is manageable debt ok?

loey93

Some of the comments are quite harsh on this post. You only live once and as long as you can manage the debts then I really don't see the issue..

Kidder81

My personal opinion is that every penny owed in debt is generally accruing interest. That is money that should be in your pocket and not going to the bank.

In my opinion, the only acceptable debt is either mortgage or business loan. But I can understand why people have other debts. Unfortunately it's too easy for people to fall into the debt cycle from which they take a long time if ever to recover.

Jenniefour

bezza59 wrote: »

Hello everyone!

Me and my wife are currently in disagreement over our situation. We are mid 40's, 2 kids and a dog!

Our debts peaked about 18 months ago an we up in the 50K's and that wasn't including the lease car! We made a commitment to sort it out, restructured the debts and sorted out our excessive spending. We current owe around 40K. The debts are all at low interest rates and we easily afford the repayments. Each month the balance gets lower and we have not used any form of credit since starting our new regime.

My wife still lives in a sense of shame over our situation... I dont!!!. It's beginning to cause arguments. As far as I am concerned; we do have a lot of debt, however it's managed, affordable and reducing month by month. We are never short of money for the essentials and life is fine. We earn decent money ( about 65k joint). I am actually quite proud that we are dealing with our debts.

As far as I am concerned, the amount of debt is not the main issue- it's the ability to manage it and pay it back. I know people who earn 20K a year but owe 30K and struggle to make inroads. To me, they are in a far worse situation than we are. And then there are people on minimum wage who owe 5k on payday loans and have no money left to live on - much less than us but a far worse scenario in my opinion.

I am I being deluded? I am not making light of our debt, but I just can't get too worked up over it as it's being dealt with!!

OP, you are asking a question, the good folks on here are doing their best to put forward potentially useful perspectives/address your question and just about every time someone tries to put something forwards that differs from your perspective you come back with a justification of your position - you feel OK about the current arrangement. However, what's crystal clear is your wife definitely does not feel OK, quite the contrary, and some people are trying to draw your attention to this. Your wife's feelings are her feelings, no right or wrong about it, but you can't make her feel/think differently. She's entitled to have her own thoughts and feelings. Your responses suggest you believe you're "right", and come over as disregarding/minimising your wife views and feelings about this. Which might be unintentional.

Big glaring red flag is that you're saying this is starting to cause arguments, which doesn't surprise me because it's not at all obvious that you're making any effort to listen (which is a lot more than hearing the words coming out of her mouth) and empathise with your wife. Your behaviour and fixed, rigid stance is having a tremendous impact on your wife, which you seem to be unaware of or disregarding.

These are the situations where, after the divorce, one person keeps repeating "I never saw that coming, I had no idea he/she was so unhappy" or "I had no idea it bothered him/her that much, I thought they were making a fuss about nothing" and the other is saying "I kept raising this issue and didn't get taken seriously" or "what I wanted was not as important as what he/she wanted and I got fed up of being the one who had to go along with what he/she wanted all the time".

So I want to ask you a question now - do you really want to engage with your wife about this because you love her and care about how she feels, and are you willing to re-visit the current arrangement and consider changing it?

If so, then it might be more helpful to consider the responses with an open mind and willingness to consider the seriousness of what's going on in your marriage. Neither of your approaches to the debt is the "right" or "wrong" one, what needs attention is finding a way to get on the same page where both of you feel supported by the other in dealing with the debt.

"I am I being deluded?". Short, alternative response - yes. Sadly.

bezza59

Well I didn't expect this post to be resurrected! I posted this 4 months ago!

To be honest, things have carried on pretty much as they were in terms of our debt repayment plan. We haven't really discussed it/argued about it since the last time I posted. Whist it's true that our attitudes towards the debts differ, we are generally a happily married couple.

The debt has continued to come down at a decent rate and we have been able to have some fun.

Thanks for posts though!

moxter

This thread is actually quite interesting - contains a lot of good points from various angles and is better than most of the "omg u cant afford sky or gym and u should spend less on cat food" type "advice".

As opinions were invited, I'll stick my own oar in, which is that this really is a pretty colossal debt for that sort of salary and while the OP doesn't want to sacrifice too many pleasures in life, that's exactly what is being sacrificed from later life by accruing so much debt in the first place, and the interest charges. A grand a month being thrown at debt is a grand that could have been going towards other things, maybe that debt has a lot to show for it, maybe it doesn't, although that's water that's a long way past the bridge now.

Generally I'm not one to think that drastic lifestyle changes are the way to sort a problem - reminds me too much of crash diets which might show some great results for a few months. I'd generally be one to think about nudges, incremental changes, which can move things slowly from net deficit towards being in the black. However, such a laid-back attitude to what is, let's face it, vast debt on what is a decent but modest joint salary, suggests that that attitude could extend to how the debt was accrued in the first place. I know that the OP has had most of this debate weeks ago now, but I still found the conversation interesting and with plenty of pointers for other people in similar situations.

bezza59

Hey folks, i'm back!

16K more debt has been cleared so we are doing ok! My wife and I still disagree over it, but we have just been getting on with it.

hoping to clear the remaining debt in the next 2 years.

Thrugelmir

Stick at it. Like looking back at the phases when ones children went through growing up. Just when it's calm. Another storm breaks.

a_silver_lining

Realised I was posting to an older thread Glad you're making headway OP.

My comment was going to be that I would aim to reduce the time frame that anything in our lives caused my partner stress.

bezza59

Thanks for replies folks.

Tbh I rarely think about the debt! It!!!8217;s just become another outgoing. We haven!!!8217;t used any form of credit since we started repaying our debt so I do think that our habits have changed. We have continued to have nice things tbought- holidays and weekends away etc. Admittedly we could have sacrificed these for faster debt repayment, but life is short!!!