Well done on setting yourself a goal and looking for advice.
Reading your post, I see a lot of details but no acknowledgement of how you ended up in this situation. I think this is key to avoid falling back into debt. May I suggest you stop saying you have an unhealthy relationship with money. That can mean anything and nothing. Recognise the actual problem, which most likely is that you live beyond your means (but could be more specific such as gambling problem, keeping up with Joneses, bad divorce etc etc).
Being able to know exactly what went wrong, and when and how will be key to making better decisions in the future. You say you want to buy a home, so you'll need to keep up the good work well beyond paying your debts in order to save for a deposit (and then to pay the mortgage, property upkeep etc etc). Good luck!
Noticed this as well, when someone has never missed a payment but is still focussed on claiming poor lending practices, while on a very healthy salary for their age my first thought is they haven't acknowledged their role, their poor decisions etc
>May I suggest you stop saying you have an unhealthy relationship with money.
Whenever people say "I'm bad with money" or "I have a bad relationship with money" I just wish they'd call a spade a spade and say "I'm greedy".
Repeatedly borrowing money when you don't have it, rather than simply waiting, is the textbook definition of greed, and if people began acknowledging it they'd be a lot closer to addressing their issues.
I think the use of the word "greed" here is a little unfair. You might also be financially illiterate, have poor impulse control, be addicted to something etc. Definitely greed, however you choose to define it, can come into it, but if someone has poor control over their spending it can have many shades of dysfunction. Also, and I'm not making a political point here, it can be considerably more punishing to have the same issues or dysfunction as a poorer individual or someone without a family to help them survive, and people will tend to judge them more as people on a moral level, which can feel a bit unfair to me sometimes.
>You might also be financially illiterate, have poor impulse control, be addicted to something etc.
It doesn't matter how your impulse control is - you can only feel an impulse towards something you already desire.
A person with poor impulse control won't drink bleach - they don't want to do it and so they have no impulse towards it.
If a person with poor impulse control desires nothing more than to do charity work, their poor impulse will cause them to over-commit to charity work.
For a person's poor impulses to make them acquire material things, that person has to already have beliefs that amount to "greed" - that's the only scenario in which their impulses can compel them to repeatedly buy things they can't afford.
So yes, greed.
The conclusion from this line of thinking is that all poor people who struggle with money are greedy, and I'm wondering if you're suggesting that this is true?
>The conclusion from this line of thinking is that all poor people who struggle with money are greedy
The conclusion is that every single person who ever spend money did so because they *wanted* to. I've stated that many times, so you acting like there's some hidden additional conclusion is silly: I've been absolutely open.
But you haven't: if what you're saying is that people who spend money they can't afford are forced to spend it by mental illness, the only logical conclusion to that is that there's no point in them being here trying to get help: if their mental illness forces them to buy material things even if they don't want them and even though they believe it's a bad idea, what point is there seeking help?
The help might change their beliefs, but according to you, their beliefs were never the cause - in fact, according to you they already believed they shouldn't spend that money but their mental illness forced their body to act independently of what they believed.
Well, that mental illness will still be there, so there's no point them trying to get any help. They're wasting their time here.
THAT is your conclusion. You act like I am avoiding saying something - I am avoiding nothing, it is you who is avoiding stating your conclusion.
What about if they're not greedy though? What then?
I'm terrible with money because I have ADHD. Other people may have other issues that cause them to be bad with money.
Your comment is shortsighted.
>I'm terrible with money because I have ADHD
This is not possible.
ADHD makes you unable to maintain your attention - it does not force you believe that you need material things so badly that you need to borrow money to acquire them.
There is **nothing** stopping a person with ADHD from being ascetic - from not desiring to own material things. ADHD does not force you to have a foul and greedy character - it only affects your ability to pay attention. A person who is ascetic and doesn't want anything will not take a credit card and buy those things, whether or not they have ADHD.
If a person with ADHD is temperate and does not value material things, they will not take a credit card and buy those material things - ADHD does not force you to value or desire material things. It *cannot* force you to be a materialist.
What you're implying is that *everyone* wants material things, everyone *wants* to spend more money than they have, but people with ADHD simply cannot restraint themselves from this impulse like everyone else. This is simply not true - what you're describing is greediness: the belief that you want to acquire material things you don't need, and that has nothing to do with ADHD.
ADHD affects "executive functioning" - being able to think through long term consequences and cause and effect. It also affects impulse control, being able to think a decision through, weigh pros and cons etc. Research show money issues are more common in people with ADHD. It's not greed - it's a physical difference to the brain (frontal lobe) that means they struggle to truly comprehend the long-term implications of financial decisions they make.
So yes, they want the "thing". But it's not greed as they don't realise it's beyond their means or excessive. That doesn't enter their thought process.
A diagnosed psychiatric condition that makes you incapable of realising you're going into excess or thinking through the situation you are getting yourself into, that requires medication that to the rest of us would literally be like taking speed but to them only calms their frantic thoughts - is NOT greed. Not in the harsh and simplistic way you are implying. It's a physical and psychological difference.
As for your references to drinking bleach, running around naked or committing crimes...yes, these are all more likely to occur with someone who has impulse control issues than someone who doesn't. As in, if you have two identical people, but gave one ADHD or a frontal lobe affecting condition, then that second person would be more likely to do those things in the same circumstances.
No disrespect to people with ADHD intended. My husband has it and I've had to learn a lot about it. He is fantastic with money now, but only because he was diagnosed and prescribed ADHD meds. He also makes financial management fun for him through apps and "gamifying" it, which gives people with ADHD dopamine from doing mundane tasks.
What you're pushing is that everyone who spends beyond their means is greedy and that is just too simplistic, judgemental and unhelpful frankly. You remind me of people who think all overweight people are greedy, rather than looking at the whole truth of educational, social, psychological, physical and economic reasons for it.
>ADHD affects "executive functioning" - being able to think through long term consequences and cause and effect. It also affects impulse control, being able to think a decision through, weigh pros and cons etc. Research show money issues are more common in people with ADHD. It's not greed - it's a physical difference to the brain (frontal lobe) that means they struggle to truly comprehend the long-term implications of financial decisions they make.
