Asset Rich, Cash Poor - Me vs £130k debt mountain

Whiterose23

Twelve years out of the workplace doesn’t mean she can’t get something - it doesn’t have to be in the same line of work as she’s done before. She could work part time in a supermarket or as a carer or something similar.
Although you say she is very sick and no energy etc, she seems to find energy and enthusiasm for drinking, going out with a friend for drinks and walking around the supermarket picking up all the expensive foods and wanting nice clothes etc. It sounds like you’re making excuses for her.

If you’re serious about clearing the debt then you’d get rid of the car for a cheaper one, destroy all her credit cards and stop her accessing any money at all apart from what she needs for essentials (which is not alcohol or clothing). Stop enabling her and pandering to her and get her to the doctor and back to work. 

How is your son a ball and chain when he’s at school exactly? It all sounds like excuses. 

I would feel depressed if I was at home all day with no purpose in life.

alt80

Had a look at your SOA, hopefully a starting point for you -

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

 

Household Information

Number of adults in household........... 2

Number of children in household......... 1

Number of cars owned.................... 2

 

Monthly Income Details

Monthly income after tax................ 3320

Partners monthly income after tax....... 0

Benefits................................ 730

Other income............................ 0

Total monthly income.................... 4050 Assume this is secure? Any opportunities for a further increase in income?

 

Monthly Expense Details

Mortgage................................ 1091 Rate / term and when does your discount rate / fix end?

Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0

Rent.................................... 0

Management charge (leasehold property).. 13 I assume this is an estate management charge on a newish build property?

Council tax............................. 196 10 or 12 months?

Electricity............................. 101 When does the deal run out – I assume at this cost it’s on an old fixed tariff?

Gas..................................... 92 As above.

Oil..................................... 0

Water rates............................. 57 Each month? Assuming you live in a newish build property I assume this is on a meter – that’s A LOT of water. I’m on the old style rates (Victorian place) and we pay £489pa, most people tend to be better off on a meter

Telephone (land line)................... 0 ? Covered by work or have no landline phone?

Mobile phone............................ 15 Can these realistically remain this low? Factoring in your son will likely want a phone very soon if he doesn’t want one now.

TV Licence.............................. 0 Do you genuinely never watch live TV – if so this is fine, if not I’d rather not get on the wrong side of them.

Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0 No Netflix / other subscription service?

Internet Services....................... 56 Might be worth shopping around when coming to the end of your tariff.

Groceries etc. ......................... 600 Does this just include food or any aspect of other things bought in supermarkets and / or eating out?

Clothing................................ 300 Do a clothing audit between you and wife – work out if either of you actually need anything. Work out what your son needs for the year and look at the budget for this again. – You should be able to make significant savings here.

Petrol/diesel........................... 140

Road tax................................ 33

Car Insurance........................... 55

Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 60

Car parking............................. 0 Do you never park?

Other travel............................ 0 Do you never use the bus / train etc?

Childcare/nursery....................... 0 Nothing?

Other child related expenses............ 25 Is this really all?

Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 200 What does this comprise?

Pet insurance/vet bills................. 15

Buildings insurance..................... 0 Get this sorted now, besides it being stupid not having buildings insurance it will likely form a condition of your mortgage

Contents insurance...................... 0 You can’t afford to replace the contents of your home, it’s madness not having any insurance

Life assurance ......................... 0 What would your wife do if she were to lose you?

Other insurance......................... 0 No items requiring separate insurance eg jewellery/ watches

Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 15 Is this really all you spend on these occasions?

Haircuts................................ 15 Likewise, is this all you spend? By the sounds of if your wife likes to look good, does she never have her hair coloured, facials, nails, brows, lashes, botox, massage etc. Do you never have your hair cut, massage, facial, botox etc.

Entertainment........................... 50 What is this for and is it really so low?

Holiday................................. 0 You never go away or visit family abroad?

Emergency fund.......................... 0 This should at least be considered.

Total monthly expenses.................. 3129

 

 

Assets

Cash.................................... 7 £7? Is this a typo? Or just the balance of your current account today?

