'normal' amounts of debt in this day and age

Whoknowskt89

I'm 27 and I think my car could be classed as an old banger (15years old, 1l runaround) but I do know a lot of people that use credit to buy new cars. Personally I took out a small loan to buy a motorbike (13 years old) and to do a few things in my flat. I could have wiped out my savings accounts to pay for it all and saved a little bit longer but a rarely for sale bike came up, I'm in a relatively secure job and I didn't want to wipe out all my savings in case anything went wrong in my flat.

The problem is spend what they earn. If you earn x a year, you'll budget to x. Other times jobs require you to look a certain way so going to primark for a suit isn't possible.
Rises in costs and no rises in wages, people put things on the cards.
Or my sister, doesn't matter to her if she could save money every penny is spent and no real emergency fund despite being a home owner, relying on a car to get to work etc. When her oven broke a few years ago, me and my parents chipped in to buy her a new one (there's 2 wages in her household too!)

worriedDan

PoorGuyNextDoor wrote: »

I earn 60k a year. Debt has just hit £40,996. Made up of £6k on credit cards the rest in loans. Its fallen fast from near £50k at Christmas time. Iv got my house to show for it although thats not what the money was spent on. Seems such a waste paying it all back now but im determinded to get it done.

I think it is the norm. Im 25 and it seems most people my age dont like to talk about debt. Id reckon most have finance on their cars. I struggle to think of anyone my age that drives an old banger of a motor yet i know of older very wealth people that do. Debt just spirals out of control. It needs to be a subject in schools before people are old enough to borrow so they are going into it with their eyes open knowing how one small loan can be the start of it and you end up six figure in the red.

Being 25 id like to think iv learnt this money lesson early enough so i can get debt free in the next 2-3 years then learn from my mistakes.

Well done for making such good progress Poor guy! It's great that you are sorting this out at 25... I wish I had! I am 36 and owed slightly more than you when we started, though ours was a joint debt of 57Kish. I am sure that there are many many people out there is a similar or more amount of debt than us.

OneLife_OneShot

No one seems to like to talk about it too much until you can relate to someone. I only told my few closet friends I had ran up some CC debts. Only my father and step mother in the family.

One of them seemed relaxed and they had money problems too so they admitted their problems and got on a DMP and the other got their CC debt cleared by a family member.

Sometimes it helps to talk about it as its easily done and to know you are not alone is half the battle. I recommend they read through here and that a few grand is not unbeatable with some good budgeting and hard work.

Btw I am 28 and the people in question are a similar age but I agree that my generation especially seem to hide about it that it is somehow normal.

FBaby

Being 25 id like to think iv learnt this money lesson early enough so i can get debt free in the next 2-3 years then learn from my mistakes.

You're absolutely right and in a way, it is almost a good thing to get into debts at that stage of life so that the lesson is learnt before it is much harder to deal with the consequences.

Both OH and I got ourselves in debts in our 20s both because it was just nice to spend the money we could. In the case of my OH, it lead to him working in the evenings after doing a FT shift during the day to pay it off quickly. After 3 months of this and totally exhausted as a result, he swore he would never let it happen again. In my case, my wake up call when I got a letter to go to court. I was so ashamed and petrified, I also thought never again.

I faced some difficult times when I had to count every penny and once owed £1K on my credit card. It felt like a fortune and I repaid it asap and then got rid of the credit card. I earn a good wage as does my OH, but I have no credit card and he pays his every month. You adapt to a life you can afford and it becomes your norm.

BLOW_FLY

Seven years ago (early thirties) my wife and I had close £50k of debt between us and nothing to show for it really, mis-spent youth and living way beyond our means in our late 20s.

Seven years on joint household income is now at £110-120k (I've been fairly fortunate with my job) the wife's IVA finished last Feb, I have £2k on CC and £7k of consolidated loan left to pay.

We have circa £50k in savings now which will be house deposit which in turn will give us a new head ache of £300k in mortgage debt.....

We've definitely learnt a lesson and the plan is to pay down the mortgage at out current earning levels as fast as possible to be debt free.

BF

Houseplant26

I was earning £20,000 then had to go down to more like £16,000 to change sectors then back at £20,000 as of very recently. I'm 27 and I'd love to be earning more but work in charity sector.

I have no real debt apart from student loan, but only £700 saved which is ideally for a much needed holiday.

I think people my age get a bad reputation for spending above their means. Things are relatively tough in an unstable job market and the rise of the buy to let landlord. I rent and on old salary rent and bills (not including food etc) was half my income.

I'm proud to say I haven't spent on credit cards just because I needed a holiday, a day out or wanted/needed something for our home.

stinabean

I've always struggled with debt, I think it's a huge issue that it's not taught in schools.

As soon as i could get one, I got a HMV store card for around £250 because my (lying cheating) partner couldn't get one in his name. He then maxed it out and didn't pay it.
I didn't learn my lesson, and took a phone contact out in my name for him. He went to india and racked up around £800 - didn't pay it. While that's not huge amounts, it was for someone who was only working part time due to education and caused me to have a default on it. I was far too ashamed to tell my parents who would've helped me out in a heartbeat.

While i've learnt my lesson in not just spending credit because it's there, it has helped me out in sticky spots and I now owe just under £2,000 on a CC, £5k on a car between me and my (non !!!!!!) partner and I'm 30 years old. Soon to have a mortgage debt of £148k so once in and the payments are less, I can hopefully get debt free fairly easily.

dktreesea

Houseplant26 wrote: »

I was earning £20,000 then had to go down to more like £16,000 to change sectors then back at £20,000 as of very recently. I'm 27 and I'd love to be earning more but work in charity sector.

I have no real debt apart from student loan, but only £700 saved which is ideally for a much needed holiday.

I think people my age get a bad reputation for spending above their means. Things are relatively tough in an unstable job market and the rise of the buy to let landlord. I rent and on old salary rent and bills (not including food etc) was half my income.

I'm proud to say I haven't spent on credit cards just because I needed a holiday, a day out or wanted/needed something for our home.

Good on you for resisting the urge to splurge. I'm not sure it's an age thing, having too much debt. It could instead be just living in a low wage, high cost economy.

Primrose

I'm shocked by the amount of debt many people have these days and wonder whether it worries them. If I had debts I simply wouldn't be able to sleep at night until every last penny had been laid off.
Excluding a mortgage which many people have, we have never had any debts. We simply went without something until we had saved up the money for it. Yes it was sometimes hard doing without, but having twice suffered unexpected redundancy during times of recession, I'm so glad we always kept our finances in good order and had emergency savings put by.

People seem to have different priorities these days. Expensive weddings, a mandatory overseas holiday every year, the latest gadgets, etc. One just hopes that all these things won't one day come back to haunt people. Recessions and unemployment have a nasty habit of coming round again at regular intervals.

Thrugelmir

Primrose wrote: »

I'm shocked by the amount of debt many people have these days and wonder whether it worries them.

For many it doesn't. At least until the **** hits the fan. Unexpected kids, job loss, sickness, relationship breakdown etc etc. Any number of events change life upside down over night. Then it's a slippery slope downwards. Even cutting back on outgoings isn't enough. As it's little more than treading more. Then another unexpected bill arrives........

Always happens to some else......not going to me.