Too much debt, where do I start?

EssexHebridean

Sounds like good progress there. I’d ignore the financial info request to be honest - you’ve offered them what you can afford, anything else is really none of their business. At the end of the day they’ll be relatively delighted to get whatever they can from you, so they might bluster a bit but not much more than that. 

Sorry to hear about your OH’s job - hopefully he will find something fast. 

welshspendthrift

@EssexHebridean thank you

sourcrates

welshspendthrift said:

They want me to fill in a financial budget , do I legally have to do this being as they have set up a plan on what I offered ? 

People always ask this question, this is not a legal matter, its a civil one, you don`t have to do anything they say, then again, they don`t have to accept your payment plan either, its a free country, they are asking you to fill it in, not telling you, you can accept or refuse as you see fit.

welshspendthrift

@sourcrates thank you they have set up the plan with what I offered so taking that as their acceptance 

DjangoUnchained

Check that the CCA they sent you as correct. They originally sent me paperwork that looked legite but i showed it  to a reputable source who advised me it wasnt the correct paperwork. I wrote back to pra telling them this expecting a "fight" but they conceded and said they were still waiting for the full paperwork, so still unenforceable.

welshspendthrift

As far as I can tell it is the original , it has my signature on it. Good news though on another for Intrum they are saying that they can’t locate paperwork and it’s not enforceable.  

welshspendthrift

@DjangoUnchained thank you for the advice 

Andyjflet

welshspendthrift said:

SandyShores said:

Hi WST, I've recently come through a journey to pay down my debts - at the start we had two cars on finance and about £25k debts - which we kept paying off but kept coming back - we also sold our house and I had a bit of a job disaster - which was sort of the start of it all.  So keep going, you've had your lightbulb moment, you've got a good job so from what I can see you will be able to do this.  It might take a little time, but at the end of that time you'll be in a good position and you'll be able to help out your family once again without risking your own financial position.

Like lots of people, we had a good income but we spent more than we earned.  I know you also said that you should in theory have money left over but don't.  The one thing that helped me was to set up separate accounts for personal spends - so instead of spending whatever is left over, I physically allocated 'spending money' to separate personal accounts (for personal spends only) and the rest of the money in my other account was only used for bills/debts.  It took a bit of working out what the best amount was and at the moment for us its £400/mth - (£5k a year).  Its worked for us because we don't dip into the bill money now and I think that £5k a year is a really good amount.  DH could easily spend way more but its really helping keep his spending in check.

On your emergency fund - I've set up a £25 monthly payment to Premium Bonds.  There's a very slim chance of a prize, and there's less chance of me spending it.  I did draw most of it out just recently when we moved house so its not too difficult to get your hands on for an emergency.  I also follow Dave Ramsey and Anthony O'Neal on instagram - its really motivating.  

Good luck on your journey.

Thanks SandyShores, I think the idea of a separate account for personal spends is a good one, my vice is music gigs so that would be good to restrict those ( Covid has cancelled loads for this year so been good in that respect although missing the live music) , if no money left then can’t go!  I’m going to get OH to set up somewhere for the EF so it doesn’t get swallowed up in grocery overspend. I’ve had a look once on Dave Ramsey, but hadn’t heard of Anthony O’Neal But will have another look at them. Need all the help I can get , thanks for all your suggestions 😀

Just open a Monzo or Starling account, I move £400 a month into spends for eating out and shopping, then set up another pot for Gigs, you can then put £20 a month into this pot and thats your allocation for gigs. The key thing is to budget it to the last £1.
Ive gone off the rails a bit this month but will be back to strict budgeting in January to get my final debt paid off in 18 months.