House value (Gross)..................... 370000

Shares and bonds (Pension)........................ 219000

Car(s).................................. 15000

Other assets............................ 2000 What’s this?

Total Assets............................ 606007

 

Secured & HP Debts

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Mortgage...................... 73200....(1091).....0 rate / term / when does discount / fix term end?

Total secured & HP debts...... 73200.....-.........-

 

Unsecured Debts

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Tesco Credit...................11884.....240.......13 Limit?

Barclaycard 1..................13018.....290.......20 Limit?

Barclaycard 2..................5716......90........22 Limit?

Overdraft......................4050......0.........40 Limit?

Barclaycard (Her)..............207.......207.......0 Limit? When does the 0% run out – and any balance / money transfer offers?

Nationwide (Her)...............11100.....291.......22 Limit?

Nationwide Credit..............12961.....221.......17 Limit?

Total unsecured debts..........58936.....1339......-

 

Monthly Budget Summary

Total monthly income.................... 4,050

Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 3,129

Available for debt repayments........... 921

Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 1,339

Amount short for making debt repayments. -418

 

Personal Balance Sheet Summary

Total assets (things you own)........... 606,007

Total HP & Secured debt................. -73,200

Total Unsecured debt.................... -58,936

Net Assets.............................. 473,871

DebtSurfer

Whiterose23 said:

Twelve years out of the workplace doesn’t mean she can’t get something - it doesn’t have to be in the same line of work as she’s done before. She could work part time in a supermarket or as a carer or something similar.
Although you say she is very sick and no energy etc, she seems to find energy and enthusiasm for drinking, going out with a friend for drinks and walking around the supermarket picking up all the expensive foods and wanting nice clothes etc. It sounds like you’re making excuses for her.

If you’re serious about clearing the debt then you’d get rid of the car for a cheaper one, destroy all her credit cards and stop her accessing any money at all apart from what she needs for essentials (which is not alcohol or clothing). Stop enabling her and pandering to her and get her to the doctor and back to work. 

How is your son a ball and chain when he’s at school exactly? It all sounds like excuses. 

I would feel depressed if I was at home all day with no purpose in life.

Thank you for your reply. I value all replies even when I don't agree with part of them. 

There is no mistake here. Yes, she has zero energy during a binge. When not, and if continuing meds, she starts get some. But not much. Some of the implications you derived aren't there; 

- She never goes with friends. Regretfully our old friends turned their backs during my out-of-job period. No longer would be "on the horse", no longer posting holiday photos from Dubai or Indonesia, no longer posting yet another "I just got a new position of Senior VP Development in XXX -- love this company!". Then a few more of her lady friends moved to a place 2 hours drive from us. We visited them several times and then it has just petered out. They found new local friends who didn't have debts.
I don't really miss them, my eyes have opened to what they are in fact.
Only a handful of friends stayed with us and these are the true friends.

- She hardly ever goes to supermarket. And the reason is not only lack of energy, but exactly the one I described. If you let her in there, she'd run a bill times higher than me.

- She tried to find a replacement for me. Tinder. Not many dates, perhaps 6 or 7 for three years. Almost never repeated with the same person. As she admitted, "they are all not nearly any replacement for you". 
Guess it was just that, attempt to get busy with something.

- Most of the time she's at zero energy she'd spend in her bed with her tablet. Watching endless series, listening to music, reading books. When out of binge, she'd start to bootstrap herself, eat better, try & cook something (exhausted after 30 minutes at the counter but returning after a lie-in). To get out is very rare. But it's better than all-day-in-bed routine.

- There's never enthusiasm for drinking. It is sad and listless.

I won't go around the place proving myself further but... no, not making any excuses, it's what it is.

===

Shortly on suggestions.

Back to work... - yes, it is a good advise. Working on that. More important, she is ready for it now. Shelves in Tesco? Nah. Sorry. Not gonna happen. She hardly can raise a cat, having lost lots of muscular mass. But there are things that she likes to do with her head, and I support her on that.