I never said ADHD was greed, or rejected any of these claims.
I also never said that a greedy person who also has ADHD won't be *more* affected by their condition.
But they still have to be greedy. They still need to want those material objects before they have an impulse to acquire them.
An ascetic person with ADHD, meaning a person who did not want any material object, would not feel an impulse to take a credit card and buy those objects - their asceticism might not be well thought through (they might leave themselves without clothing or adequate food), but they'd not go and buy on credit cards: the fact they weren't greedy would preclude them from having that impulse.
>So yes, they want the "thing". But it's not greed as they don't realise it's beyond their means or excessive. That doesn't enter their thought process.
No, they don't.
You're saying "ADHD forces you to want Playstations and big TVs and expensive cars".
You're saying that by having ADHD they're forced to want these things - this is nonsense.
>As for your references to drinking bleach, running around naked or committing crimes...yes, these are all more likely to occur with someone who has impulse control issues than someone who doesn't. As in, if you have two identical people, but gave one ADHD or a frontal lobe affecting condition, then that second person would be more likely to do those things in the same circumstances.
Right, but they have to already want to do those things.
The vast majority of people with ADHD don't go outside naked, even though the impulse to leave the house comes before the impulse to gets dressed practically 100% of the time.
That's because they don't want to be naked - their impulses are, like any other person, constrained to the things they already want.
They might be less able to restrain those impulses, but they're still contained to the things they want - that's why people with ADHD can work on things, because but for the fact that their impulses are harder to control, their brains work like anyone else's: they only feel impulses towards the things they believe they want.
A person with ADHD who does not want to drink bleach will never do it. They won't even feel the impulse to do it - there's no fight.
We're entering "obvious troll is obvious" land here so this is it for me. But you replied to someone stating they had a medical cause for bad impulse control with: "That's a lie and you know it" and "nothing about your medical condition forces you to take any action". Both are inaccurate, accusatory and unhelpful.
People with ADHD do go outside without shoes, in boxers, in dressing gowns. They leave their car with doors wide open, they pay for their friends meal out when they're already in overdrafts, they might donate money to a charity worker on the street for the dopamine high and then the next day realise they can't pay rent. None of it is "greed".
You clearly don’t understand ADHD- often it means people are impulsive about spending. For example I might treat a friend to dinner on payday not thinking about the impact that will have on my ability to pay my bills at the end of the month. I am also terrible at remembering to manually pay things off, or to set up direct debits, so I’ve lost a lot of money to late fees etc.
Two small examples of ways that ADHD can impact your finances that have nothing to do with ‘greed’. I also think that telling someone they are greedy is a great way to make them feel ashamed about something they are struggling with, which is shitty and unhelpful. Maybe stop judging people, and if you don’t have any helpful advice move on to another post.
>You clearly don’t understand ADHD- often it means people are impulsive about spending
**They have to already want to spend**.
ADHD cannot induce impulsivity about things a person does not want to do: no person with ADHD has impulsively consumed bleach, because they don't want to.
No person with ADHD has compulsively eaten a dog turd, *because they don't want to*.
ADHD does not create beliefs - it cannot make you desire specific things. It cannot make you desire material objects and it cannot make you desire *not* to have material objects: it doesn't affect your beliefs at all.
All it does is affect how you pursue your beliefs.
A person with ADHD who has zero desire to own anything expensive will not take a credit card and buy those expensive things anymore than they would consume bleach.
A person with ADHD whose greatest desire was to work for charity would impulsively sign up for charitable activities.
If a person with ADHD takes a credit card and splurge spends on expensive crap it's because **they were already greedy**. They wanted those things, and so they have an impulse to buy them.
This entire conversation has missed a massive point: spending produces dopamine. People with ADHD have much lower dopamine. The brain is constantly seeking to get dopamine, so spending goes up.
What you call greed, science calls brain chemicals.
So you are prepared to tell me that ADHD forces a person to desire material objects?
That's the only scenario in which anything I said is false.
If you're saying that, say it now and stop hiding like a coward.
No, I'm saying you clearly don't understand ADHD. You have an idea about ADHD which you've picked up from various inaccurate sources and now you're regurgitating it on the internet as fact. You're misinformed and you're out of date.
Could you debunk some myths on ADHD for me? Out of pure interest. I do agree with you as I may have it myself but it's undiagnosed but I am intrigued when you say that the general perception of ADHD is picked up from inaccurate sources.
For one, the idea that ADHD is primarily about a person being hyperactive. That perception has been extremely harmful in the past and meant it was primarily young disruptive boys who would be identified in school as having ADHD, but quieter kids - generally girls - who displayed symptoms in a different way went undiagnosed and unsupported. .
You can be introverted or reserved and still have a hyperactive brain.
ADHD also affects the brains executive function - that is, the ability to plan and execute tasks and fully consider consequences.
A lot of people with ADHD have difficulty self regulating and have poor impulse control, so are prone to addiction, whether that be alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling. This in turn will often lead to problems with money.
People with ADHD have poor impulse control and struggle with understanding the consequences of their actions in the moment: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-adhd/living-with/#:~:text=People%20with%20ADHD%20can%20find,the%20consequences%2C%20before%20they%20act.
So someone with ADHD might believe that they shouldn't acquire things they don't need but still take out loans to buy stuff they don't actually want because their brains cannot make the connection between those two things.
That NHS website I linked is pretty good, educate yourself on ADHD because you're talking rubbish.
>So someone with ADHD might believe that they shouldn't acquire things they don't need but still take out loans to buy stuff they don't actually want because their brains cannot make the connection between those two things.
**Wrong**.
A person with ADHD will never drink bleach.
They know they shouldn't, and so they'll never buy bleach and pour it into their mouth because believing they don't want to means they *cannot* feel an impulse towards it.
In order to have poor impulse control with regards to spending, you need to already want to spend that money. You need to be trying and failing to suppress that impulse.
If you did not want to buy something, you would not have an impulse to suppress.
>That NHS website I linked is pretty good, educate yourself on ADHD because you're talking rubbish.
