Our BR Diary, from start to finish......

tigerfeet2006

And there we go case in point

Scarlett.1974

ccastley wrote: »

Hi Scarlett,

Your thread has been a tremendous comfort to me though I of course wish you weren;t having to go through this. If I can be half as positive as you over the whole thing I'll be a lot better equipped to get through this.

The main problem I'm having (as you know, having kindly offered advice on my thread) is letting go of the house. It looks inevitable, but I am gutted. We've hung on by tooth and nail for 2 years since my husbands accident and I just feel like a bloody failure letting it go. I'm so scared I'll never be able to buy again with house prices on the up and my health on the low, and I wonder what kind of legacy I'll leave my son. How did you get your head around it all?

Crystal

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Hi Crystal

I'm glad reading this has helped you a little, I really am, I feel quite humbled.

I won't lie to you - letting go of our old house was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. I felt like a terrible failure, I lost count of the number of times I cried on my husband's shoulders that I'd let my children down by letting things get this bad.

But eventually I realised that what my children needed was a happy mum, a mum not stressed, pouring over bank statements and a calculator every day, desperating trying to make ends meet, a mum who wasn't always snappy and angry and upset. All they really need is love, food in their bellies and a warm bed at night, the rest is not important. I realised (albiet very late) that really, that house was like an albatross around all our necks, it wasn't a happy home anymore. I also realised that "home" is much, MUCH more than bricks and mortar - a house is just a house at the end of the day, it's the people who share it with you that make it a home.

Okay, we're renting now and yes, we don't have the security that owning your own home brings but I'm a great believer in fate - if this is meant to be our long term home then it will be, if not then we'll find somewhere else

Since leaving the house I feel like a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders. We're so much happier here, it's quite amazing really. And there ARE benefits to renting - you choose the house you want (within reason!) in the area you want (I bet if you were to look at right move at private rentals in your area you'd be pleasantly surprised at the choice). Any problems, boiler breaks, radiator doesn't work, gas hob breaks? (yes, we had all of those happen here in the first week!) Not your problem Quick call to letting agent and taa-daa - a nice man turns up and fixes the lot.

Sorry, I've gone into 'waffle-mode' again. What I'm trying to say in a very roundabout way, is once you make the decision in your head that this is what you need to do, your heart will soon follow. I promise

Scarlett xxx

ccastley

Hi Scarlett,

Just wanted to say thanks for your lovely reply. Just about to attempt to wind down after a tough day and I will reply at length tomorrow. Thank God for MSE and people like you, who don't judge and only seek to help.

God Bless,

Crystal

Scarlett.1974

You're very welcome

I hope you can reach a decision that you're happy and comfortable with and if you've any more questions or concerns then please do post them and we will do all we can to help you.

This place is, quite simply, full of amazing people, people who have helped me and my husband so much in the last few months. The support, help and encouragement is there for you, you just need to reach out and ask for it

Take care,
Scarlett xx

ccastley

Hiya Scarlett,

I've read your thread again today with my husband alongside me and he has found it just as helpful and comforting as me - so thanks again.

We've decided that you're quite right in the way you've done things...the thing is, our creditors think we're going through an IVA anyway and our income is zilch at the moment, pretty much, so putting money aside is virtually impossible. I'm getting messed around something chronic by the DWP (they misadvised us from the start) and my husband only started work on Wednesday and doesn't get paid for another three weeks and only brings home about 130 quid a week, so I'm not sure how long we can drag things out for so we can out the money aside for a rented place. We are already 4 months in arrears on most things including the mortgage and secured loan...

Any ideas on what we could do? And would you recommend that we don't tell our creditors or the EAs that we're going BR?

Thanks again Scarlett...you and everyone else on here has really helped.

Crystal

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Scarlett.1974

Hi Crystal,

Sorry for the delay, have been working on the dreaded forms this morning!

I personally haven't told my creditors I'm going BR, I'm still using stalling tactics at the moment (ignoring the phone etc..) and I didn't tell the letting agents either. What I did tell them (because I knew we'd fail a credit check) is that there was no point in them credit checking us because there was no way we would pass it, so what could we do instead? The options they gave me were to either pay 6 months rent in advance OR (some of them asked for both, a bit harsh I thought) to use a guarantor, someone with an immaculate credit score. The only problem we had with this was the only people we could have asked (my parents) are both retired so not earning the 3 x the monthly rent that was required to be a guarantor. I know it wouldn't be ideal for you, but is there anyone, parents maybe, that could help with the rental advance or guarantor?

Private landlords may be another option for you, they don't tend to bother with credit checks. Have a look in your local paper in the "properties to rent" section or local shop windows or gumtree

ccastley

hiya Scarlett et al

I'm not sure if you've read my thread but we've finally decided to bite the bullet, get rid of the old albatross and have a true fresh start.

I still haven't taken any proper advice...last week I decided to let the debt charity that's been dealing with us have another crack of the whip and called Clearstart and they both proved themselves as useless as I first thought, so I will be calling CCCS again tomorrow and possibly National Debtline too. We also have MyVesta in my area too...they're a charity who seem pretty good. My friend's going through an IVA with them so they're an option too.