Sell a car for a cheaper one - it seems so logical -- get your a£se in the grip soldier and eat the humble pie!
Every sale is you losing money. Every purchase, too, you pay a share to the dealer as they need their margin. 
If I sell my Merc, I'll probably get £12k, and could never drive any good car again. Hello, Tesco Value old years, where 10-year-old Focus is your new Rossinant, zero to 100 in 12 sec. All I'd win is some £6-8k -- not even enough to pay off a single card. Is it worth it?...
While logical, we didn't take psychological aspect into consideration. At this moment, my car is the only place I still feel like my old self. Cut this and the life becomes gray stream of liquid (excrement). Guess I just refuse to eat a humble pie, b/c it tastes like that very substance...
Also can't exclude the fact that cheaper cars tend to require more maintenance. I paid more for wife's Volvo to get endless "nearside o/s/f boosters perished" fixed than I ever paid for my Merc. Extra recipe for feeling blue. My first car in the UK was a Mondeo which ate money constantly. Then there was a BMW 5er which did the same and ended up bursting its engine at 90k miles just when I intended to use it as a part-ex...

Sorry, not gonna happen.  

Stopping her access to any money. This one will help, indeed. I'm working on it. You can't just cut it altogether -- shock like that can literally drive her into a noose (a few years ago I already caught her right on time when she tried to hang herself on a banister). It's a nuclear method, with nuclear consequences. 

Doctors... only if she chooses. You don't just drag an adult person to the doctor if they don't want to. Sure, I can try ultimatums. Go to the doctor, or else.
Are we still talking about my wife of 17 years, or some hated neighbour who has parked across my driveway?

My solutions that I'm working on almost all lie in financial sphere.

===

P.S. Just predicting that in nearest 10 replies someone will say: "you are weak // you are the culprit // you're doing nothing // you talk rubbish // you didn't come here to solve your problems". Would be great to be mistaken.

strawb_shortcake

It may be worthwhile rereading your thread, people's ideas come from what you've said. 
You said you can't talk to your wife about money. 
You've said your wife meets swingers - I'm assuming this is the English interpretation and your wife meets others for sex? 

You are naturally defence of your wife, we all like to moan about our loved ones from time to time, but find it difficult when others agree or add their comments. 

You need to look at your situation more objectively, what would you say/advise a friend or relative if they confided in you that they were living a life like yourself?

I volunteer with children, they pick up on everything, when you don't think they are listening; they are! 

I'm no expert but without fixing the root problems of your situation i.e. your wife's health and spending habits, fixing the money side is going to be an uphill struggle and likely 1 step forward 2 steps back.

Also, your SOA - it don't recall seeing life insurance, what happens to your wife and Son in the event you aren't here to support them. What if you become to ill to work? What's your plan? 

£300 on clothes, £600 on groceries, these are both areas that can be cut 

alt80

@Debtsurfer Apologies, I wasn't sure how to take what you wrote. 

My wife didn't believe she was in a bad place and in many ways she wasn't but therapy has been transformative for her. I can only speak from my own experiences and with the knowledge my addiction affected my wife and son, it's not known as a 'family disease' for no reason. You mention your wife's alcoholism and hooking up with men on Tinder, it's bound to affect you mate. It seems some of your reluctance re therapy comes from your cultural background and fear of being judged. A good therapist is not there to judge but to help you to understand your behaviours and optimise your life.

DebtSurfer

CalJo99 said:

Even if her physical health is genuinely frail, that's no excuse for her alcohol consumption and obsessive spending. Crack those two, and she can be as  frail as she likes (or doesn't like).

Indeed. These are the two directions I'm working on currently. Just not with the drastic methods. Believe me, the drastic methods can break her down forever and there goes the "happily ever after".

Plus I'm trying to aim at purely financial solutions aiming to increase our income by different means, and cut unnecessary expenses. With my grip on money, they might just help to break one of the sides of the debt oubliette.

enthusiasticsaver

Your soa shows you are not managing the minimums. You have a £400 shortfall. 

A DMP freezes the interest on the cards and overdraft so that would be the biggest help to you. Yes it involves defaults and trashes your credit record but honestly more borrowing would make your situation so much worse and you are a long way off getting 0% deals if those cards are close to the limit and the spending continues at the same rate. You won’t pass affordability checks. That would be my option in your situation unless you can get an iron fist to the spending and cut down the groceries, medical and clothing which look to be the only areas with scope to decrease. 

