a month" both of which are luxuries at the end of the day and £85 isn't to be sniffed at!
One avenue you could look down is open a credit union or something similar. hope this helps, good luck on your debt free journey!