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Debt Angel. Advice? experiences?
Phoenixx73
Posts: 146 Forumite
Recently we applied for a loan of £5000 to cover both paying off Welcome Finance (who have us on a hideous APR) and to fund a bond and deposit on a bigger house as we are expecting our 4th child imminently.
Tonight the phone rings and a company called Debt Angel one of their financial advisors was talking us through our options. Because of our history of applying for too many loans (to fund said deposit) they told us that we are unable to get a loan anywhere so instead they suggested a debt management program with them. She was very thorough, explaining practically everything to me, with my outgoings of £365 a month I could reduce my payments to £200 a month over the same period of time it would take to pay off the loan with Welcome. She assured me that there were no fees to pay and that the money I paid would go to my creditors, and that I could back out of the agreement with Angel at any time I wished with no fees or charges.
Now this sounds an awful lot like an IVA to me but I am unsure whether or not this would be in our best interests to pursue or to steer well clear. After all, the original intent of the loan was to get a bigger house as the one we are currently in is rapidly becoming too small for our needs.
Any help, advice, testimonials, warnings or the like would be very helpful to us in making a decision. after all, we don't want to end up being worse off at this stage of the game.
My apologies if I have posted this in the wrong section. It was a toss up between here and the loans board. I hope I picked the right one.
Tonight the phone rings and a company called Debt Angel one of their financial advisors was talking us through our options. Because of our history of applying for too many loans (to fund said deposit) they told us that we are unable to get a loan anywhere so instead they suggested a debt management program with them. She was very thorough, explaining practically everything to me, with my outgoings of £365 a month I could reduce my payments to £200 a month over the same period of time it would take to pay off the loan with Welcome. She assured me that there were no fees to pay and that the money I paid would go to my creditors, and that I could back out of the agreement with Angel at any time I wished with no fees or charges.
Now this sounds an awful lot like an IVA to me but I am unsure whether or not this would be in our best interests to pursue or to steer well clear. After all, the original intent of the loan was to get a bigger house as the one we are currently in is rapidly becoming too small for our needs.
Any help, advice, testimonials, warnings or the like would be very helpful to us in making a decision. after all, we don't want to end up being worse off at this stage of the game.
My apologies if I have posted this in the wrong section. It was a toss up between here and the loans board. I hope I picked the right one.
I Reject your reality and substitute my own.
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
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Hi. I would stop applying for loans as obviously it is affecting your credit file and you are now more likely to be turned down.
I have never heard of debt angels who may or may not be offering the right solution for you (we will need a full SOA to tell this) but will almost certainly be charging you for the service which you can get free advice on (and a free service I believe) from CCCS or CAB. a DMP is like an IVA but is based on trust and is not legally binding like an IVA is so they could be talking about a dmp but if you have any doubts I would go with your instinct and avoid them.
Post your SOA and we'll see what we can do to help.Making my money go further with MSE :j
How much can I save in 2012 challenge
75/1200 :eek:0 -
sorry, please define SOA for me. I'm not familiar with that particular acronym.I Reject your reality and substitute my own.
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
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An SOA is a statement of affairs - if you go to the post at the top of this board, welcoming newbies and telling you what it is - its every single bit of money you spend, basically - everything from the mortgage to the cup of coffee at Starbucks. It is amazing what we can see to help!
Other than that, I'd say, anything you agree to, you want to see it in writing, and you want a few days to read it properly. Never, ever, ever sign anything or agree to anything where they don't agree to this. Like Martin says, there is no debt problem that can't be solved.
Good luck - check out the soa, and keep posting.2023: the year I get to buy a car0 -
HAve a look here
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=107280
it is the basic debt tool. If you want to talk to any of the debt charities or set up any sort of DMP, you need to do one anyway.
Also have you taken advice as to what effect a DMP would have on your attempts to get a bigger house?If you've have not made a mistake, you've made nothing0 -
HAve a look here
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=107280
it is the basic debt tool. If you want to talk to any of the debt charities or set up any sort of DMP, you need to do one anyway.
Also have you taken advice as to what effect a DMP would have on your attempts to get a bigger house?
As things stand right now. we are totaly on top of all repayments and haven't defaulted on anything (which makes me even more confused as to why this was offered to begin with) and this phone call only happened about 90 minutes ago (about half an hour before my original posting) so I have yet to look into any effects it may have on our housing situation (in actual fact, the thought hadn't even ocoured to me, thanks for flagging that for us)I Reject your reality and substitute my own.
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
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Are you rental or purchase?
A DMP of any description will affect your credit rating, with estate agents and or mortgage companies.If you've have not made a mistake, you've made nothing0 -
Rental properties. we are looking to rent againI Reject your reality and substitute my own.
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
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Do the SOA and people can advise you better, but do NOT do a DMP with any company other than a debt charity or Payplan.
And it does not look as if you really need to do one at all, but post up the SOA.If you've have not made a mistake, you've made nothing0 -
Will get cracking on SOA. My initial thought concerning the whole thing was CAB first and go from there IF we should find ourselves needing it. but as it stands we can comfortably afford all of our outgoings with some left to spare at the end of the week.
It just struck me as odd/worrying that someone would ring us out of the blue offering supposedly free help for a problem we don't have when all we were loking for was a loan for a bond and deposit on a new rental house.
Maybe it is the cynic in me but in this day and age gift horses are as rare as rocking horse **** so the alarm bells started ringing.I Reject your reality and substitute my own.
When life gives you lemons, throw em back and say you want CASH instead!
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If you check the Debt Angel site it does tell you that there are fees to pay, based on how many creditors you have.
Quite frankly if they have told you that there were no fees to pay, would you now trust them?Tallyhoh! Stopped Smoking October 2000. Saved £29382.50 so far!0
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