Doing a DMP won’t cost you your home or your pension. The debts are unsecured. You can also self manage a DMP if you don’t want to use a debt charity. You can still remortgage with your current lender when a deal expires even with a DMP. Without doing that you are facing a long haul. You have obviously been relying on credit for a while but eventually there is a tipping point even without the poisoned chalice of a wife who won’t stick to a budget. 

DebtSurfer

Thank you! This is where we get to business, discussing money.

Total monthly income.................... 4050 Assume this is secure? Any opportunities for a further increase in income?
It is more-less secure now. If I don't do something stupid like stopping doing anything of course
Being 54 in my current company is not a problem, there are quite a few people over 50 and over 60 even. 
But it is in some other companies, who try to hire cheaper younger workforce, losing our (older people's) experience.

There are some chances to increase income.
1) Me getting promotion -- one part of what I do seems to be taken well by the company leadership, which could bring me a higher post.
2) Me learning even better profession while being on the current -- I know what it could be, just not sure there's enough positions on this.
3) Indeed finding a job for my fair half. She's keen on this. Only sorry, it's never gonna be stacking shelves or changing sheets. It could be becoming a surveyor, junior estate agent, anything to deal with properties for example.

Mortgage................................ 1091 Rate / term and when does your discount rate / fix end?
Variable, very good rate, BoE+1.09%, the deal is £0 fee, switch at any other tariff any time, the nominal term is 2 years, but the great part is they don't do credit scoring to prolong the deal, so I can continue indefinitely -- or even improve if there'd be even better tariff. 
Having this mortgage allowed me: overpayments as much as I like, underpayments (out of overpayment reserve) which saved me during the Dark Days... 
Why was I not fixing before -- fixed deals lack flexibility, have ERPs, and who knows even might need a credit scoring during re-mortgaging to new deal. Even though BoE grew 11th time in a row -- but I believe it will peak soon and then slowly goes down.
Why am I not fixing now -- c'mon, the rates are going down soon, that would be counter-productive innit.
I might however fix when there's 5 years left, on the best tariff, if my finances are secure enough. No remortgaging will be required after that. However I will not, if my strategy works out and I break the debt oubliette, as the repayments will start in earnest and I will need overpayment freedom.

Management charge (leasehold property).. 13 I assume this is an estate management charge on a newish build property?
Absolutely right. The builder brought in some estate management co. (which is in bed with them) so we are not transferred to council. We're working on this, it is very very not easy to get rid of these guys. Law on their side...

Council tax............................. 196 10 or 12 months?
£2357.13 pa. 11 payments of 196 and one 201.13. Starting April 2023.

Electricity............................. 101 When does the deal run out – I assume at this cost it’s on an old fixed tariff?
Gas..................................... 92 As above.

No. Dual-fuel, Variable from BG. All fixed are currently beyond any limits, still, even though it will change soon. 193 for both is my current direct debit. I set the DD higher than necessary at one point, so created a reserve. I pester the family on the use of both. We are managing well. 

Water rates............................. 57 Each month? Assuming you live in a newish build property I assume this is on a meter – that’s A LOT of water. I’m on the old style rates (Victorian place) and we pay £489pa, most people tend to be better off on a meter

Guess I'll be getting a new year bill of 54. And this is not a fixed rate, we have a meter, 10-year-old house. I have a project in my mind to get around to properly configuring the 3 dual-flush toilets in the house to properly dispense the right amount of water. With child clothes and ours, too, we run the washing machine a few times a week, there's no escaping this.

Telephone (land line)................... 0 ? Covered by work or have no landline phone?
BT offiers telephone + internet + mobile. Telephone (Digital, VoIP) is included in internet deal.

Mobile phone............................ 15 Can these realistically remain this low? Factoring in your son will likely want a phone very soon if he doesn’t want one now.
He is getting one next year, that'll add about 8 or so. I am good in finding deals! This one is grandfathered from BT Mobile before they stopped taking new customers, low b/c I have a great tariff on BT Internet, so 2x data and minus 5 per line for being with BT.
Regretfully, one day this will end and I'll have to raise it a bit.

