In Debt - Reality Check in place!

Reddington85

So after a disastrous house and a wedding, I've managed to get myself into a bit of a debt hole and I realise now I need support (likely a DMP I guess) but I've put my fairly embarassing SOA below and any advice or help will be appreciated

This is my personal debt and not linked to my wife - she covers lots of other bills (car - tv licence - weekly shop - most clothes - home goods etc)

[font=courier new][b]Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet[/b][b]

Household Information[/b]

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

Number of children in household......... 0

Number of cars owned.................... 1[b]

Monthly Income Details[/b]

Monthly income after tax................ 2672

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

Benefits................................ 0

Other income............................ 0[b]

Total monthly income.................... 2672[/b][b]

Monthly Expense Details[/b]

Mortgage................................ 529

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

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

Management charge (leasehold property).. 0

Council tax............................. 169

Electricity............................. 60.5

Gas..................................... 60.5

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

Water rates............................. 25

Telephone (land line)................... 0

Mobile phone............................ 17

TV Licence.............................. 0

Satellite/Cable TV...................... 24

Internet Services....................... 24

Groceries etc. ......................... 30

Clothing................................ 25

Petrol/diesel........................... 0

Road tax................................ 0

Car Insurance........................... 0

Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0

Car parking............................. 0

Other travel............................ 20

Childcare/nursery....................... 0

Other child related expenses............ 0

Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0

Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0

Buildings insurance..................... 15

Contents insurance...................... 15

Life assurance ......................... 0

Other insurance......................... 0

Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 25

Haircuts................................ 0

Entertainment........................... 125

Holiday................................. 100

Emergency fund.......................... 25[b]

Total monthly expenses.................. 1289[/b]

[b]

Assets[/b]

Cash.................................... 0

House value (Gross)..................... 148500

Shares and bonds........................ 0

Car(s).................................. 0

Other assets............................ 0[b]

Total Assets............................ 148500[/b]

[b]

Secured & HP Debts[/b]

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

Mortgage...................... 100082...(529)......4[b]

Total secured & HP debts...... 100082....-.........-   [/b]

[b]Unsecured Debts[/b]

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

Updraft Loan...................5158......170.......6

118 Money......................1850......34........8

Santander Loan.................10982.....293.......11

Capital One ...................103.......102.......0

MBNA...........................1660......41.52.....21

Natwest CC.....................2684......33........0

Santander CC...................1727......48.12.....14

Sainsburys CC..................2269......74........0

HSBC...........................1057......31.35.....0

Marbles........................2320......134.......15

BIP New Day CC.................1530......83........22

M&S CC.........................1756......42........0

Monzo CC.......................959.......100.......13

Lendable.......................5056......276.......11

Natwest Loan...................8418......241.......8

Barclays Partner Fian..........600.......46........0[b]

Total unsecured debts..........48129.....1748.99...-  [/b]

[b]

Monthly Budget Summary[/b]

Total monthly income.................... 2,672

Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,289

Available for debt repayments........... 1,383

Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 1,748.99[b]

Amount short for making debt repayments. -365.99[/b]

[b]Personal Balance Sheet Summary[/b]

Total assets (things you own)........... 148,500

Total HP & Secured debt................. -100,082

Total Unsecured debt.................... -48,129[b]

Net Assets.............................. 289[/b]

[i]Created using the SOA calculator at www.LemonFool.co.uk.

Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.[/i][/font]

fatbelly

You are £360 short of making ends meet. Can you save £360? There are some expensive items st the end of your list that you should look at but with you only contributing £30 per month towards the groceries, I think you are beyond the point where this level of debt is affordable

The good point of your ska is that on your figures you have £1300 available against  48k of debt.

So yes I think a debt management plan is needed

Reddington85

fatbelly said:

You are £360 short of making ends meet. Can you save £360? There are some expensive items st the end of your list that you should look at but with you only contributing £30 per month towards the groceries, I think you are beyond the point where this level of debt is affordable

The good point of your ska is that on your figures you have £1300 available against  48k of debt.

So yes I think a debt management plan is needed

Yeah I can cut some essentials out - tbh the holiday and entertainment are inflated numbers (a worst case) 

I'll contact Step Change or Payplan this afternoon and get that ball rolling I guess - feels quite good talking about it - didn't really see a way out for a long time but reading around on here it seems...not the end of the world 

Grumpelstiltskin

Do not make the mistake of rushing into a DMP to quickly, be sure you are doing the correct thing and we usually advise to stop paying, build up an emergency fund and wait for defaults.