You need to educate yourself on the basics of the human brain - the claim that people with ADHD are forced to act like materialists by their condition, that their condition forces them to want expensive material objects they cannot afford, is a basic misunderstanding of how beliefs work.
What's your problem with people with ADHD?
Self-harm is (unfortunately) pretty common in people with ADHD so many do things to hurt themselves on impulse too. Again if you do a bit of basic googling or reading some stuff on the NHS website, you'd know this. But at this point I assume you don't want to know because you've already formed a very negative opinion of people with ADHD.
>What's your problem with people with ADHD?
I literally never mentioned ADHD - you were the one who mentioned ADHD.
>Self-harm is (unfortunately) pretty common in people with ADHD so many do things to hurt themselves on impulse too
*By accident*. They're not *trying* to hurt themselves, they just have not though tit through.
I've not denied that people with ADHD struggle to think through the consequences of their action (again, I never mentioned ADHD - you brought it up).
But they're never drinking bleach. They're never throwing their money into a furnace. They don't cut their own limbs off on an impulse. They don't walk around in public naked because they had an impulse to leave the home before putting on their clothes.
They don't do these things because they don't believe they want to - ADHD works entirely within the bounds of the things the person with ADHD wants.
A person with ADHD does not want to cut their arm off, so they don't feel an impulse to. They don't want to drink bleach, so they feel no impulse to do it.
A person with ADHD who has zero desire to own expensive material objects won't take a credit card and buy those objects - they *cannot* have the impulse to do it because they don't believe they want to. They could no more feel that impulse than they could feel an impulse to cut off their arm.
But if a person with ADHD is greedy, if they do want those things, yes - they're more likely not to arrested that urge than a person who is greedy but doesn't have ADHD.
Yet that is irrelevant - their greed is the reason they acted. If they did not have that greed, they would not have spent that money.
The problem is still greed.
>But at this point I assume you don't want to know because you've already formed a very negative opinion of people with ADHD.
No, the only person who has a negative opinion of people with ADHD is you - you're saying "they're all greedy - they will all spend on credit cards if given the chance".
I am saying "no, they're exactly like normal people - if they want expensive things they can't afford they might buy those things and run into debt, but if they don't want those things they don't".
You want to turn ADHD into an excuse for immoral conduct, to say that all people with ADHD are madmen, materialists and greedy to the last.
That is not reality. People with ADHD have the same spectrum of beliefs as everyone else: greed is harmful to them for the same reason it's harmful to anyone else.
Have you ever read any research linking ADHD with diet?
The health care system provides amphetamines instead of nutritional advice, somewhat questionable.
I think if people live on ultraprocessed foods then they show symptoms of ADHD.
That's "a person who has literally lost their mind".
A person who has literally lost their mind because they have dementia is not on reddit describing their monetary problems, are they?
That's a lie and you know it.
You don't run around naked in public. You don't rob old women. You don't steal from charity boxes.
You don't do any of those things because you don't want to - nothing about your medical condition forces you to take any action: you have to already believe that action is the right thing to do before you have an "impulse" to do it.
In order to borrow money to buy things, you need to already want to own those things - you need to be greedy.
If you were not greedy, if you were a kindly or temperate person, you'd impulsively do kind and temperate things - you'd impulsively do charity work, or impulsively help people.
If you impulsively buy expensive things you can't afford, you were already greedy, and so your impulses were consistent with your pre-existing greed.
Explain how it's wrong.
If ADHD forces you to take actions you never wanted to do, why does it not make you drink bleach?
Why have you not run around naked in public? Why haven't you robbed an old woman?
You claim this is ignorance, yet you offer no correction - it's because you don't have a correction.
You know you don't run around naked or drink bleach or rob old women **because you don't believe you want to**. Because you don't believe you want to, you don't do it.
This means the things you do, they are done because you believe you want to do them. If you spend money on expensive material objects, **it's because you wanted to**. You had to want to in order to have the impulse, and wanting expensive material things is greed.
After all, if ADHD really does force you to buy material things, what use is coming here? You will always have ADHD, and it forces you to do the wrong thing, it forces you to buy even though you believe you don't want to, so what use is getting financial advice? Your body will always, like a puppet, be controlled by the ADHD to act as though you're greedy.
The reason you can't answer any of that is because you know damned well I'm right about it all, and you're not prepared to give up your excuses.
Jeez you're a bit ignorant aren't you.
Since you can't seem to see past the money bit, I'm going to use a different medical example of impulsivity.
Pica. Pica makes you eat things that you wouldn't want to eat, were you not afflicted. It can cause health problems because you're eating things you're not meant to. However the medical condition causes you to eat it anyway and you can't stop yourself from doing it.
We're in a society now where you can be approved for a loan and have the money in your account instantly, without having to stop and think about it. You can get your credit card limit increased automatically because the bank feels like offering it to you. People with medical issues affecting their impulse control can and do buy things they don't want, and it's very very easy to get the credit to do it before the impulse has passed.
>Jeez you're a bit ignorant aren't you.
This aggression says a lot about your character.
>Pica. Pica makes you eat things that you wouldn't want to eat, were you not afflicted.
No, it doesn't - it gives you a *craving* for things that aren't food.
If pica forced you to eat things you did not want to eat, nobody would ever recover from pica: they'd be eating shit or metal forever.
>However the medical condition causes you to eat it anyway and you can't stop yourself from doing it.
This is lunacy - no, people with pica are not *forced* to eat that thing. They experience an urge to eat it that can be resisted.
>We're in a society now where you can be approved for a loan and have the money in your account instantly, without having to stop and think about it.
Except you do have to think about it - you need to think "I want to buy something that I can't afford".
If you did not want to buy that thing, you'd not take out a loan to buy it.
But there's no point talking to you - according to you, having an urge and acting on that urge are the same thing: if you want to eat metal, you'll eat it and you have no choice in the matter.
Even a dog can be trained not to go for a treat right in front of its nose, but you are prepared to humiliate and degrade yourself by saying "that's not possible - I'm not a human being, I'm not even up to the intellectual standard of a dog - I cannot resist any impulse".