I use SIM Only contracts (currently our contract is over and we're free to go, but EE, the successor, would give us 20GB for £9 pm each.

Wife and me have 4 year old phones, both Samsung, she has A50, I have S10, so far going strong, nothing we need they can't do. If I get really bored with austerity, might get a S21 Plus from someone on Facebook Marketplace and sell two current ones, but I'm trying to exercise restraint. Hard for a techie, but we are where we are.

TV Licence.............................. 0 Do you genuinely never watch live TV – if so this is fine, if not I’d rather not get on the wrong side of them.
Always paid before, never gotten on the wrong side of the law. Then I've noticed I never ever watched telly, instead movies and series. My son neither watched it too. No time for this. Then a storm torn down our TV antenna. I never repaired it. Best proof this house doesn't have a TV! useless thing.

Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0 No Netflix / other subscription service?
Nope. The sites from a different country which show us the movies from back there do not require any payment.
At one point had £10 pm Spotify paid -- understood I don't mind some ads and stopped this too. Result

Internet Services....................... 56 Might be worth shopping around when coming to the end of your tariff.
This is for Gigabit internet and phone (which I don't use, but it costs £0). BT is not cheap but I need to move huge files to / from work. Not ready to downsize to 500 or indeed 150 Mbps, it would save probably £10 pm, but start wasting my time at work.

This is supposed to cost over £70 without a deal but of course I have one.

Virgin of comparable rates is cheaper but their upload is half BT's 110 Mbps. No go as it's upload I often need.

Groceries etc. ......................... 600 Does this just include food or any aspect of other things bought in supermarkets and / or eating out?
Traditionally it's whatever comes out of the supermarket. Food, TP, cleaning stuff, doggie bags. No time to categorise further on this one. My app shows these as "groceries".

We practically don't go out. Last time we did, we ran £80 bill and I rambled about it for two days later... Regretfully my wife loves it.

Clothing................................ 300 Do a clothing audit between you and wife – work out if either of you actually need anything. 
Fast fashion type. Practically all hers, but some for our son as he grows.
That is the Dragon 1. Clothes/shoes/handbags. If not this, I'd be outside of the debt oubliette long time ago.
Dragon 2 is cosmetics/perfume, only the best for the fair lady. 

I shopped once. I have bought 6 pairs of jeans, a few of slacks, lots of t-shirts, business shirts and different shoes and trainers. Spent £300. That will serve me OK  

This stuff costs!!!
We try to review each time and she really tries to exercise "restraint" but lots of work to do.

Car parking............................. 0 Do you never park?
Occasionally in hospitals. These go into medical expenses.
In town I know where to park for free. In London I don't go anymore, I hate its "green" policies, ULEZ and CC with a vengeance.

Other travel............................ 0 Do you never use the bus / train etc?
Once in a blue moon, only on business. I drive everywhere, it's so much more convenient. Last time I used bus, I was working in London...

Childcare/nursery....................... 0 Nothing?
Thank God. No wrap around clubs, he's 8, goes to school and comes home. I take him wherever I go shopping or doing stuff.

Other child related expenses............ 25 Is this really all?
Clothing was mentioned in clothing. Some Christmas gifts may be mentioned in gifts. 
There are not many expenses. Toys, good things, art stuff - he likes to draw. 
He is a real soldier just like his dad.

Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 200 What does this comprise?
Mostly blasted dentist bills, about 3/4 of these. They are awful. We go to the same clinic for nearly 20 years. Love the dentists, hate the bills. Last time only her bills were £2000 for Year 2022. My wallet hates them.

Just recently I had to run £1,100 bill (plus £400 is pending) for my massive dental work... guess my Y2023 statement will be no better.

Also some bio-active tablets, vitamins, active ingredients -- someone tries to return her lost health. I have a firm grip on these, rejecting probably 90% of her attempted purchases in this section.

Buildings insurance..................... 0 Get this sorted now, besides it being stupid not having buildings insurance it will likely form a condition of your mortgage.
That was a grim reality of 2022, when in addition to above I had £900 loan repayments as well!

