New Loan when on debt repayment plan

Emilyincountryside

Hello,

I am in a pretty dire predicament - my 20 year old battered car ( the only one in the household) is on its very last legs and has cost me a lot in repairs, more than it's worth, in fact. I am already on a debt repayment scheme for some old credit cards, and I have been rejected on some soft searches for loans for £10K. I thought if I could get a loan, then I can pay for a 2nd hand car upfront. I am told I should not apply for another credit card, and I cannot get £10k on it anyway at 0% interest. But if I go on a PCP scheme, I would pay more than the loan per month and interest of at least 12.9% or more.

I can only drive an automatic, which is more expensive, and I cannot go without a car, as I work in healthcare in the community. What can I do? Everything seems to be spiralling. Thank you for any advice.

FlorayG

Buy a cheap car. You would be surprised at how reliable a car costing under £1,000 can be. Speak with local independent mechanics; often they know of a good car that they have been maintaining only for sale because the owner wants to spend a lot of money on one.

A friend of mine recently sold a 100% reliable car for £600. She'd had it 16 years from new and it was still running reliably, she just wanted to spend £20k on a new one

dumpster_fire2025

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82186762#Comment_82186762

OP can only drive auto. I'm not sure that the handful of autos under £1000 are going to be quite as reliable as the manuals.

Edit: That doesn't mean they have to spend £10k though.

Brie

how much are you paying each month on the debt repayments? I don't really need to know - it's for you to stop and think about it. What will happen if you stop paying anything for, say, 6 months? Will that give you enough to buy an inexpensive auto? Autotrader shows there's nearly 5k automatics available in the UK for between £4k & £5k. If I cut that down to within 50 miles of where I live (Dorset) there's still nearly 1,000.

So what I'm suggesting is to tell your creditors that you've got a problem that will be resolved in 6 months but that you have to stop paying for that length of time. Let's say you are paying £300 a month so in 6 months you'll have £1800 to put towards a car. At that point you might be able to find one for that price or find a way to finance the rest of a £4k car.

Grumpelstiltskin

OK a few more details please, your debt repayment plan, is it with a charity or a fee charging company? how old are the debts? how much in total do you owe? how much are you paying each month?

Have you looked at our Debt Free Wannabe board?

The answer to these questions may give us an idea of the way forward which will not be a large loan.