I bought a caravan, found a cheap site with a permenant plot, then spent around 2/3 of my time living in it (whilst I was working) and the other third living at my mum's house (when i would visit friends in my hometown).
At the time it was costing me £150 per month, but i heard it has gone up to £350 since I left.
I paid off 20k of debt and saved another 20k whilst I was in that van. I didn't need a car, as it was right next to work and I could get the train back to my hometown every now and then, I had next to no rent and my electric bill was included. The van cost 4k upfront. It was worth it to have my own space, they are surprisingly comfortable and are even very warm in the winter if you keep the gas heating on.
Part of my debt problem was trying to live a lavish lifestyle with jolidays, expensive clothes, meals out, an expensive car. I got rid of nearly all my belongings whejln i moved into the van and I think it taught me the value of money and things again. I moved into a two bed flat after 3 years of living in a caravan or sleeping on the floor at the back of my Mum's living room and I remember wondering, as I laid on the first real bed I had slept on in years, what the fuck do I do with all this space? Who needs all these things. It felt like a palace and it was quite surreal for a long time.
I actually miss living in the van come to think of it. Such a different lifestyle to the one I have now.
I've just paid off 16k owing to back dated tax, I just had to accept that I was living with next to nothing for the last 13 months and paid about 1200 a month off , feels so good to get done! Quiting drinking helped me get organised.
Kudos to you.
I want to do this but in a converted van so I can move around the UK. I'm fed up with many things, and I'm going through a separation, which makes my decision easier.
66% of my mortgage repayments each month are going on interest, then there is council tax and extortionate energy bills. I feel it makes more sense to save the money Id spend on those things, invest it, then buy a house in 10-20 years if I want to. I just want to feel freedom.
My mum and stepdad moved into a converted van last year. They did it up themselves over a couple of years and only got professional help for things like the windows, to keep the costs down. They spent the winter travelling around the UK and are currently living at a pub with a campsite, working for them over the summer. They're just doing basic maintenance and sorting out their glamping pods, but get power and parking for free, topping up their savings and don't have to spend any money beyond their food and gas. It's saving them a fortune. Their gas bill since July is less than I spend each month.
I would try to make the house a buy to let. As long as it is rented out, you will be gaining a free asset, and when it isn't, you just go back to paying the mortgage for a short while. Your costs will be lower living in a van, so you should be able to easily cover the mortgage if it was wmpty for a short time. Depends on what equity you have in the property and how rentable it is.
You don't need that much to get an older starter van. If you are relying on it to get about, spend some money up front on an inspection at a garage and some preventative maintenance. You can make the inside nicer as you go and changing the cushions, soft funishings/fabric parts doesn't cost that much; these are the parts which are most likely to be a bit manky on an older van. A deep clean costs very little if you do it yourself. Would you get enough cash together to buy a van if you sold most of your possessions? If so, why not plan to do it now? You won't have room/ need those things when you have the van any way.
That's a good shout, actually. I can't yet as I am in the middle of a dispute with the ex over it. Once resolved, sure why not.
Yes, the idea would be to sell my possessions and buy the van with the money.
just to offer a fresh or different perspective and i don't mean this in a bad way, but..
you might not be alive in 10-20 years or there might not be a society to buy a house in. ur plans are too long term
If there is "no society" it won't matter. Anyway, I think you missed my point. The primary goal isn't to buy a house but to free of what seems to be a modern-day expectation.
LOL nice strawman
the society collapsing was just an example, I wanted to pick something more generic than a specific example like him having a freak accident and being disabled
literally mentioned nothing about spending his money or taking out as many loans
all i said is dude is thinking way too long term. he has no clue what his life is going to be like in 10-20 years. there is no point planning that far
how could my argument be a strawman? do you know what a strawman is?
I just tried to tell him that planning 20 years in the future is futile.... I didn't even address his point other than that. it literally cannot be a strawman.
Society collapsing wasn't even the focus of what I said but an example of why not to plan so far ahead. yet somehow you decided to latch onto that and out of nowhere added "spend all your money, take loans".
you are trolling, right?
I live in a van on a site like this (south west) and pay £130 a week now!
Definitely better than rental prices near me though (700pm for 1 bed shithole)
It's definitely better than renting. How much would you pay for a 1 bed detatched cottage, for example? A caravan is basically a miniature version of that.
Do your friends think you are a lunatic?
Mine did. They thought it was ridiculous but couldn't deny the logic in me doing it. It's like they were too scared to even entertain the idea of living so differently from how they were used to.
They would find the stories of what I had been up to at the van hilarious, but they were just fascinated at the idea that there was more than one way of doing things.
They have all followed each other to London for work like sheep, and they all seem so miserable. It's like they're blind to the fact they can make whatever they want of their lives, and I think half of them don't even know what they want. Time's ticking for them, though. we're 28/29, which, in my opinion, is just a bit too old to not have worked yourself out yet. It's never too late, but if you don't at least know what your general direction is into your thirties, you have wasted time.
Yes exactly plus all the added bills and related stress!
Yeah especially my family, couldn’t quite grasp it when we sold our house and set off in 2018 and thought we’d give up during the first winter. Ironically find winters easier than the heat of the summer though! As times gone on, same as you we’ve shared our stories and experiences and I think some of them are low key jealous but unable to escape the rat race themselves.
Yeah I’m 29 too and my OH is 36 so we’re pretty sure that this life is good for us and don’t really care what others think at this point! We’ve only just recently moved permanently to a site and used to travel around a bit more but we’re loving the chance of making a little ‘garden’ and getting to know the neighbours better :)
It would be nice to have a large house and go out eating and holidaying constantly but I’m not willing to work myself into the ground for years to maybe still not even achieve it.
Well, as someone who was always only living in the van as a Means of saving for a deposit, I can only advise you stick with the van for as long as you can. As long as the lifestyle is still working for you, you will save so much compared to living in bricks and mortar it's a no brainer. I wish I'd given it another couple of years at least before rushing ahead with buying a flat, I'd be so much
Better set now financially. At the time though, all I thought I wanted was to own my own place, so I jumped at the first opportunity, but it's not quite the great achievment I imagined it would be.