In 2023 I'll get one alongside with my car insurance renewal. After these ever strengthening storms which threaten to de-roof your home... sounds like a good idea, after all.

Contents insurance...................... 0 You can’t afford to replace the contents of your home, it’s madness not having any insurance
It was grim reality of 2022. Will arrive alongside house insurance.

Life assurance ......................... 0 What would your wife do if she were to lose you?
Thankfully, that one comes from my company for free among my benefits. My pension also has a statement of distribution in case I get under a bus.

Other insurance......................... 0 No items requiring separate insurance eg jewellery/ watches
Regretfully this belongs to a more affluent state of things.
My smartwatch was £400 but probably £100 now. Not worth it...
Phones are sturdy this days -- finally -- if worn in cases. 

Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 15 Is this really all you spend on these occasions?
I wrote somewhere. What Christmas?... Our son will get Santa coming and bringing gifts. Birthday will require some, too. Our birthday and Christmas gifts are nominal, because everyone knows there's no money for that.

Haircuts................................ 15 Likewise, is this all you spend? By the sounds of if your wife likes to look good, does she never have her hair coloured, facials, nails, brows, lashes, botox, massage etc. Do you never have your hair cut, massage, facial, botox etc.
She does look good, but I help her get her hair coloured and cut. Cost: £0 - quality the same.
She is a cosmetics and beauty expert, so she does it all.
However cosmetics / perfume / beauty stuff is the Dragon #2 as mentioned above.

So these £15 * 12 = £180 is for dad to get a crew cut and son to have a nice one. Sometimes our mom would trim us herself. 

Entertainment........................... 50 What is this for and is it really so low?
That would be going out sometimes. We don't go out often. This part of our live is severely restricted. Last time we left £80 in a pub. I was brooding a coupla' days after. She and son were chuffed... 

Holiday................................. 0 You never go away or visit family abroad?
No immediate family left mate. Holidays as you can probably guess are out of question. Can't afford.
Life sucks? Not particularly. Holidays are overrated.

Emergency fund.......................... 0 This should at least be considered.
Would love to have some. If current conditions will improve.

< . . . >

Cash.................................... 7 £7? Is this a typo? Or just the balance of your current account today?
It's the measly seven pounds left for the future to be paid in the embassy for something. They only accept cash.

I don't do cash. I hate cash. This is money dead, not bringing interest, outside of digital economy.
Previously was needed for parkomats, thank God now they are all done by the phone. 
The only place cash may be necessary is to pay a tradesman -- you know, for lower rates ;-) somehow they prefer it, but mostly still a bank transfer.

The balance of my current account is currently -3700 but on 31/3 salary will bring it up to -400...

Other assets............................ 2000 What’s this?
Various wife's trinkets from inherited ones to current ones. 
Plus our tablet PCs, my laptop, our phones, some older tech to sell, child stuff to sell. 

Barclaycard (Her)..............207.......207.......0 Limit? When does the 0% run out – and any balance / money transfer offers?
It's not 0%. It's just paid in full every month. It's got a rolling balance. Always paid in full. Limit is £250. Her card these days. Talk about me being "unable to limit" her expenses anyone?

Cards in general

There used to be quite a lot of 0% and 7.9% offers I've been swapping. At one point I did 7 swaps to-and-fro between Tesco card with 0% balance transfer for 12 months (fee 2.9%) and a Nationwide card (7.9% for 18 months zero fee). This brought about £12k under zero percent balance transfer. 

Regretfully these have petered out now as I was working to get rid of overdraft by maxing out cards, to avoid spending from current account. Now the CC's will need some half-year TLC to get paid back to level where I might get another 0%.

Right now there's still some 0% and 7.9% left on 2 cards, but they will expire in 2023... I better kill some balance off the cards, or it'll become hard due to ever growing interest bills.

