£30K of debt, using credit cards and Overdrafts to survive. Its consuming me, I'm miserable!

RAS

The issue with the My community loan is that credit unions are often less forgiving than traditional credit providers so you can expect much more active management, higher expectations of repayment and they are more likely to go legal. Possibly because they don't have billions to cushion the impact of individual debtors.

You and your wife need to work through the debt issues. Is she putting stuff on credit because the leccie bills in debt, or is she buying new clothes for junior at the supermarket because she wants to spoil them? You both need to sit down every month and work out what needs to be paid over the next 2 months and what might be spare. 

MOTs, holidays, Christmas and birthdays come round every year. How much did you spend on each last year? Divide by 12 and add to your SOA. If you can't afford it, then you have to work out what matters most. Can you reduce the grocery bill and do the family get away, or drop out of the get away? 

That's kinda ignoring that with 2 older cars, you really need to be saving up for replacements. Do you absolutely need both?

Grumpelstiltskin

You still haven't answered the question about Child Benefit. Is your wife getting it? If so what is she doing with it?

You  must be sure she is 100% on board and she understands no spending on credit if you as a family are going to get over this.

EssexHebridean

Lostinmunich said:

Thank you so much, and everyone else’s comments.

The mortgage and deeds are solely in my name, but we are married.

the partners  cc is 3000 limit and she pays 300 and then I think spends it again.

The jabs she’s lost 1 stone in a couple months, whether it’s placebo or real I don’t know, I don’t think it’s great given are financial situation.

i Want to knuckle down and clear it, but I know between now and September, I have two mots. I have my partners birthday my daughters. My mums too. A camping trip and then in September we’re meant to be having a family bnb trip. So I think any overpay will be spent again on cards.

The DMP option might be a route to take, as I couldn’t possibly add anymore on. And I feel like I could budget and keep an emergency fund in my own account and build it. For these things planned. 

And I could build this up whilst defaulting too. 

As you said and many others default first and then DMP. How does that work when they all take different times to default? Will the first debtor wait  if I don’t pay, waiting for the last one to default? 

How will it affect my house, I don’t want to jeopardise it? 

Community loan was a debt consolidation loan but still unsecured and it was meant to help lower monthly outgoings…  it didn’t.

Thank you soo so much for helping 

You have a choice at this stage - view it as a fork in the road. One direction will take you to a better financial future and a foot on the path to clearing your debt. The other takes you to nice presents, holidays, and further into debt.

Which path you want to take depends entirely on you - expectations around presents can be managed now (Partners £200 a month jabs might be considered as quite a present all by themself!) - are you honestly telling me your Mum would want anything from you if she knew your financial situation? Camping trips can be done very cheaply indeed - basic camp site, cook at your tent rather than eating out, take with you basic foodstuffs you have at home that you won’t use a full pack of in your stay, and just buy fresh items locally, and make sure days out are to free or very cheap - alternate days visiting places with days staying “on foot” distance from the site. 

You need to work out a budget that allows for some fun, and allows you to budget for things like the MOT tests (how far away are those? Are you expecting to need anything done?) but also means you can step right away from using cards.

You can have “debt free” or you can have “doing all the things and if it costs too much we’ll just put it on credit” - but you can’t have both, I’m afraid. Decision time. 

Lostinmunich

Grumpelstiltskin said:

You still haven't answered the question about Child Benefit. Is your wife getting it? If so what is she doing with it?

You  must be sure she is 100% on board and she understands no spending on credit if you as a family are going to get over this.

I am going to talk to her tonight about wanting to tackle this and have a plan. understanding all our income and outgoings. 

I am going to track our whole month finances, every penny and find out where it’s going?

would it be worth me balance transferring my wife’s CC to mine. In case of her Iva?  

Grumpelstiltskin

Lostinmunich said:

Grumpelstiltskin said:

You still haven't answered the question about Child Benefit. Is your wife getting it? If so what is she doing with it?

You  must be sure she is 100% on board and she understands no spending on credit if you as a family are going to get over this.

I am going to talk to her tonight about wanting to tackle this and have a plan. understanding all our income and outgoings. 

I am going to track our whole month finances, every penny and find out where it’s going?

would it be worth me balance transferring my wife’s CC to mine. In case of her Iva?  

I would say hang on and see what you find out and if she is prepared to work with you.

Lostinmunich

EssexHebridean said:

Lostinmunich said:

Thank you so much, and everyone else’s comments.

The mortgage and deeds are solely in my name, but we are married.

the partners  cc is 3000 limit and she pays 300 and then I think spends it again.

The jabs she’s lost 1 stone in a couple months, whether it’s placebo or real I don’t know, I don’t think it’s great given are financial situation.

i Want to knuckle down and clear it, but I know between now and September, I have two mots. I have my partners birthday my daughters. My mums too. A camping trip and then in September we’re meant to be having a family bnb trip. So I think any overpay will be spent again on cards.