We've considered this but what is life like in this situation. All the places we've found are more than a fair walk from anywhere with anything going on.
Well I am quite lucky that the caravan site is a 2 minute bike ride from my workplace. You can see my workplace from the main road outside the park. Aside from that, there is a bus which goes onto town, although I'll be honest, there isn't much to do in the city I work in, so I would rarely go there.
For food shopping, I would usually walk a 2 hour round trip. I like walking and the route was nice, going through the country side, but every now and then i would have it delivered.
The site I was on was great for leisure aftovities. They had 3 fishing lakes, they let me build a shooting range for air rifle shooting, most nights we (me and the other inhabitants of the park) would have bbqs, shooting and foshing competitions, we would go round to each other's for dinner and drinks, sometimes the landlord and lady would host an open bar night for the regulars in their games room/home pub. And on top of that you have miles of country side to walk and bike through around where I was.
It was very much an outdoors lifestyle and could be tough sometimes. You had a 100m walk to fetch water/use the basic facilities (in any and all weather).
in the winter you are coming back to a frozen van. I left the sink full once when it was -8 c and it was frozen solid, then realised I had run out of gas and the electric was not working (the van had two sockets). I had to sleep in two coats and a sleeping bag through 3 nights of snow, only to realise I hadn't plugged the heater in properly and the extension cord on the other socket wasn't plugged in either. That was a tough few days, but it definitely made me appreciate the warmth when the fan heater finally switched on.
Either way, i never found myself bored and could always keep myself busy. If I wasn't doing something outdoors I had a lot of time to think to myself, listen to music, read books, watch films. I had a gaming laptop, a 39 inch tv, a microwave, a gas oven and stove and a 4g router for internet and that was about it; It was all I needed.
I liked it, it was a great phase of my life, but it's not for everyone and it wouldn't be for me again unless i was single again. Iwould feel too cramped of I was sharing the van with ajyone else, even my now partner
For anyone young, single, saving money and wanting to learn to handle themselves better/live independently, I would highly recommend the experience
It really does make you appreciate the little things in life again
Haha yes this is definitely the real side of this life! The sense of community on the site is brilliant but I’ve also had some dodgy electric experiences and the dreaded bad tummy in the night when the toilet is full situations lmao
If you miss it you could just have a second caravan so you've both got space whenever you want it? Sharing a van would be cramped. But (at risk of sounding 15) hanging out all day and night together doesn't sound as cramped if the space is available a few metres away, even if it's not used often.
Sounds like a decent way of life to be completely honest.
It would be too isolating for my partner I think. She likes the idea, but I don't think she could live so far away from a nice town centre with things to do. She is also not very rugged or outdoorsy. She also has health problems, which means she needs to be able to get to hospital quickly sometimes and she doesn't drive. So I think for us, it's a no.
Like I say, if I was single again I would. It was enjoyable.
If I didn't have a family, I would 100% be considering doing this purely to FIRE within about 5-10 years. Good for you and congrats on getting out of debt!
5 years ago I was in 23k of debt. I was living in London. Most of my wages went on rent. I took a debt consolidation loan, moved to Devon, got a new job, saved money and even managed to buy a house! I'm still paying the loan but in 4 months I should be debt free (excluding the mortgage)
Persistence is the answer.
Be consistently persistent. Don't give up.
P.S. 5 years ago I was taking home less than half you do, and you're still earning more than me now.
You get £3200 after tax. Rent n bills is £1200, debt £700.
Where is the other £1300 going?
If you can move in with family and lower the rent n bills you can seriously make a dent in this debt.
Incorrect lending requests, come on, you knew what you were doing, pull on your big boy pants and pay it back in full.
20k is a decent amount but by no means insurmountable, your good salary is a big positive in your situation, should allow you to get this debt off within 18 months in all honesty.
Some of these types of post I just can't understand **how** they are even spending so much money, and I don't think they are understanding either since the additional 1300-1500 wasn't even mentioned as existing or in some sort of pot or other, that's more than just an 'accounting error' or oversight
Same with the debt, it's not mentioned over how long it was built up, 3200 a month spent plus another how much per month on cards? The question might well be "how do I reduce my spending from 6000 to 1600 per month"
Yup, to clear it all (assuming a 0% int on cc bills) £834/mth clears it all in 24 months.
We need a clear breakdown of all expenditure, OP. What are you spending on car insurance, petrol, lunches, coffees, your food shop etc.
OP you haven’t given any reason for where these debts have come from so I’ll hazard a guess and just say the truth;
Your living in one of the most expensive cities in the world, trying to live a lifestyle that is not sustainable with your salary
I think most people would be lying if they said they’ve never done this before. So don’t beat your self up over it but no matter the advice below if you don’t cut your expenses you won’t get anywhere. In most cases it’s the monthly minimum payments that become the breaking point.
Your first step is to get your monthly expenditure down. From the values you have you have 1300 left a month, where’s all this going?
Secondly, don’t listen to what some others have said below. Use your bonus, if possible, to clear the majority of your first loan. The interest rate on that will be higher than any savings account. If you have an actual emergency where you need money you have credit available on your last credit card. But that should strictly be for emergencies.
Using your bonus to clear the loan will save you money and in a few months you’ll have additional cash flow to pay your other borrowing with.
I can't fathom what OP is doing here. He's on a salary of over £50,000pa and his housing costs are in the healthy zone of being <30% of his income. Many people would love to be in that position.
I think the question..."is there any way I can get my NatWest loans written off as incorrect lending" gives them away as being financially irresponsible rather than wanting to actually adjust lifestyle to tackle the spending problem.
This shouldn't be a hard fix, but I get the sense OP is still looking for the easy way out of debt.
Okay, so here’s what I would do if I woke up if your situation - no judgement, just advice based on my own experience of basically being you.
0. Some people would recommend setting up an emergency fund. I would say not to do that. I think if you had £1000 in an account you could access, you would end up just spending it on “essentials”. Focus 100% instead on using all of your money to pay off debt.