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Tesco Credit...................11884.....240.......13 Limit = 12300

Barclaycard 1..................13018.....290.......20 Limit = 13400

Barclaycard 2..................5716......90........22 Limit = 5950

Overdraft......................4050......0.........40 Limit = 5000 + super emergency 1000 from wife's account

Barclaycard (Her)..............207.......207.......0 Limit = 250. Her main spending card now

Nationwide (Her)...............11100.....291.......22 Limit = 11100. Hate it, it doesn't stop her from overrunning the limit, so sometimes she fails to control and spends a bit even though forbidden to do so, so have to pay this off early partially sometimes

Nationwide Credit..............12961.....221.......17 Limit = 13200

They are currently quite seriously strained as a consequence of me hurrying to pay off the overdraft at least partially. I almost fully succeeded and brought it from 4800 to 700... and there came Her dental bills, car maintenance and lots of other unexpected bills, then my dentals. Only 2 dentals cost us £2000+... and her car required 4 new tyres at once. 

Hello Sisyphus, start again!

===============

PHEW. There you are, all there!
Everyone who would dare to delve there, can benefit as well. 

Thank you for your bravery to even look into this!

DebtSurfer

enthusiasticsaver said:

Your soa shows you are not managing the minimums. You have a £400 shortfall. 

A DMP freezes the interest on the cards and overdraft so that would be the biggest help to you. Yes it involves defaults and trashes your credit record but honestly more borrowing would make your situation so much worse and you are a long way off getting 0% deals if those cards are close to the limit and the spending continues at the same rate. You won’t pass affordability checks. That would be my option in your situation unless you can get an iron fist to the spending and cut down the groceries, medical and clothing which look to be the only areas with scope to decrease. 

Doing a DMP won’t cost you your home or your pension. The debts are unsecured. You can also self manage a DMP if you don’t want to use a debt charity. You can still remortgage with your current lender when a deal expires even with a DMP. Without doing that you are facing a long haul. You have obviously been relying on credit for a while but eventually there is a tipping point even without the poisoned chalice of a wife who won’t stick to a budget. 

Think this is what the Money Worries lines offer, or about the same.
Once I even rang this line. (after they were trying to send me "You're in persistent debt" notice over my overdraft). I know you gotta tell them no I am not, and they get off your back. However they suggested that I call this line and so I did.
I straight away said that I didn't think I belonged there, and just wanted to know what it is all about.
 
Indeed they were going to offer me to freeze interest on overdraft. 
Much good it would do me... £50-80 interest a month not paid, but -- I'd probably be restricted from running more debt on this overdraft, which is the way to cope with unexpected bills for me. 
If I went into DMP they'd force me to repay repay repay only at the condition of frozen interest.
However that would put severe limitations on my ability to cover what life throws at me. No more manoeuvre space.

I am afraid that DMP would thus cut all my ability to put anything on credit.
That would really suck.

Also DMP would not rid me of any debt. It will still be there for ages to come. Only my minimum repayments would turn from £1300 into £600. This will not quicken my repayments at all, I'd still be paying minimums. But hey this is what I can do right now by spending a bit of what I've repaid -- where there is still hope of getting back into 0% deal with Tesco.

I have thus a £600 or so reserve. 
Only I'm not spending it all. On good months I don't spend any of what I've just repaid. When there are no extra bills and Her spending is manageable. 

If push came to shove, and I really need more money -- I'd also underpay on my mortgage payment -- even though I don't take it lightly and am hellbent on paying maximum of it ASAP, now that monthly interest bill on it is £300 due to BoE trying their monetaristic solutions on us all. Already didn't do any of these since June '22 and intend to continue this way, the sight of mortgage going down steadily brings joy to my heart!

Hope: the rates on variables (and credit card interests) will start to go down in the second half of '23, the war will somehow end or get frozen, the prices will stop growing that badly, this will allow to pay off mortgage faster, reduce interest bills and make my life generally better.

RE: Affordability.
General rate loans are firmly not available due to yes, affordability checks, which is currently 0-20% according to all of my credit reporting services. Even though my credit score is fair and almost good. 
I suspect that the normal cards are the same. Again, darned affordability checks.
I won't touch with a barge pole the available to me bad credit offerings. These are not for me. Let them stick their 49.9% APR cards with 3 months 0% where the sun doesn't shine. This is merely insulting my intelligence!
Likewise I'm not touching secure loans at 9% APR - yeah right, let them go fly a kite, I'm not putting my house into peril.
A few years ago I tried to increase my mortgage to consolidate all debts at 1.19% rate. That would've been lovely and in all truth should have worked. But the advisor merely put in the digits and said £0 available -- even though putting them there would clear them all. Monkey, he was, no ability to decide, merely repeated "no affordability mate" and I was on my way.

