Debt Fighter - needing advice!

duchy

Congratulations on taking control of your debt instead of letting it control you !With regard to savings-my instinct would be to leave the £800 in there -as I think you feel the need for a safety net but from next month-stop saving (how likely is it to be a disaster costing over £800?) and put that £100 towards creditcards instead. Look at the interest you are earning on your savings and compare the rate (likely no more than 6%)with the massive 21.6% you are paying on you highest interest card. That money can work a lot harder for you clearing debt. The kid's savings you can always play catch-up with later once you've sorted everything out (sounds like a long way away but it isn 't really).The snowball will give you actual figures of what difference it will make-it brings home just how much money the creditcard companies are making out of us all-if we let them.
In the slightly longer term when car and house insurance renewals come up check out the cashback sites like quidco. I just switched home insurance and got £70 cashback (and the Co-op was the cheapest insurance quote I could find so I got a better deal anyway).Same goes for the phone if you choose to switch provider to a cheaper one-they all are on quidco so you're saving money and getting the cashback bonus-win-win situation.

dancingfairy

You are not letting your family down - you've got a problem and you're sorting - great lesson I would say and your child(ren) will learn good money mnagment from you and learn to budget for things - that can't be a bad thing.

What has failed is our countrys education system - I'm guessing you went to school and learnt history/geography/re/music etc. All fab and then went on to learn a profession? Well - did you ever have any training on how to get a good deal with insurance/gas/electric? Ever learn how credit cards work and how they charge you huge amounts of interest and then interest on interest? Ever learnt about useful budgetting? or earning extra bits and bobs by ebaying/car booting/mystery shopping/clicking/ cashback sites etc? No? and neither did most of the population - you are not alone there are thousands and thousands of people like you in similar or worse situations - stick around on here and you will see the hundreds of other people all struggling with similar issues.

I wish you the best of luck.

Verbatim

Debt_Fighter wrote: »

Having had another look through everything, I think a realistic amount we can pay to our creditors is £650 per month, meaning we'll be debt free in about 5 years.

Having read a lot about them, I'm so against IVAs it's not true - so the fact we can do a DMP for roughly the same amount of time is comforting.

I had no idea that at the end of an IVA the creditors can basically make you sell your house, and take the equity - unless I'm reading it wrong. They may wipe out the debt for you, but as far as I can see, IVAs are definitely not for home owners.

The important thing for us is we are now determined to sort ourselves out before it got too bad. By that, I mean so far we haven't missed a single credit card payment - our credit history is unblemished.

Whilst some might wonder why we now need a DMP, the fact is if we kept going as we were, the minimum payments would have got too high, and then we would have started missing payments. So hopefully, the creditors will see how good we've been up to now, and help us by accepting lower payments.


hi,

Sounds to me that you're pretty money savvy (OK apart from the overspend on the ccs!), in that you've got most things down and have a good brace of 0% and lob ccs.

i think it will be difficult but obviously essential to live without cards for the duration. Good luck with it.

Debt_Fighter

10 months later and I wanted to come back on here to ask some questions!

Our Payplan DMP has been in place since March, and we have been paying £437 per month. Almost all creditors have reduced interest (3/4 to zero, others to 6%)

However, Nationwide have ruthlessly persued us, and yesterday they were granted a charging order at a county court hearing (which I attended). They are also going for another as we had 2 debts with them.

The judge granted the order on condition they take no further enforcement action so long as we maintain the payments.

My question is, does interest now stop, or can they still add interest to the debt?

A bit of research on my part suggests that they cannot add interest because:

1) The debt was regulted under the consumer credit act 1974

2) The debt is under £5000

Has anyone got any experience of this? If they can still add interest, then I really don't see the point - we might aswell sell up now.

Debt_Fighter

*Bump*

Anyone?

piglet39

Hiya

TBH I don't know the answer but I'm giving you a bump.

Piglet

Debt_Fighter

piglet39 wrote: »

Hiya

TBH I don't know the answer but I'm giving you a bump.

Piglet

Thanks Piglet.

I have just made some phonecalls (to my DMP people and also to the court), and it seems a charging order wasn't granted at all. But the judge mentioned those words, and I think I heard wrong. It was all very confusing!

JayJay7777

Hi

I am am in the same position as you with Nationwide being the most aggressive of my creditors. I have 2 debts with them and both went from a DMP to charging orders being agreed against my property!

However the interest is then frozen and I only pay the set amount which was agreed in the first place. Payplan informed me that they are simply trying to secure the debt owed, plus the Solicitors who did on it behalf of Nationwide informed me that they would never make me sell the property unless I failed the payments!

Debt_Fighter

JayJay7777 wrote: »

Hi

I am am in the same position as you with Nationwide being the most aggressive of my creditors. I have 2 debts with them and both went from a DMP to charging orders being agreed against my property!

However the interest is then frozen and I only pay the set amount which was agreed in the first place. Payplan informed me that they are simply trying to secure the debt owed, plus the Solicitors who did on it behalf of Nationwide informed me that they would never make me sell the property unless I failed the payments!

Nationwide and Northern Rock are said to be the most aggressive of the lot.

The judge upheld my original payment offer at the redetermination hearing, refused the application for a charging order, and told Nationwide they could take no further action against me so long as I kept up the payments.

Then the guy representing Nationwide had the cheek to request that court costs be added to the debt.

The judge raised a finger and said "Err, NO! I will not heap further misery on Mr *******

Bloody right too.

In some ways though, a charging order isn't so bad if the interest is frozen, but with DMPs they can still add interest. I shall now write to Nationwide requesting that interest is frozen to enable me to clear the debt asap.

Verbatim

Nice to hear from you DF but not in such yuk circumstances, obviously.

Nationwide put up such a user friendly image that they're not a bank but still a cuddly building society but I've heard and read similar stories about them. What a cheek wanting you to bear the costs of their outrageous court application. Hope they freeze the interest for you.