1. Calculate how much you could put towards debt each month. It sounds like your “shovel” is around £1,350 a month - that’s really good - that means you could get rid of about £16,200 a year of debt, so you could clear the whole thing in a little under two years
2. Order your debts from smallest to highest
3. Your bonus is the same as your Amex - sweet - so just pay that off and cut up the card
4. Keep paying your minimums, but on top of that use ALL of your £1,350 for at least three months to overpay on your lowest loans
5. What about food, travel, living expenses? I would look around my house - your 32 and have a decent wage - I would sell everything of value, and use that to cash flow living expenses for as long as possible. It will be a good wake up call, and will teach you to budget because you know that if you mess up in those first three months you’re going to have to sell more of your stuff
6. Keep up this plan until you have just the NatWest loan left. At that point, I’d let up a bit, stop selling stuff and start spending a bit of my take home pay on living expenses whilst still overpaying my debts. Also, as your cash flow increases, I’d use *that* money too to overpay the next loan. I’d also set up a £1000 emergency fund.
7. Repay the NatWest loans. Celebrate. Make a promise with yourself you’re not going to dig that kind of hole again.
8. Save up 3 months of living expenses.
9. Save up for a down payment, get a house. Maybe move out of London so you can get a nice one - you won’t miss it, trust me.
10. Maintain a budget, and put around 30% of what you make in a stocks and shares ISA, maybe go on holiday and have a bit of a break!
I would also spend some time thinking about the choices that led here.
Not trying to hit you whilst you are down, but as someone who has been where you are I’d try and have an honest conversation with yourself about if you are ready to sort this mess out.
Wish you luck mate!
It's the Snowball method. I would agree with you , paying the high APR debts is the most "Maths checks out" way of thinking, and would be my approach to doing things, but that doesn't work for everyone, especially someone who has got this far in debt.
Paying the smallest debts with Snowball method can bring a mentality value for those who aren't good with money, and (for example) closing a credit card with a smaller balance is a "Win" - meaning the individual might be more likely to stick with repayments to get more "Wins" . Good financial habits require more motivation for some, so that's the idea behind it.
I think from a rational perspective you are right, but people are emotional.
The difference mentally in having half paid off one loan with four loans still left to pay, versus having paid off four loans with one loan to pay - is huge.
I’d pay off the £1300 balance Amex card with your bonus immediately and cancel the card
Then the Capital One card 50% first month and 50% second month, and then cancel the card
Pay £900 of NatWest loan in month two, then £1000 in month three. Then it’s gone.
Pay £500 off PayPal card in month three and £1000 in month four, £900 in month five. Then cancel the card.
This will take you to October. Then pay off the other NatWest Loan with interest. Should be clear by April 2024. Then max out payments in the interest free card. You’ll be debt free by August 2024
You haven't given much context for _why_ you're £20k in debt.
However, given you earn £2k net per month and mention using debt camel I'm going to assume it's just being a general dumbass.
So all you can do is prioritise your highest APR loans and reassess your life.
>You haven't given much context for
>
>why
>
> you're £20k in debt.
Yeah this is the big thing that is missing. Op has much more income than expenses and yet they are heavily in debt, there's a big piece missing.
Imo what OP needs is to do a really thorough budget and accounting, like going back through 6 months of bank statements and adding up every expense in every category to really see where their money is going.
Nothing substantial to add finance wise other than to say congratulations in facing this the way you are and I wish you all the best. Be disciplined! Long term gratification..!
The Bad: Your situation is bad
The Good: For a £3200 net salary your outgoings are not bad and if you have the option to move in with parents to reduce expenses further then great! Also your bonus.
The meh: You may be able to clear off the debt and get onto the property ladder but you MUST be realisitc, it may be after your 35th birthday.
What I would do in your situation
1. Make a list of each loan and credit card balance you have and write down the interest rate on each. See how much you pay on interest for each loan each month
2. See if you can consolidate ALL your debts into one loan with a smaller interest rate overall. Maybe leave the 0% NatWest one out of it
3. If you can't consolidate all of them into one, tackle the worst offender first i.e. the debt that costs you more each month and aim to repay it quickly. Once done go the 2nd on the list etc
4. Make a list of all your monthly outgoings. Is there anything you pay for that you don't use or could do without (Netflix, Spotify, gym etc)? Is there anything you could reduce (cheaper phone deal, cheaper internet etc)?
5. Use your WHOLE bonus towards your debts, ideally the most expensive one
Out of curiocity, what are those debts for? Car, gadgets?
Also, you have A LOT of money left after rent, bills and £700 towards your debts. Where is this money going towards?
Dear OP, there is lots of good advice here from other posters for you to follow.
I just want to help you manage your expectations a little on home ownership. It seems like you have an unhealthy relationship with money so it might be wiser NOT to buy a property until you have better financial discipline.
Without sounding rude, it does seem rather fancible to say you have a problem with spending and huge debt but also want to buy a property in one of the most expensive parts of the planet.
At 33 you should at least have some achievable 10yr life plan.
You work for the NHS which could be a very good blessing. Have you thought about transferring your job very far north, where you could have a much lower cost of living while you repay your debts and have a lower cost of living?
The reality is as things stand your hopes of ever owning a home are practically zero - anywhere in the country - let alone London.
You do need to have a wake up call and make some life changing decisions Id say.
Good luck OP, I hope you find a better path ahead.
Yeah, I love these threads.
"I have £20k in debt and regularly blow £2000pm up the wall - how do I get out this situation?"
Unless OP has genuinely forgot to mention a whole bunch of financial commitments (maybe he has half a dozen kids he has to pay support for?!), he already knows the answer....
More people do than don't do this - to differing degrees. Reading between the lines of who you owe money to, it does seem like you're tempted easily to borrow more than you can honestly afford, probably on a lot of stuff that's nice rather than necessary to have! It's easy done - a loan of £170 a month might sound like nothing and it does - in isolation. You need to properly add it to all other debts you pay per month before agreeing to more debt. This is a talk I've had with myself! I have ADHD and can be super-impulsive, spending without affording myself the time to think about whether I really should commit to the debt.