However
- Tesco (where I shop for 20 years) love me and will likely bring up another 0% offer with 2.99% fee for 12 months offer, once I get their card's balance down to 85-90%. All I need for this is to pay another £1k to them and this may trigger it.
- Also if I manage to pay off a bit off Nationwide CC (mine) I'll get a 7.9% APR for 18 months deal -- may then manage another round of "debt laundering" by repeating transfer between two cards, cleaning more and more with each xfer to and fro. 
- My mortgage will probably continue to offer me same great conditions b/c they don't do credit check when you remortgage for further 2 years on my deal. Granted, no other provider would give me a mortgage now... but I can stick with Nationwide and pay it off. That would free up £900-1100 a month and would be equivalent to the promotion I am waiting for with such hope. 

That will be my ticket out of the Debt Oubliette. One way or another. 

DMP, on the other side, will spoil my history for 6 years. Hello, Tesco Value life...

===
Pension Dip

Practically everyone on the forum think that dipping into pension is a really bad idea. 
- I agree that this is a decision not to take lightly, but that would kill my debts and stop wasting the thousands I am losing on interest (probably about £8000 a year!!!) practically instantly, and enable me to start attacking my mortgage immediately with a vengeance, then start saving in earnest. 
- Everyone talks about how that will lose me pension in the older age, but no one remember that in 6 years I'd lose £50k hand over fist into interest...
- Who knows whether I'll be able to hold bastions for 6 years?...
- I still have 12+ years until State Pension age, there'd be enough time to replenish a bit of lost pension fund.
- There are rumours that annual contribution limit after you took the lump sum will be reviewed from £4k to £10k. I'd increase my contribution significantly, and see if my company could match that. That'd also reduce my tax bill !
- I'd open ISA/LISA and start saving there. 
- And an investment account for a few thou.

- I was also thinking about a combined solution where I'd just take £20k-30k-40k sum only (£20k is honestly within the limits of my pension account annual fluctuations!) -- that wouldn't rob me of much, but would let me to pay off a few of my cards, reducing monthly outgoings, and enabling 0% deals again -- that would let me to detoxify lots of my debt to 0% and/or 8% balance transfer deals and start to pay off things by a normal snowball method.

In this case and in this case only I might even go ahead and replace my £12k Merc with an old, £5k range, Audi A6 or Volvo S80 for a few years, to kill the debt faster. I could eat the humble pie for a set amount of years, but not when it's forever. There has to be hope in front, then I'm ready for limited sacrifices.

My snowball calculations showed that in 5 years I could be debt-and-mortgage free.
Promotion or better job title + increased incomes + snowballing would make it possible. 

I could be meeting my 60 free of my gorram debt mountain.

Think I saw somewhere a free pension advisor appointment for 1 hour. 
Might just have a chat with them. What do they think?
Will check among benefits at work as well, our pension provider may be offering free consultations as well. 
Costs me nothing, hurts me never, expands my mind for sure.

DebtSurfer

Good news!

Since 6 February 2023, I drastically reduced my sugar intake and added lots of protein and "good" fats (like peanut butter). On advice of the my wife. What the hake I said, and went for it. Easier than I thought.

She's trying too, but honestly I'd rather her gain some weight now... Ladies love to eat too little, but sometimes it's the opposite we yearn for!

My Loss for 7 weeks: 6 kg and counting. That's nearly 1st for I-don't-do-metrics types )
Fat is leaving my stomach and sides. There's even a hint of sixpack getting from under that fat!
Now I can lightly jog, which was difficult before as I spared the knees...
Also I added strength exercises. 

So far I just love the results!

The body asks to return where it was once!
I need to sleep more and this can help even further.

P.S. Here, just one of my ways to never give up and add some joy into my life.