The DMP option might be a route to take, as I couldn’t possibly add anymore on. And I feel like I could budget and keep an emergency fund in my own account and build it. For these things planned. 

And I could build this up whilst defaulting too. 

As you said and many others default first and then DMP. How does that work when they all take different times to default? Will the first debtor wait  if I don’t pay, waiting for the last one to default? 

How will it affect my house, I don’t want to jeopardise it? 

Community loan was a debt consolidation loan but still unsecured and it was meant to help lower monthly outgoings…  it didn’t.

Thank you soo so much for helping 

You have a choice at this stage - view it as a fork in the road. One direction will take you to a better financial future and a foot on the path to clearing your debt. The other takes you to nice presents, holidays, and further into debt.

Which path you want to take depends entirely on you - expectations around presents can be managed now (Partners £200 a month jabs might be considered as quite a present all by themself!) - are you honestly telling me your Mum would want anything from you if she knew your financial situation? Camping trips can be done very cheaply indeed - basic camp site, cook at your tent rather than eating out, take with you basic foodstuffs you have at home that you won’t use a full pack of in your stay, and just buy fresh items locally, and make sure days out are to free or very cheap - alternate days visiting places with days staying “on foot” distance from the site. 

You need to work out a budget that allows for some fun, and allows you to budget for things like the MOT tests (how far away are those? Are you expecting to need anything done?) but also means you can step right away from using cards.

You can have “debt free” or you can have “doing all the things and if it costs too much we’ll just put it on credit” - but you can’t have both, I’m afraid. Decision time. 

Will the DMP help me towards this being debt free I don’t want to take anymore out. Could I do a DMP and pay the loan? 

[Deleted User]

Lostinmunich said:

Grumpelstiltskin said:

You still haven't answered the question about Child Benefit. Is your wife getting it? If so what is she doing with it?

You  must be sure she is 100% on board and she understands no spending on credit if you as a family are going to get over this.

I am going to talk to her tonight about wanting to tackle this and have a plan. understanding all our income and outgoings. 

I am going to track our whole month finances, every penny and find out where it’s going?

would it be worth me balance transferring my wife’s CC to mine. In case of her Iva?  

This risk is that you transfer the CC, wife now has an empty card and continues spending...

Lostinmunich

[Deleted User] said:

Lostinmunich said:

Grumpelstiltskin said:

You still haven't answered the question about Child Benefit. Is your wife getting it? If so what is she doing with it?

You  must be sure she is 100% on board and she understands no spending on credit if you as a family are going to get over this.

I am going to talk to her tonight about wanting to tackle this and have a plan. understanding all our income and outgoings. 

I am going to track our whole month finances, every penny and find out where it’s going?

would it be worth me balance transferring my wife’s CC to mine. In case of her Iva?  

This risk is that you transfer the CC, wife now has an empty card and continues spending...

I agree, looking back I already did this once with a £500 credit card a year or two ago. 

And it’s happened again.. now.

i need to speak to her about it.

 i also have made unnecessary purchases and enabled us to get here. So I realise I am also the problem but I want to fix this now. 

Sleepysophie

@Lostinmunich I might be stating the obvious but with an IVA already in place in addition to a CC (which is against the IVA rules) and then with the added fact that she is shutting down any conversation around debt, it seems you might be fighting a loosing battle with your wife. Is there anyone from her side of the family that could support you in speaking to her, perhaps in terms of mediation? 

EssexHebridean

You need to make a decision around how you want your future to look and what you are prepared to sacrifice before it’s really worth looking any further at solutions. And by “you” I mean both of you. 

The issue you have is that there is little slack in your SOA really - £100 a month in entertainment is a lot for a family with debt, obviously the £200 for the jabs is an “easy” saving (and would bring you back into the black again without making any other changes, although to be debt free will take a lot more changes than that. )

The two of you need to sit down and get on the same page financially. Can your wife work out a side-Hussle to earn the £200 a month to pay for the jabs herself if they are that important to her? It might also be worth trying to get to the bottom of the “why” around that - what will miraculously be better about her life if she is a few dress sizes smaller? And what happens if she gets to a size “insert her number of choice here” and then life isn’t much different - what then? On a purely practical level, where is she proposing to get the money to pay for the new clothes she will need, too? Currently there isn’t enough spare to pay for the essentials! 

@fatbelly - right now is it practical for the OP to stop all payments to the CCs but continue paying the credit union loan? Or will that give them problems down the line?  Lesley the card spending needs to stop, and that solution won’t fix the bigger problem, but it might give the OP time to get themselves together, have the conversations that are needed with their wife and build an emergency fund while also straightening their budget out?