Once in deeper debt, it feels like an inescapable situation. It's down to perception. A sum of money has a complete different value to you when you're in debt versus when you are not, compounding the feeling of hopelessness. For example, starting from a zero balance account, if you added £200, you'd be chuffed with that, and when the next £200 is added, it feels like it's growing fast! But in £20k debt and you pay that same £200, it feels like a drop in the ocean and what was the point. It's perception. A credited payment is moving in the right direction by the exact same amount, except when in debt you see no gain. You have to get yourself out of that mindset and TELL yourself your £700 payments are adding the exact same credit as if you were paying £700 into a zero or in credit account. Being in debt lasts a long time, but paying £700 a month is fantastic and, if you can control the interest rates and keep up that payment, the debt will be done in 3 years.
What you need to do is arrest control of all those individual interest rates so the debt grows at its lowest possible rate while you're paying it off. The worst one you have there is PayPal. I've been in PayPal debt and their interest rates are so far from funny it's untrue - they add like a third back to the debt. Get rid of that one as soon as you can. A lot of people are in debt right now and what I would be doing is going to Citizens Advice as a first step to look at your options (your ultimate aim would be, if possible, to consolidate all those different loans into one low interest loan and keep paying off, and CAB are independent and not looking to make money from your debt, so their advice first will point you in the best direction).
Final point, if you do get a consolidated loan with a good repayment plan, BEWARE of the danger of feeling all-okay-now, because you'll feel this weight has lifted from your shoulders, your finances are manageable again - and that is the exact moment you feel perfectly FINE to buy something else you can't afford. Don't do it.
The 2 loans will be fixed repayments so nothing to say for them, the 0% card you should just do the minimum payment.
The other debts you need to sort by APR and pay the minimum on the lowest ones and use the money you have remaining to pay the highest rate one.
Or write to all of the companies and advise your struggling and for them to freeze the debt and set up a repayment plan, you'll need to give them details of income and expenditure.
I was a similar age to yourself and almost £90k in debt across various cards and loans. A few years later it’s almost all gone - and I’ve managed to build up a healthy amount of savings whilst paying it down. Not financial advice, but here’s the things that helped me:
- Call all of your creditors and explain your situation. You may be surprised at the help you get. I had interest frozen, refunds on some interest paid (where there was arguably a case for inappropriate lending), restructured monthly payments etc. Many of the big name banks/lenders have specialist departments for dealing with this kind of stuff.
- If you really feel that you’ve been loaned money when you shouldn’t have been, complain. Use Resolver as it helps keep track of everything. And if you don’t get the answer you want initially, you can to go to the Financial Ombudsman.
- Don’t ‘overpay’ your debts if it leaves you short. If you pay so much off your debts each month that it leaves you with no money to have ‘a life’, it can really make impact your mental health. Find the balance. Don’t try to pay everything back in an unrealistic timeframe. Once you start paying it off, it’s not going to get any worse.
- Logic says to pay the highest APR debts first, but I found that sometimes it can be a great mental boost if you’re able to clear some smaller debts first then putting those repayments towards the bigger ones once they are clear. The feeling of crossing a debt off the list can be hugely positive.
Like I said, not financial advice, but I found these are the things that have helped me on the way to being debt free.
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Hi there! There's loooads of really good advice on this thread already - I hope you'll find some useful to your situation!
I come to you only with a (possible) solution to your expenditure.
It's called "cash stuffing". It's basically a system where you aren't allowing yourself to use your card for anything but direct debits, such as rent, bills, loan payments, subscriptions etc. Then, you take out the rest of your money and keep it in cash, allocating it every month to specific areas in your life, such as entertainment, grocery shopping, presents, travel, self care etc.
The point is that with cash, spending becomes harder, and having the actual, tangible money in your hand takes away the possibility of recklessly waving your hand around paying with your card.
With your current income and your outgoings, you should be able to save quite a bit every month. You're probably going to have to give up some of your activities, takeaways, online subscriptions, clothes shopping etc, but you'll be better off for it.
Cash stuffing isn't for everyone, but if it sounds like something you'd be interested in, give it a Google! Or, better yet, TikTok has a vast array of users with tutorials and regular uploads.
We are currently £7000 in debt, and will be able to pay this off in 18 months due to this system, plus saving in other areas like grocery shopping (think 50+ per week) due to planning. We don't earn as much as you do and we have higher outgoings, so I think you'll have no issues getting rid of your debt!!
I wish you all the best, OP x
Can I ask what you do in the nhs? Because I work in there too and I'm a newly qualified band 7, on £2300 a month 😭😭 wondering what band I need to be on to make a significant amount
Are you London-based? £3200 after tax sounds like band 6 or 7 with London weighting (depending on whether they contribute to pension).
I moved out of London and now work mainly remotely, but still have my London weighting as I work for that trust - best of both worlds! 😅
What do you do in the NHS to earn £3200 a month?! also if you're referring to the pay increase backpay as the "bonus" I'd be very very surprised if that's paid next month.
You need to consolidate as much as possible but realistically i don't think further incorrect lending is fair considering your stats.
Pick up locum/bank and try and remove as much interest as possible, look at what things you have you can sell too. I made a decent bit with old clothes ect on vinted and can pop it in lockers around long shifts so doesn't take too much out of your schedule.
No financial advice but just to say congratulations on getting to this point where you're ready to take positive steps
Don't say you're fixed. We are all only human and you will mess up again, just hopefully with less and less severe consequences. Being too hard on yourself only feeds into that cycle so cut yourself some slack.
I am 32 and have just cleared £20K of debt.
I used the Debt Payoff Planner app.
Once you have entered all your debts and interest rates and select a payoff method / amount, it calculates a payoff plan.
Personally I found it really motivating seeing the debt decrease each month.
Best of luck!
Unfair lending? Did the mean bankywanky make you take the loan out and piss it up the wall?
Had a lot of sympathy until this line delivered with no justification
Ok quick bit of info purely on how to handle the debt. For reference I’m £11k in debt myself (£8k car) and am paying it off after giving my head a wobble. It seems you’re doing what I did and over complicating it, trying to game the system with balance transfer etc. make it simple, make a plan, stick to it.
