Giving advice & Any advice from anyone would be grateful.

DJ1998

I’ll start by saying yes we signed for this loan but did we truly understand what we signed into, no we were desperate to keep a roof over our young children's heads.
We took a £47,000 interest rate loan out OVER 16 years ago, paying back about £425 a month, we have paid back around £80,000, I contacted said company about a settlement figure which was nearly £34,000. So a £47,000 loan had turned into a over a £100,000 loan. Please all be carefull look ahead, if anyone is thinking of a loan just now,  I cried on the phone like a desperate child, these companies don't care. 

MorningcoffeeIV

That sounds reasonable for such a long term loan, especially if your situation was not good and were high risk. 

When you take out a loan, whether just now or 16 years ago, make sure you understand its terms.

sourcrates

The pitfalls of secured borrowing are well known, it`s never a good move to take out secured borrowing with variable interest rates, you always end up paying silly money back to them, I don`t know what advice you are looking for to be honest, it`s a horrible situation for you, but it is what it is, and you can`t change it now.

All I can say is never borrow more money to get out of debt, always take the debt solution instead.

mcpitman

DJ1998 said:

I’ll start by saying yes we signed for this loan but did we truly understand what we signed into, no we were desperate to keep a roof over our young children's heads.
Next time read the T's&C's that come with a loan, then you would know what you had signed up for.

We took a £47,000 interest rate loan out OVER 16 years ago, paying back about £425 a month, we have paid back around £80,000, I contacted said company about a settlement figure which was nearly £34,000. So a £47,000 loan had turned into a over a £100,000 loan. Please all be carefull look ahead, if anyone is thinking of a loan just now,  I cried on the phone like a desperate child, these companies don't care. 
That's how long term, interest bearing, secured credit works.

Sorry but not much sympathy from me.

Surely a simple "x" amount per month, times repayment = "y" paid back. quick maths tells you that iver 20 years £425 is going to cost north of £100k.

horsewithnoname

DJ1998 said:

I’ll start by saying yes we signed for this loan but did we truly understand what we signed into, no we were desperate to keep a roof over our young children's heads.
We took a £47,000 interest rate loan out OVER 16 years ago, paying back about £425 a month, we have paid back around £80,000, I contacted said company about a settlement figure which was nearly £34,000. So a £47,000 loan had turned into a over a £100,000 loan. Please all be carefull look ahead, if anyone is thinking of a loan just now,  I cried on the phone like a desperate child, these companies don't care. 

Sorry about you finding yourself in a dire situation; not a time where an ideal decision is likely to be made. Hopefully it has been a [very expensive] lesson.
I hope you are in a better situation now. Take care.

Ebe_Scrooge

I feel there have been some rather blunt replies to your original post, which may be taken the wrong way.  Yes, they are factually correct, especially given the fact that you say you understood the agreement you were entering into.

For the benefit of anyone else who may be in a similar unfortunate situation and who reads this, please take note of the advice from sourcrates.  If you're ever in the situation where you find yourself "having" to take out a loan (especially a high-interest one) simply in order to survive, please take a step back and try to view things objectively.  Easier said than done, I know - but attempting to borrow your way out of debt is never going to work.  There are always ways around situations like this, and a phone call to one of the well-respected charities such as CAB or Step-Change is a sensible first step.

I do feel for your situation, unfortunately there is little that can be done about it now, other than to learn a very painful lesson from it.

MalMonroe

Hi, I can't really advise either but would like to add my sympathy, which I do have for you. I've been in a similar desperate situation and know exactly how you must have felt at the outset. Because I was on my own, a single parent on a low income with debt already in place, there was no way I would ever have been accepted for a loan and although I felt really hard done by at the time, I came to realise that lenders did me a favour. 

I did turn to one of the free debt help agencies, StepChange and they were able to offer me a way out - I am not going to say it was easy because it really wasn't. But I have to say that if I had been able to get a loan at the time, I probably would have done as you did. It was only because my credit reports were in tatters that I couldn't. 

Many of us forumites have been in debt and have managed to find a way out, some people are still on the journey but most of us do know how it feels. Sadly, you're right when you say that these companies do not care. We are just numbers to them and they are just in it for the profits, of course. 

All the best to you.

EssexHebridean

Hi OP - I'll also offer some sympathy and also some reassurance - you are far from the first person to find yourself in a situation like this, and you won't be the last either. Try to look at it this way - yes it's been an expensive thing to do, and you're not quite done with it yet - but at the time you felt you were doing the only thing you possibly could, I assume? It's easy for others to judge, to say that you could just have done the maths etc - but when things feel that desperate sometimes finding a solution is more important than the longer term effects of that solution. Now, there are resources like this place, to tell those in similarly desperate positions about what to do, who can help, and most importantly what NOT to do - if you came along to us tomorrow considering taking a long secured loan to clear debt - we'd immediately say no, don't, never turn unsecured debt (which I assume is what you had?) into secured - etc etc etc. We'd point you towards Stepchange or one of the other free debt charities. We'd help you to go through your budget step by step to work out where savings could be made, and perhaps most of all, there would be people here (I mean on Debt Free Wannabe - as on that board we have a no judgement rule) who would be able to offer support and be a sounding board for the worries and panics that everyone has when facing up to debt. 

Looking at the current day - are you able to afford the payments you are making to the loan? If you are struggling, then all that help above is still sitting there waiting for you - pop over to the DFW and start a thread with your SOA and we can make suggestions. 

Kimik

I do understand believe me.
 I am an old poster who has just returned after a long break. although have always kept an eye on this site .
Telling you that you should not have taken out this loan is like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.
In 2007 I made the same mistake; at the time we could afford it but 3 years later the main earner was suddenly made redundant. We owed a lot more than you 
We had no option but to extend the loan to reduce the payments. That is when the people on this site became my saviours. I saved £1000's over the next 10 years and finally paid off this horrible debt this year along with our interest only mortgage. We had enough equity to downsize and for the first time are completely debt free.
You have come to the best place possible for honest and helpful advice. Use all the boards, read the threads and listen to the advice given. There is light at the end of the tunnel ...promise 

DJ1998

I appreciate everyone replying, good and bad, one of the reasons I posted was to warn others, we wish we had never done it and yes our circumstances have changed, one of us was made redundant and changed careers with smaller wages but love the job. We will get there. Thank you, especially to the ones who showed kindness, and didn't judge.