Had a really bad year, SOA, please be gentle

Karonher

Would you be able to cut your food budget and petrol a little? I know some petrol money will be repaid by your partner, but it still seems a lot. Are there things you could do near to where your partner works?

honeybee1234

Karonher said:

Would you be able to cut your food budget and petrol a little? I know some petrol money will be repaid by your partner, but it still seems a lot. Are there things you could do near to where your partner works?

I could definitely cut my food budget, it's something I've been thinking about. I reckon being stricter, I could shave £5 a week off. I do eat the same every day, so possibly buying in bulk or bigger budget packs will work. Bigger bags of rice, oats (not sure where?), frozen berries instead of fresh are all things I will do, as well as batch cooking, and being organised in having food ready to go. I'm actually experimenting a bit with alternative carb and protein sources whilst I'm at home, in order to spend less and avoid the shops, so I have three days' worth of sweet potato and also slow cooker lentil bolognaise ready from earlier! 

I'll have a think about the petrol. 

BabyStepper

I understand you have had a bad year and I sympathise, I do hope you begin to feel better soon and are getting all the help you need. 
However, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but the advice you have been given so far is not making much sense. You have had a £500 deficit, has that been for the last 12 months? Talk of snowballing your payments does not work because there is no surplus in your budget to pay anything at all towards your debts in the first place. How are you paying clearpay and klarna at the start of April? How have you been managing? Desperate times call for desperate measures and we have all used credit to make up a shortfall, no-one here is going to judge you so please don't worry about that, but a fuller picture of what's been happening can really help. 
This doesn't look like poor money management to me, it looks like very hard times.
Trimming a few quid from your food and petrol budget is not going to solve this. £160 is reasonable for one person to eat but you can't afford the gym, or to run your car, or pay your son's mobile phone. If you got rid of these payments your outgoings would reduce to £1,136, freeing up some cash for debt repayment but I understand you're reluctant to take these steps. Your rent takes up half of your income and anyone would struggle in a situation like that. Could you sell your car and buy a cheaper one? Move to a cheaper place? Do you have anything to sell that could pay clearpay and klarna at the start of April?
Regarding how to move forward, I don't think the debt management arrangements would work for you as you need a surplus to offer as a payment. Even with those 3 debts paid off, once a realistic budget is made, that includes birthday gifts for your children, haircuts for you and a few other things you have missed, your deficit will still be there. 
I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm hoping to bump up your thread and that some of the other more knowledgable dfw-ers will appear and guide you in the right direction, if I could tag them in this post then I would!  Help is available, and you will feel better about all this soon. Try to hang on, and keep posting, we're all here for you, you have come to the right place. 

warby68

I think BabyStepper is right - your rent and car related expenses take around £1180 of your £1400 income. These are significantly out of proportion and not sustainable even with no debt. Something will need to change more significantly to turn this around. Unfortunately you cannot afford to subsidize your partner either, not at all and on the face of it the case isn't strong either if you don't live together, its a one way street sort of thing. If you could get rid of the car, you might have a little breathing space.
Clearly you have had a terrible time but the financial side will just get worse if you don't make some changes.
Obviously the current worldwide situation will affect your ability to act constructively at the moment but perhaps letting the car go might not be worst thing if you can't negotiate with them. Even offroading your car might help temporarily if that's possible. I think it will be harder to negotiate on your rent as this is paid by benefits which will be uninterrupted by the crisis.
Short term you may need payment holidays on all your debts as well but that might not be easy either at the moment as your income is unaffected by Covid 19 but you could argue you have been trying to review your situation but that the pandemic has delayed your ability to do this.
I'm sorry things are tough and you have some tough decisions to make.

honeybee1234

BabyStepper said:

I understand you have had a bad year and I sympathise, I do hope you begin to feel better soon and are getting all the help you need. 
However, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but the advice you have been given so far is not making much sense. You have had a £500 deficit, has that been for the last 12 months? Talk of snowballing your payments does not work because there is no surplus in your budget to pay anything at all towards your debts in the first place. How are you paying clearpay and klarna at the start of April? How have you been managing? Desperate times call for desperate measures and we have all used credit to make up a shortfall, no-one here is going to judge you so please don't worry about that, but a fuller picture of what's been happening can really help. 
This doesn't look like poor money management to me, it looks like very hard times.
Trimming a few quid from your food and petrol budget is not going to solve this. £160 is reasonable for one person to eat but you can't afford the gym, or to run your car, or pay your son's mobile phone. If you got rid of these payments your outgoings would reduce to £1,136, freeing up some cash for debt repayment but I understand you're reluctant to take these steps. Your rent takes up half of your income and anyone would struggle in a situation like that. Could you sell your car and buy a cheaper one? Move to a cheaper place? Do you have anything to sell that could pay clearpay and klarna at the start of April?
Regarding how to move forward, I don't think the debt management arrangements would work for you as you need a surplus to offer as a payment. Even with those 3 debts paid off, once a realistic budget is made, that includes birthday gifts for your children, haircuts for you and a few other things you have missed, your deficit will still be there. 
I'm not an expert in this area, but I'm hoping to bump up your thread and that some of the other more knowledgable dfw-ers will appear and guide you in the right direction, if I could tag them in this post then I would!  Help is available, and you will feel better about all this soon. Try to hang on, and keep posting, we're all here for you, you have come to the right place. 