I think the thing that made me see what I was doing to us all by hanging on to the house was what you said here (I haven't managed to quote properly before so if it goes wrong do excuse me...):

Scarlett.1974 wrote: »

But eventually I realised that what my children needed was a happy mum, a mum not stressed, pouring over bank statements and a calculator every day, desperating trying to make ends meet, a mum who wasn't always snappy and angry and upset. All they really need is love, food in their bellies and a warm bed at night, the rest is not important. I realised (albiet very late) that really, that house was like an albatross around all our necks, it wasn't a happy home anymore. I also realised that "home" is much, MUCH more than bricks and mortar - a house is just a house at the end of the day, it's the people who share it with you that make it a home.

And what you wrote there was so obviously true, that it really brought tears to my eyes and settled the matter for me almost there and then. Once I'd had a chance to talk to my DH and he'd read the thread too he wholeheartedly agreed. So thanks again!

So sorry about hijacking your thread...I just wanted you to know exactly how much you have all helped us.

Now over to you...is the house feeling like home now? Did you manage to finish the forms with the I & E info?

Crystal

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Scarlett.1974

You have no need to apologise, I'm delighted and slightly humbled that my ramblings have helped you and your husband, I really am.

I do totally understand how you're feeling right now. If you'd told me 6 months ago that this is where we'd be now, in rented, our house gone (or as good as) and BR just a couple of weeks away I'd have been horrified. This last few months have been a hell of a journey and the start of it was the hardest. Back in September when this all 'kicked off' I was determined to fight till the death if necessary to keep our house. It took time for me to realise I was fighting a losing battle. All I was doing was digging the hole we were in deeper and deeper and I was making myself ill in the process. H never had the same emotional attachment to that house that I did, so it was a bit easier for him to let go.

But now....... I'm happier and more content that I've felt for quite a long time I never thought it would or could, but this place really does feel like home. Of course, it does help that it's actually a very nice house, much nicer and more attractive than our old one

Thanks for asking My forms are 99% finished :j I just have the bank account balance bit to fill in, which I won't know until a couple of days before the BR, when I know exactly how much will be left in there (am aiming for as little as possible!).

One more thing - do stick around, do keep posting. I wouldn't be where I am now if it weren't for the support and help from the quite amazing people on this forum. I certainly wouldn't have had the strength to do what I've done, with the move and everything, this place has been my salvation it really has

ccastley

Hiya Scarlett et al

Scarlett - I know what you mean about the emotional attachment; my DH and I had pretty much the same situation, and at times that was hard too. Just made me want to shake/and or throttle him though I knew he wasn't deliberately being like that - he just wasn't wired that way.

As for the forms - wahey! That really is some progress I guess your organisation paid off! I have a Folder of Doom of sorts myself, though it's a Tesco Value Lever Arch so I'm thinking either I need to cover it in dodgy wallpaper (remember doing that with exercise books at school?!) or treat myself to a pretty one. Re: the bank balance - do you just have to tell them the balance or do they want to see the statements? I'm worried about my squirrelling away money for rent being seen as naughty, though really how else do they expect you to get by? At the end of the day if we had savings we wouldn't be here now would we...

The weekend has been weird to say the least - over the past few days I've gone from being overwhelmed and upset to being perversely excited about a new house and a fresh start, though I know that this decision is in some ways just the beginning of our problems. I have so many questions and worries...aside from this site which is obviously pretty much the font of all BR knowledge, have any of you read any books or found another useful resource? Preferably one that puts it in layman's terms as on a bad day (I have ME) it's all I can do to read my 2 year old's books coherently.

Well I hope you're all keeping well and this dreary Monday isn't too depressing for al of you. I'm tucked up in bed with the laptop and a Lemsip, which still tastes nice so I'm not on the mend yet (you know you're getting better when you realise how foul it actually tastes...)

Crystal

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Scarlett.1974

Good morning Crystal

Re the bank balance question - well, I'm assuming they'll want to see bank statements etc..... and mine will very clearly show me squirreling money away for the BR fees, deposit & bond for the new house, as well as the moving fees etc...... If the OR is not happy with the way I did that then I guess I'll have to face the consequences, but like you said, how else are you supposed to get that money together? Once we'd make the decision to go BR and stopped paying all our creditors there was obviously quite a bit of money floating around at that point, but none of it was used for any 'underhand' purposes, it all went on renting and moving costs

I haven't read any books about BR (I don't even know if there are any!) but a couple of other websites which are a great source of information are these:

http://www.debtquestions.co.uk/debt_forum/ and
http://bankruptcysupportersclub.co.uk/default.aspx (this one you have to register to read the posts, but it's a fantastic site, well worth joining up )

Pmsl :rotfl: I certainly DO remember covering my school books with wallpaper! My dad is a painter & decorator, so we always had a rather interesting selection of papers to choose from; when I was at school super-fresco was very popular but it was so blooming well padded my books used to end up about 6 inches thick each :rotfl:

Hope you feel better soon. You must be bad if you're drinking those lemsips without gagging, they're vile! <heaves>