Best way to clear my debt...

Potbellypig

Me and my partner are currently paying about £570 a month (depends on how many fridays are in the month) to debt, and it goes as follows:


Vanquis 1 - £900 balance (paying £100pm)
Vanquis 2 - £820 balance (paying £100pm)
Barclaycard - £400 balance (paying £50pm)
Provident loan - £4950 balance with total interest already added to balance (paying £50 per week)
Loan from a friend - £578 balance (paying £70pm)


I've a snowball debt calculator and if we continue at the current rate that we are paying then we'll be debt clear by Nov-2015. I believe that this is the best way to pay these (given our current situation) but I thought I'd ask out there to see if anyone has any other suggestions.


Switching to a better credit card deal isn't an option because we are both previously bankrupt. I know.

DevCoder

What are the APR%'s on each of those ?

Potbellypig

I believe Vanquis 1 is 69.9% but Vanquis 2 is less because it's now a 'gold' card. Not sure exactly what without looking. Barclaycard is 34.9%.


Interest on Provident loan is probably extortionate. Wouldn't surprise me if it was in excess of 200%. Interest on the loan from a friend is nothing.

kerri_gt

You really need to post a SOA for people to be able to give you the best advise, http://www.stoozing.com/calculator/soa.php

Be honest about what you spend otherwise advise won't be relevant. I'd also suggest keeping a spending diary, write down everything you spend over the course of at least a month - its amazing how incidental spends add up and is invaluable to looking at areas to reduce spending.

In addition, include all the APRs on your current debt.

You're DFD isn't that far away so with a few tweaks (doesn't have to mean denying yourself everything) it might be possible to bring it a little closer.

DevCoder

Potbellypig wrote: »

I believe Vanquis 1 is 69.9% but Vanquis 2 is less because it's now a 'gold' card. Not sure exactly what without looking. Barclaycard is 34.9%.


Interest on Provident loan is probably extortionate. Wouldn't surprise me if it was in excess of 200%. Interest on the loan from a friend is nothing.

You really need to find those APR's, the stacking debt idea is that you throw as much money as possible at the biggest APR and pay the minimum on the others. So if the provident one is in the 100's% APR then this would be the one to target, especially with such a large balance.

Snowball works the other way around, have you tried calculating both and seen which is better?

DevCoder

For an explanation see

https://www.savvymoney.com/debt-blog/article/debt-stacking-vs-snowball/

Its $ example based but the principle is the same (currency makes no difference at this level)

dancingfairy

Make sure you do a proper budget and understand why you have got in debt again. Obviously it's possible that you were unlucky twice but you need to make sure you don't get in this situation again and that you are able to enjoy your hard earned money and are not using it to line the pockets of the credit card companies.
df

Potbellypig

Thanks for your responses. I'll do one of those SOA's tomorrow and post it to see if and where we can save money. Good idea about the diary aswell. It's not something that I've ever thought of before.


I'll take a look at that debt stacking aswell. On first thought, it looks like that would actually take me longer to pay off than the snowball though? It's something I'd need to look at...


Not unlucky dancingfairy, we are both just quite poor at money management. We are both getting better though and luckily time is on our side (both late 20's). I'll love to be good at money management. I really envy you guys and gals that are.