In need of help

superslayeruk

Hi there

I have been reading this forum for some time now and joined in a bit occasionally, however i have decided that i really need help and thought a diary entry would help.

when i was 19 i got myself in serious amounts of debt just by spending all of the free money that the credit cards kept giving me (i was only earning about £15,000) and had £10,000 credit limit with both Natwest and Egg not to mention a few smaller credit cards. Anyway suffice to say that with interest etc i owed iro £45,000 by the time i was about 25, i owned up to it and have been paying it off ever since. All of my cards are now on 0% or a maximum of 6.9% for life of balance and slowly i am whitling them down. The problem is i have recently got engaged (fantastic news) however my partner wants me to move in with him which i cannot afford to do (i currently live rent free at my parents, thank god for them!) He knows my debt situation and realises that i cannot contribute to the mortgage which he has taken on himself, but i still pay for all the food as my contribution for living there almost full time. I am now down to about £27,000 (cant be 100% accurate as egg money manager cannot connect to all of my accounts at the moment:rolleyes: ) but can't seem to get any lower than this. I have now joined quidco, every research company i can and also mystery shopping ( thank you MSE's for all of these fantastic ideas) but i still need to physically earn more to get rid of my debt and live.

I am currently earning £1840 after tax each month of which £800 i spend of living costs and the rest pays off my debt. I am also studying a full time course so that i can get a better job and earn more money in the future, however this leaves me very little free time to earn more money. Can anyone help me with other ideas of bringing in extra cash?

I am also supposed to be getting married next year which i am not even looking forward to as i have no idea how we are going to pay for it! It is supposed to be the happiest day of my life and i dont want to totally scrimp on it.

As you can probably tell i am having a "down" day today, not surprising after carrying this debt for over 10 years! I have talked to debt management companies about IVA's but apparently my situation is not serious enough and as i have carried this for so long i dont want to go bankrupt (wish i had done this 5 years ago).

All help advice and support would be most welcome.

lisabell

Hi

Well done on doing so well and getting your debt down you should be very pleased.
I too did the same thing when i turned 18 that was it for me i got offered credit cards and spent went crazy on them.
My debt carried on getting worse and noe am just about to go on an iva.
Have you thought about ebaying anything or car booting as you seem to be doing most other things.
I wish you luck and you will get there eventually
Lisa

slippalong

Hi,
Well done on getting your finances in order.Have you posted an SOA so that the good people on here may be able to help you some more on saving and also re your wedding,I think there are some good posts on the forum somewhere on getting down wedding costs.

andan

Definately get your SOA on here, as that seems to be the only area that could be cut down seeing as you don't have much time spare. Are you still living rent free, i only ask because your living costs seem to be quite high at £800, i only just earn that a month.

Hope you feel better later and congrats on the engagement.

RAS

Hiya

have you spoken to any of the debt charities?

Are the creditors still charging interest/

have you requested the CCas for all these debts?

superslayeruk

Thanks everyone who has responded so far, sorry for the delay i have been doing my exams. I have spoken to a debt charity who said that i wasnt right for an IVA and i dont want to go bankrupt. Havent yet done my SOA either but will get that up here shortly. with regard to interest most of my cards are on 0% or on a max of 6.9%. Not sure what CCA is can you shed a bit of light on that one for me?

I am in the process of writing up descriptions of everything that i can sell on ebay. Can anyone suggest any reputable work from home type work? maybe typing or something?

Thanks again for the help and support it really does help!

superslayeruk

Oh and the £800 covers car insurance, tax, servicing and repairs, food, £200 petrol, mobile phone, parking at uni, horses medication (yes i know!) horses food. tv license.

Car is 1.4 to capitalise on low insurance and tax - i have shopped around for insurance and got cashback on quidco. Petrol unavoidable as i live in the middle of nowhere. Mobile phone - on an employee rate for life through a friend.

GeorgeUK

Details of a CCA here:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=578486

From what you have said, it sounds like you have been using promotional offers and LOB cards to keep transferring your debt. Not sure a CCA would be of much use if this was the case.

Have you started reclaiming your bank charges (on hold for test case), and you CC charges (not part of the test case)

For IVA you would probably be a home owner to go on this as it is basicall one step away from bankrupcy so definately not for you.

If you post up a SOA we should be able to show you where you can make some savings. That's a decent wage, but if you are living at home with parents you should be making a pretty big dent in the debts.
http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html

Also put your current debts into the snowball calculator to see how long it will take to pay off. It is often advised to pay the minimum to all but the highest APR so hopefully you will save quite a bit in interest with your 0% cards. Remeber when you clear a card that you could be offerred another 0% deal on that as incentive for you to keep the account open.
http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx

superslayeruk

OK so far this is what i owe:

Egg - £5917.47 APR 5.8% LOB
Capital One - £4,000 (circa) APR 6.7% LOB
Citi - £1506.79 APR 6.9% LOB
halifax - £2344.93 0% ends 2nd July 2008
mint - £3149.56 APR 6.9% lOB
nationwide - £4651.19 APR 15.9%
tesco - £1912.00 0% ends June
Lombard loan £291 per month ends Feb 09

I have just got a Natwest cc with 0% for 13months with a credit limit of £7350 i wanted to transfer the halifax and tesco to this but after seeing the nationwide one's interest i have to get rid of it :eek: ! Can someone suggest which would be the best ones to move around?

Thank you in advance.

poorandindenial

Before you make the decision you need to know what the interest rates of those ending in june and july, if they are (eg) 23% then you won't necessarily be better off for moving the nationwide one.

Have you used the snowball calculator yet?? that really helps you see the impact of different courses of action for different cards.

RAS

Hi what is the interest rate in halifax and tesco after the deals end?

Have you played the snowball on https://www.whatsthecost.com. It shows you have to pay off the debt most effectively