BACK AGAIN! damn it

angelflower_2

Being in debt seems to be an endless cycle for me - and its doing my head in. For the last few years, I have been coasting along from pay check to pay check not letting anything become major but almost without seeing it coming, I am in deep again.

The headlines:

I have around £2000 in mortgage arrears, and have a court date for the 11th September for repossession hearing in which I am hoping to be able to ask for more time.

My wages have been arrested for a council tax debt.

My tax is also extortionate as I was overpaid last year and they are seeking it back over the course of this tax year.

So, despite just getting an £7k pay rise, I just cant seem to clear my feet.

Then the other stuff, I am in a bit of a payday loan cycle. I only have 3 loans left but one of them is up at £750 which I renew each month and pay over £200 in interest each month.

On paper I have enough money to pay my outgoings but I have let my non essential spending get out of control.

I have been leasing a car, but that gets returned on Wed so that will save a bunch.

The crisis points are:
repossession hearing (admit I am scared about this one )
Stopping the payday loan cycle
Finding a way to pay for some essential house repairs. I currently have no hot water since the boiler has died, and we dont have an electric shower so am making baths using kettle and pots. Not fun. My roof is also leaking.

Just getting it all down here again to try and focus the mind.

Any advice on the house and tapping into any repair routes would be most helpful. Ive spent some time on the other threads today too but I feel like this thread is my home. Ive been here about 15 years!!!!

EDIT: Damn, just seen my sig .... my original DFD was 2017.......if ONLY!!

Craig1981

hiya

if everything is affordable on paper, then there should be no issues?

Payday loans - stop paying them - mortgage, C/Tax far more important. contact the payday loan companies and request they hold interest and come to an affordable arrangement for that.

is this your first time at court for the possession hearing? if so, you should be able to get this suspended on an affordable arrangement to clear costs and arrears within 6 to 12 months. make sure you have done a full and honest income and expenditure for the hearing. make sure you send this to the mortgage company too - could be that something can be agreed before the hearing itself

again payday loans will not be accepted as an "okay" expense for affordability on the mortgage repayments.

what are all your debts and income? it could be that an IVA would be they way forward

Willing2Learn

Hi angelflower,

I agree with the above. You need to focus on your priority debts and put everything else on hold. Write to them, your non-priority creditors, asking for 30 days grace while you seek advice off StepChange or any other free debt counselling service.


Don't be sad about it though. These things can happen. You need to find a method of budgeting that stops the overspending!!

angelflower_2

thanks everyone. Im going through stepchange online tool right now.

Yes, this is my first court hearing. I am trying to work out how to get a solicitor and have an appointment with citizens advice bureau soon too. I think i need to close my bank account as the payday loans can take direct payment via my card I think. Or maybe just request a new card before the next pay date so the card number and code on the back change?

Willing2Learn

You don't need to close your bank account. All you need do is to stop the continuous payment authority (CPA) so that the card payment is cancelled and authority to take the payment has been withdrawn.

See National Debtline guidance on how this should be done. You want the bit that says "Stopping a CPA"
https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/factsheets/Pages/payday-loans/payday-loan-debt.aspx

Edit: And here is a sample letter cancelling your CPA
https://www.nationaldebtline.org/EW/sampleletters/Pages/Withdraw-your-continuous-payment-authority-from-payday-loan-company-%28sole-name%29.aspx

MovingForwards

If the roof leak is accessable from the inside there is some stuff you can buy to seal it and prevent the leak (I did it several years ago), i cant remember what it is called.

Cancel your debut card and request a new one. That will stop payday loans taking the money.

Do a SOA so we can see where you can trim back.

You have straightened up before and can do it again.

datlex

Look up THEM FIRST It is the order in which your debts/bills should be paid.

Craig1981

angelflower wrote: »

Yes, this is my first court hearing. I am trying to work out how to get a solicitor and have an appointment with citizens advice bureau soon too. I think i need to close my bank account as the payday loans can take direct payment via my card I think. Or maybe just request a new card before the next pay date so the card number and code on the back change?

i would suggest getting to the court 45 min to an hour earlier than the hearing time. there is usually a CAB presence or PSU (https://www.thepsu.org/) who will or can assist on the day as well, but please DONT take this as definite. still make sure you try to get arrangements etc done prior to the hearing

fatbelly

Yes you don't need a solicitor (you don't need to have someone else to invoice you!) but there may well be someone at the court that day who can give free assistance. In my area it's Shelter who do it but it used to be CAB.

That is because the courts tend to bunch all the repossession hearings together on one day and so it makes sense to have someone to assist. We used to have six cases listed for every half hour, or five minutes per case.

The hearings are in a room with you (and your rep if you can link with one), a representative of the mortgage company (usually a junior legal exec who will have a huge case load for that day), the judge and an usher.

You need to show you can make the contractual monthly instalment (cmi) plus something that clears the arrears within the remaining term of the mortgage.

An order which suspends possession is termed an SPO, and one that goes to the extreme of the mortgage term is referred to as a Norgan order as it was a case c&g vs Norgan that set precedent for this. Sometimes you can see a reference on the legal rep's cover sheet because he/she will have already worked this out.

My default was usually to pitch for an SPO that cleared the arrears in 50 months unless we were really tight on the figures. Once you have the order you can always pay more but you can't pay less.

Dress smartly, get there early, have your figures ready, talk to the other side (but don't be bullied), see if you can find the court desk help, refer to the judge as sir/ma'am and just answer the questions they ask. You'll be OK.

sourcrates

Just one thing about the payday loans, if you just cancel the CPA it only tends to work once, if the lender applies again, the payment goes through, its best to report your card as lost, get a new one with a different number, then they cannot debt your account.

angelflower_2

Just a wee update, because I feel productive

Spoke tonight with StepChange who walked me through some of the figures on my account and offered me a bit more advice regarding applying for a Moritorium to allow a bit of breathing space. This may even stop the court hearing apparently!

I need to get hold of some extra figures for them from a wages arrestment and overpayment in income tax and then I will be able to finalise the budget.

They advised me to try and get my utility bills down but that was a non starter. Took an hour on the online chat thing and I would only save £3 so I might be stuck with that until the debt there will be cleared. They would only set up if I agreed to a specific repayment amount which I cant do whilst they are helping.

Also ordered a new bank card so waiting on that now, and stepchange sent me a template to send to each of the payday loan companies stopping the automatic payments so I will prepare and send them tomorrow.

This debt stuff is really tough, but it gets easier with every micro action in the right direction, right?