Thankyou for your kind reply 😊

I have been looking over my SOA yesterday and I realised I've read it wrong 😖 I don't know how but I understood the debt repayments part as part of my budget rather than 'as well as' if that makes sense? Wishful thinking probably 😊

The debts have pretty much all been accrued since I moved out of the family home last year. I left with nothing except my clothes (and the kids!) and basically started with nothing. At the same time I got made redundant. I used credit to buy furniture and household items.

The car... Me and my ex have looked into selling it, but after a lot of investigation, it looks that even getting the best price in selling, or selling at auction, there would still be around a 4k deficit that will need repaying. So I've kept it for now. I feel torn, my car gets me to the gym and that's literally my lifeline, my sanity. Obviously it doesn't have to be **that** car, but I'm very aware that with no means of getting out, I'd stay at home all the time... Hello fully blown agoraphobia.

Moving is difficult... Impossible to get a private let as I'm not working and I'm not eligible for the council list, I've checked. I feel stuck 😕

KxMx

Council Housing departments sometimes have a list of benefit friendly landlords, which may lead to a cheaper rent in a different property.

Realise in the short term with the current climate it won't help, but may in a few months time.

honeybee1234

warby68 said:

I think BabyStepper is right - your rent and car related expenses take around £1180 of your £1400 income. These are significantly out of proportion and not sustainable even with no debt. Something will need to change more significantly to turn this around. Unfortunately you cannot afford to subsidize your partner either, not at all and on the face of it the case isn't strong either if you don't live together, its a one way street sort of thing. If you could get rid of the car, you might have a little breathing space.
Clearly you have had a terrible time but the financial side will just get worse if you don't make some changes.
Obviously the current worldwide situation will affect your ability to act constructively at the moment but perhaps letting the car go might not be worst thing if you can't negotiate with them. Even offroading your car might help temporarily if that's possible. I think it will be harder to negotiate on your rent as this is paid by benefits which will be uninterrupted by the crisis.
Short term you may need payment holidays on all your debts as well but that might not be easy either at the moment as your income is unaffected by Covid 19 but you could argue you have been trying to review your situation but that the pandemic has delayed your ability to do this.
I'm sorry things are tough and you have some tough decisions to make.

Thankyou also for your kind reply. Is it worth negotiating with the car finance company? Am I likely to be able to achieve anything? Genuine question, I've never had a car on finance before.

I am awaiting the outcome of my PIP assessment, I've been told this will still be processed, but obviously the timeframe is probably going to be longer... and no guarantee of actually getting anything. I also understand the basic element of Universal Credit is going up from April so I think I'll be getting around an extra £90, but I don't know if this is a time-limited arrangement? Is it for everyone as that's how I read it?

I'm going to spend some time thinking about all of this today. 

EimearF

Not to scare you but your car is likely a secured loan, which means unlike the rest of your debts they can take the car in the event of non payment. This has to be your first priority debt if you want to keep the car. 
Do you have a spare bedroom? Could you rent it out? I know this might not be suitable given your MH issues but it could halve most of your fixed expenses. 

warby68

I would try with the car finance company - explain the various ways you are vulnerable and that your car pre-dated these with Covid19 getting in the way of sorting things now. Requesting something specific and not too ridiculuous  (3m payment holiday for example) - can help. They will be swamped so you never know, anything at all will help you. I still think this car has to go but everyone needs to just get through the next few months so try what you can.  Your petrol at least should be minimal, you can't take your partner to work now anyway as you would be mixing households.

Fireflyaway

Your living expenses look pretty reasonable. The first obvious thing is just don't borrow anything more. No matter how tempting. No loans, catalogue or credit cards. Once you resolve to never borrow again it does make things clearer. Close the accounts once they are paid. Once you feel more settled could you look at getting a few hours work? Even a couple of hours cleaning in the evenings or delivering leaflets. Getting out and earning money no matter what amount will really boost you and give you a feeling of moving forward and being more in control. Above everything look after yourself! You can and will get in a better situation with time but don't focus on money too much. Do things you enjoy and take time to relax.