I don't think it gets much worse than this. Feel totally beaten

LabRatty

What a great start! No wonder you feel like a different person.

If you're seeing it as a three-year project, I'd certainly reinstate the pension contributions. I missed out on 5 years worth of contributions early in my career and now, nearing retirement, I'm acutely aware of the loss.

I'd also echo the suggestion of planning in frequent small treats, especially if you can be creative and spend time and energy instead of money. Many libraries - if you still have one - have information about free or cheap local events. Bake biscuits or a cake with your son or have a go at some bread if you feel energetic!

Keep in touch and let us know how things go; your strategy is bound to evolve over time and people here will be as supportive as you need.

All the best,
LR

CapricornLass

Hiya, I'm glad you told your wife. I know you probably wanted to protect her - but we women are tougher than you think! She may also have ideas on how pounds and pennies can be trimmed from your budget here and there, too, and help get the debt down faster.

One thing that I found that helped me was You Need a Budget (YNAB) to keep track of my spending. The other thing that you must be aware of is that you have to budget for paying back debts in the same way as you do for food or the rent - I know it sounds obvious, but it took me four years to learn that lesson.

Go back as soon as you can to paying back into your pension. I know it seems like a no-brainer not to pay in until you've paid your debts, but it will have a lasting impact on the money you will have available to you in retirement, and as Silvertabby says, it will also on the amount paid to your wife to bring your son up if you were to die in service. It will be tough enough for her without having to do it in poverty as well.

Good luck, though. Its tough having to tighten your belt, and even harder keeping up it, but the day you pay off that last debt, I will guarantee that you will feel fantastic.

When_the_going_gets_tough

Congratulations on making a start and sharing it with your wife. You sound determined best of luck with the journey

Jon_B_2

Just a quick point. I notice you say you are receiving £82.80/month benefits. I'm going to guess this is child benefit.

Judging by your net income you are going to have to pay this all back at the end of the tax year as you must be on close to £60k/year gross. If I were you, I'd opt out of receiving child benefit as soon as possible and do a self assessment after this tax year to work out what you need to pay the HMRC before 31st Jan 2018.

Jon

lazer-zxr

Good luck Dan.
Amazing similarities top where I was 2 years ago.
My income was 3300, partners 800. With 59k of debt. I told my wife we were in a lot of debt, but there was a plan, and we were progressing nicely along the plan providing we stuck to the budget ... which has become a habit.

worriedDan

Morning guys, thanks for all of the posts. I will be responding to some of them individually a little bit later on.

I managed to have another debt conversation with my wife this morning. We were talking about refinancing some of the debt that is not 0%. She asked " so how much we owe exactly?"... at this point I clammed up ( again). Still struggling to get the " we owe 50K" words out. I told her that I didn't know the exact amount ( this is true as the figures on my SOA were approximate figures) but that we were talking about tens of thousands of pounds. I asked her if she wanted me to access our credit reports and write a list of all of our debts and balances. She laughed and said no and that it was not necessary. She also said that she knew that it was under control as we don't receive threatening phone calls, letters etc. The mortgage is always paid on time and there is food in the fridge.

As I said yesterday, I do want to get to a stage where all of the exact balances etc are laid out for both of us to see, however I wan't to do this after a few months of repayment so that I can show her the progress that we are making.

24 hours ago I was stressing that my wife was being kept in the dark about our financial situation. Since then I have....

• Put together a budget
• Shared details of the the budget with my wife ( she totally supports it BTW)
• Told her that we are tens of thousands of pounds in debt
• Offered

to access our credit reports and give her total balances etc.

Is this enough for now??

enthusiasticsaver

Several more things you can do.

Move anything not on 0% to new 0% deals if you can't. Don't consolidate/restructure - it never works or hardly ever.

Set up spending diary so you can check to see if you are keeping on budget.

Set up spreadsheet with 0% deals and when they finish. Focus all spare disposable income on highest paying debt first and pay minimums on others. When all interest charging ones paid focus on those where 0% finishes soonest. It will motivate you to start seeing them paid off and dropping away.

Cut up credit cards and start emergency savings so in the future you are not tempted to spend on a card. Remember to set up account for annual bills for car etc. You have nothing in your budget for car maintenance so you need to allocate an amount to that depending on age of car and mileage done. Same goes for house maintenance.

How much do you realistically think you can pay off the debt by each month?

angelpye

Well done OP you seem to be making great progress.

I think your wife wants to know what the exact situation is but hasn't asked you to pull up credit file because she trusts you or wants to show she trusts you. To be honest I think as she has asked I would go ahead and pull the exact figures together and just tell her. You have gone this far so why not full disclosure right now?

It will mean you both have equal knowledge of the seriousness of situation - i.e. its a high amount but have caught it in time to not let it get too out of hand given your income. But, if some of that income was to drop, loss of job etc, it could become a big problem quickly.

There may be some tough times ahead, relative to your lifestyle, as you adjust your expenses and I think full disclosure now will remove any chance of feeling being kept in the dark or trust was misplaced in the future.

Are you not telling her because of how it will make you feel about how far it got , or because of how your wife may feel?

I hope that doesn't sound harsh, and your wife seems pretty calm about it all, but if I was her I would want the full hard facts and be in it totally together rather than 'protected'.

I wish you well, and keep focused! You can do this!

Karonher

I can understand your wife showing she trusts you and you wanting to protect her, but her comments do make me wonder if she realises how worried you are. Tens of thousands could be £20,000 and she could see this as quite easy to pay off on your salaries, and keep up her level of spending.

Could you set up a budget for you both to stick to for maybe 6 months saying that you want a lot of the debt gone? At that stage, you could show her the figures. If she has kept to it as well, - or as well as possible - you can congratulate yourselves on how well you have both done, if she has not bothered you can show her the figures and this may push her into action.

LabRatty

It's a really good start.

In addition, I'd
- get some contents insurance set up - not expensive but vital in the event of total loss through (for example) fire.
- put the next two months budgeted council tax payments away in a separate account as the start of your emergency fund. (Tesco current account is easy to open online and pays 3% on balances up to £3000 with no conditions attached).
- have a look at the eligibility checker and apply very selectively for a 0% BT card with the highest chance of acceptance. Doesn't matter if you're offered a lower limit than you'd ideally like; every little helps. Transfer what you can and snowball the remainder.

Once again, well done on getting a handle on this. It looks as if you'll be someone who treats it as a project, and take pride in achieving interim targets.

All the best,
LR