Reddington85

Grumpelstiltskin said:

Do not make the mistake of rushing into a DMP to quickly, be sure you are doing the correct thing and we usually advise to stop paying, build up an emergency fund and wait for defaults.

I've completed the assesment with Step Change and they recommend a DMP 

Would stopping paying mean everything secured (loans and credit cards) whilst paying stuff like Council Tax, Mortgage, Utilities, Insurance etc? Sorry if thats a basic question 

Grumpelstiltskin

You stop paying all UNSECURED debt, you carry on with secured debt and utilities.

You need to open a new basic ( no overdraft ) account with a banking group you don't owe money to and manually transfer vital direct debits ( do not use the switching service ) to your new accounts.

Whatever you do don't rush into anything, there is no rush.

You do realize if you have any joint accounts with your wife her credit record can be affected.

Reddington85

Grumpelstiltskin said:

You stop paying all UNSECURED debt, you carry on with secured debt and utilities.

You need to open a new basic ( no overdraft ) account with a banking group you don't owe money to and manually transfer vital direct debits ( do not use the switching service ) to your new accounts.

Whatever you do don't rush into anything, there is no rush.

You do realize if you have any joint accounts with your wife her credit record can be affected.

The only joint account we have is the Mortgage (in place for 10 years and we've never had an issue with)

Ok - thats really helpful thank you

tigergambit

Please don't go straight into a DMP with Stepchange or PayPlan. Take time to let everything default and save the payments you would have been making into a settlement/emergency fund. When you get round to starting your DMP you should have a more realistic picture of your SOA. You can then work out how much you want to continue saving and divide the remainder up amongst your creditors.

As you have a substantial amount you can save from (£1300?) consider that if you can limit repayments to, say, £300 then in a couple of years you will have a good fund to make Full & Final settlement offers from. 

You have multiple debts to some of your creditors - have you considered making affordability complaints against these? Should save you some interest.

RAS

You and your wife need to do a joint SOA, which you may not want to share here but do need. You also both need to understand where this debt comes from. The problem with splitting finances is that neither of you have clear understanding of your overall finances, unless you have rigourous monthly finance meetings and discuss un-budgeted spends meantime.

If your wife has been paying sone basics and you've been paying the fun stuff, it's going to affect both your lifestyles. Is your wife up for it?

Make sure you share no accounts other than the mortgage. You'll need to re-new the mortgage with your current provider, choose the best option on-line.

Reddington85

tigergambit said:

Please don't go straight into a DMP with Stepchange or PayPlan. Take time to let everything default and save the payments you would have been making into a settlement/emergency fund. When you get round to starting your DMP you should have a more realistic picture of your SOA. You can then work out how much you want to continue saving and divide the remainder up amongst your creditors.

As you have a substantial amount you can save from (£1300?) consider that if you can limit repayments to, say, £300 then in a couple of years you will have a good fund to make Full & Final settlement offers from. 

You have multiple debts to some of your creditors - have you considered making affordability complaints against these? Should save you some interest.

Thank you - this is great advice. Stepchange offered me a Breathing Space option too - though not sure if this will make a difference at this stage?

Is there a guide to best practice on affordability complaints? I would guess Natwest are the obvious ones and NewDay (in their various guises)

RAS said:

You and your wife need to do a joint SOA, which you may not want to share here but do need. You also both need to understand where this debt comes from. The problem with splitting finances is that neither of you have clear understanding of your overall finances, unless you have rigourous monthly finance meetings and discuss un-budgeted spends meantime.

If your wife has been paying sone basics and you've been paying the fun stuff, it's going to affect both your lifestyles. Is your wife up for it?

Make sure you share no accounts other than the mortgage. You'll need to re-new the mortgage with your current provider, choose the best option on-line.

Thanks RAS, I've just done one that we've gone through and there's some budget (like TV/internet) that she's going to take on . The real pain has come from the wedding going overbudget and a house move that has ended with some unforseen and extensive repairs (which is where we've had to exhaust some credit lines) - there's not really an imbalance between fun and basics 

Yes we only share council tax and mortgage and will keep it that way.. 

RAS

For things like holidays, do you have friends/family for whom you can house sit? Or look at city breaks when some of the hotel chains have very cheap deals?