Credit card debts

Looking4silverlining

Hello. I hope that I am asking in the right place? 
I am self employed and currently have approx £25,000.00 in credit card debs with 6 different cards. This all came about after my partner suffered an awful illness and neither of us could work for a long time. I have been making the payments ever since (6 years now) I have managed to get some of the debt into 0% interest deals but these are going to come to an end soon and I am now I the position of not being able to go any further at all with borrowing. I would really like to consolidate all of them and get the interest down. I don't know how as I don't own any big capitol. I own my own van (£9k) which is my only hope of earning with my business so I don't want to lose that. I don't think I can do a DRO or IVA as I want to keep the van. Can anyone advise? I am starting to get very stressed and worried about it now. Thanks in advance. 

Brie

I think the best thing is to post a statement of accounts and list all your income, expenditure and the debts with as much detail as possible so people can make helpful suggestions.  

I think you are right about not being able to do a DRO - if the van is worth that much and is yours then no it wouldn't work.  If it's owned by your business maybe that's different - but I have a suspicion that it might not work too easily that way.  Can't say re the IVA.

But good for you for facing up to this - talking it through will hopefully lessen the strain for you and enable you to find a way forward.  

EssexHebridean

Consolidation is generally not the best idea - you can’t borrow your way out of debt in that way. Consolidating unsecured debt into secured is an even worse idea - and is definitely to be avoided.

another thing to consider - if you can no longer get 0% balance transfers, why do you think you would even be accepted for any further borrowing? 

I agree with Brie - first stop here is an SOA which will show you all your income and outgoings in one place, and give a proper idea of whether your budget is balancing currently.

fatbelly

I also agree with the above. I have seen a car worth 8k exempted in an IVA but I wouldn't rush into that. It may not be the best strategy

Looking4silverlining

Thanks guys. No I didn't expect to be accepted for more loans but wondered if anywhere did consolidation of debts that are being paid on time every time. Ill look into the SOA but Im 100% sure already that Im earning virtually nothing compared to my outgoings because of the debts. 

EssexHebridean

The point of the SOA is that you do have income, and you do have expenditure - you will have priority bills, some discretionary spending, and of course the debt payments. The SOA sets everything out clearly so you can see where you stand. It's important to complete it to reflect where you are right now - not what you "think" you should be spending or what you imagine we expect to see - it needs to be open, honest, and include all your current  spending so far as possible. 

It's sounding as though you might be a candidate for a DMP - again, the SOA will help to see whether that would work for you or not. 

sourcrates

Can you please stick to just the one thread @Looking4silverlining.

It only confuses people.

Thanks.

Looking4silverlining

sourcrates said:

Can you please stick to just the one thread @Looking4silverlining.

It only confuses people.

Thanks.

Errrrrrr.....? I don't understand I thought I just kept replying to this same thread?

Looking4silverlining

So Ive done the SOA calculator form but Im not sure how to put it onto here. Can someone assist? Whats Lemonfool or MSE?
Thanks in advance

Martico

MSE is Money Saving Expert, so if you press "format for MSE" then you can copy/paste and it should be formatted (near enough) for this site

EssexHebridean

Looking4silverlining said:

So Ive done the SOA calculator form but Im not sure how to put it onto here. Can someone assist? Whats Lemonfool or MSE?
Thanks in advance

You've completed the SOA on the Lemonfool site yes? At the bottom it should have a "format for MSE" option - click that, then copy and paste the results into a new post on this thread. That gets it here in a format we can easily use and then comment on if needed.