repossession and secured loan

leolady

My husband left me with a young baby after taking out a joint  secured loan with Picture Loans. In 2008 the Building Society repossessed our house and, after living with relatives, I was given a Housing Association property . I am a disabled single mother with one child and have been paying Picture Loans £30 pm  but they keep asking for more and are threatening debt recovery, I understand my husband has been paying some of the credit card and utility bills directly to the companies involved but the debt to Picture Loans doesn't seem to reduce - I do not know if they received any funds from the house sale. My husband does support his son but has MS and I am on disability benefit. I am at my wits end because I do not want debt collectors knocking on my door. Please help.

[Deleted User]

Post on the DFW boards but essentially, they can only have what you and your husband can afford.

sourcrates

I`ll move this for you.

sourcrates

Hi,

OK, stop worrying, no need to be at the end of anything, defaulted secured loans are amongst the least chased of defaulted borrowing, simply because the amounts are usually quite high, and people don`t have that kind of money just lying around to pay them off in full.

You are already in the debt recovery stage, if the debt is still with Picture, then all that means is they will pass it over to a debt collector, nothing to fear there either, its basically standard procedure with defaulted debts.

Debt collectors mostly work from a call centre, imagine a snotty 18 year old fresh out of school, just started his first job, bit spotty, long hair, with trousers round his knees, that is your average call centre operative at a debt collectors.......scary stuff huh !!

Only a very few collectors actually knock on doors these days, and even if you were unlucky enough to be passed to one of them, they are just self employed folk no different to you and me, they are not bailiffs, and have no more power than anyone else does, you do not have to speak to them, you do not have to answer the door to them, nor engage with them at all, basically they can just be ignored.

Now hopefully you should be a tad more relaxed by this point, so my advise to you moving forwards, is to ignore there letters, let them pass your account to a DCA, you will find they will most likely be a lot easier to deal with than you think, most collectors will accept whatever is offered by way of payment, you can write and explain your circumstances, it will all be taken into account, they cannot take what you don`t have, so calm yourself down, and look at this rationally.

FCA guidelines on fair debt collection practices are paramount these days, they are not allowed to take more from you than you can afford, or face FCA rebuke, you offer what`s affordable, and no more, if you owe a lot of money, and have no reasonable chance of ever repaying it, it stands a fair chance of being either side-lined or even written off.

leolady

Thank you for your help

Jude57

@leolady I agree with everything @sourcrates has said but I'd go further and suggest you look at whether this debt is reasonably repayable at all. If you're disabled and living on benefits, with no likelihood of your situation improving in, say, the next 5 - 6 years, there may be other options available to you. Once the secured house was repossessed and sold, the Picture loan became just like an unsecured debt. It can be dealt with like any other debt.

I'd say £30 per month is never going to make a meaningful dent in this debt, and it's probably a struggle for you to find that each month. I'm thinking that, depending on how much is outstanding, you might qualify for one of the insolvency debt solutions, like a Debt Relief Order. It does depend on your circumstances but it could be right for you if you meet the criteria.

If you put your monthly Statement of Affairs (income and expenditure) up here, we can see what solutions might be best for you. Your ex partner could probably also do with some debt advice, so maybe point him in this direction, too?

leolady

I have read through the advise but I am wondering if there is a way that I can discover if Picture Loans were paid any money by the Building Society that repossessed the house - or if the paid credit cards and utility bills have been taken into account so the money owed  Picture  Loans should be reduced, It is interesting that they are still saying the loan is secured against the property that was repossessed by the Building Society in 2008

Jude57

leolady said:

I have read through the advise but I am wondering if there is a way that I can discover if Picture Loans were paid any money by the Building Society that repossessed the house - or if the paid credit cards and utility bills have been taken into account so the money owed  Picture  Loans should be reduced, It is interesting that they are still saying the loan is secured against the property that was repossessed by the Building Society in 2008

Absolutely. Write (pen and paper) to Picture asking for a full statement of account, showing all payments made from the date the loan was taken out, up to today. Make it clear you have no wish to know who made the payments, just the dates and amounts paid. Then they can't refuse on GDPR grounds. I suspect Picture, like a lot of sub-prime lenders, don't actually understand what happens when the security for a loan is gone. They seem to think that saying it's a secured loan gives them more rights, and they rely on their customers not knowing any better, no disrespect to you.

bris

leolady said:

 that they are still saying the loan is secured against the property that was repossessed by the Building Society in 2008

It can't be, after repossession the building society sell it and take what they are due as first charge, If there is anything left then the second charge is paid.

The building society are legally obliged to get the best possible price for the property, but often with fees there is not much left.

The charge on the property does not move to the new owner, the debt diverts back to you.

Debt collectors are toothless, they can call you and send you letters but in reality they can be ignored.

If you have the inclination to do it just stop all payments, ignore the calls and letters and let them harass your X husband.

The time to take notice is when or if they send the court papers through but don't worry about that either as that's not actually a bad thing either.

With you circumstances the courts will decide how much you pay them per month and affordability is a key factor.

The courts will look at your income and outgoings and decide on what you can afford, I have seen people being ordered to pay a pound a week so don't worry about debt collectors banging on your door as that's not how it works these days.  

leolady

I wrote to Picture Home Loans requesting statement of payments made.-  the statement only shows the monthly payments made by me. There is no amount that could have been from the Building Society when they repossessed and sold the property.
The £7000 loan taken out in 2010 has now increased to £17000+ some of which has been incurred from Picture Loans charging me £5 each time they phone me or send a letter.
They did suggest I contact citizens advice but I have not done so yet. I have not said anything to them about it no longer being a secured loan.
Not sure what steps I should take next.
I really appreciate all the advise and help given by the Forum Members. Thank you

leolady

Sorry I just made a typo error - the loan was taken out in 2007 NOT 2010