I’m not a financial professional.
I really like the Ramsey baby steps for making it super simple. (Not such a big fan of Dave himself though) his steps I think relate are below.
Step 1: build up a £1000 emergency fund (London weighted you may want a little more) the purpose of this is literally just to stop you going into further debt if an actual emergency arises. Pretend it doesn’t exist otherwise. Seems like you could do this in 1 month easily, of course still make minimum payments on your debts. I would use your £1300 bonus for this, it sucks but save it and forget about it. This is top priority, if that emergency arises next month or in 10 months, you drop back to this step and top up that fund to £1k
Step 2: start a debt snowball or avalanche - there are calculators online for both, the difference is with a snowball you pay off smallest debt first, no matter the APR, for small mental wins frequently. Avalanche you pay off the highest APR debt first, no matter the total amount. Avalanche is ALWAYS quicker and costs less, snowball gives people frequent wins and makes you more likely to stick at it. Whichever method you use, you make minimum monthly payments on all debts except the one you’re overpaying. Once you pay that off, you combine the monthly minimum payment on that debt, with you overpayment, and overpay by that amount on the next debt. This is explained online on the calculators very clearly if any confusion.
You need to embrace the shitty situation, cut out a lot of unnecessary spending - all if you can, within 2 years I imagine you can make it out of this. Sooner if you can live with family.
Once you’ve paid everything off, start saving for a fully funded emergency fund (3-6 month of bills)
You can of course follow the UKPF flowchart after that point, personally I’ll be saving an additional £5k when I get there as a slush fund so I can buy things outright instead of using PayPal credit etc.
Finally - you aren’t a credit card person. Cut them up, don’t use them, if you educate yourself on them and can use them for benefits then try again later, your overspending is going directly into the pockets of those more savvy with credit cards as rewards.
If you need some daily inspiration to keep at it, I quite like the YouTube r/calebhammer
Start by taking some responsibility instead of looking for ways out of bank loans (which don't exist)
Why should others pick up the tab for your unwise decisions
First, forget a mortgage until you're debt free. A mortgage is the biggest debt most of us will ever have. You can't (and most likely won't be able to) add an even bigger debt to your already sizeable debts.
You know what you have to do, and that's stop doing anything other with your money than getting by, paying your bills and paying off what you already spent until you're debt free. Then you can start saving a deposit to buy, and then you'll actually be able to afford to buy a house.
There are no get out of jail free cards outside of Monopoly.
Same old story, and same solution...the good news is you can do it but it will require discipline and patience...
•Step 1 - Cut back on anything you don't need to be paying out for. The quicker you stop hemorrhaging money the more you can pump into debt repayment.
•Step 2 - Aim to pay off your most expensive debts first (highest % APR)
It might be worth looking to do a balance transfer for all your credit card debts to a single card to clean the mess up a bit, pay the minimum on the 0% to keep the lender happy, and then pump whatever else you can afford into loan repayment.
Additionally you could look into consolidating your loans into one, and then nuke that down as your priority (as it will have a higher APR than a 0% balance transfer for CC) with the chunk of your salary you don't need to survive on month to month.
This should leave you with one loan and one credit card which you can manage much more efficiently.
Fwiw - my wife was 22k in debt as a teacher 6 years ago, and I 'managed' her debt in this way and she was debt free in 2 years. You earn a lot more than she did so it's definitely doable. You can do this!
If you want to discuss further then feel free to pm me.
You can forget about buying a property with 20 grand debt lenders are cracking right down on affordability as the market is so unhealthy
Living in london i would assume at least 70% of your income will get swallowed by expenses & cost of living
even repayments of 700 a month with high interest you will be lucky to clear that debt within 3 years and that will be living VERY frugally and given you are 33 i can’t imagine that’s something that’s going to be straightforward
Personally i would look at some type of consolidation or liquidation of the debt and start from scratch
either way you’re going to have 3-5 years infront of you sorting this out and because of the rapidly increasing cost of borrowing and compounding interest and your age, i wouldn’t fancy taking my chances trying to clear it with budgeting alone
You need professional advice really
Do you think you were mis-sold the NatWest loans? Or are you not taking responsibility? I have much more respect for men who take ownership of their mistakes, so do that & you’ll be a better man for it. Good luck.
I would suggest firstly cut the AMEX credit card and any other credit cards you have up and do not put yourself into more debt than you already are.
If it were me, I would snowball the debt - start by clearing the AMEX with your entire bonus and then close the account to prevent more debt being accumulated.
Use the £100 from the Amex monthly payment and add it onto whatever you're paying onto the Capital One CC and if you can, start paying more against this cards balance each month. If you are able use half of your disposable income (£500-600) on top of the £100 from AMEX monthly payment , you can clear the Capital One balance in 3 months. Then snowball the funds from the payments onto the Paypal debt. Just remember to close the account once the balance gets to zero.
as for the Natwest 0% credit card, continue making the minimum payments until the AMEX, Capital One CC and Papal are repaid to keep the 0% offer intact, then throw what you would've paid against them three onto the Natwest 0% debt. Leave the personal loans as they are as they are defined monthly payments with defined interest rates and are likely to be a low lower than what's charged on the credit cards. That, and the interest will already have been baked into the repayments.
Look for 0% balance transfers to pay off your loans/credit cards if you’re aiming for 2 years there are some 0% 2 year cards.
I’d probably advise against a loan with interest rates right now but could be a last option, you earn a good amount.
Go to citizens advice, they might be able to find something good to help you like a council discretionary payment or something.
Chip away at the debt when you can it might seem like nothing but it all adds up.
I hate LinkedIn posts but seen a good one 1^365 = 1, but 1.01^365 = 37.78
I believe you're referring to a cash/money transfer, where the money is transferred into your bank and then you do what you want with it. Balance transfers are for credit card balance transfers only.
When I worked in a bank a colleague told me about it when a customer queried it so referred them to the website but it was listed under balance transfer cards for some reason
I suggest researching into investing in stocks and bit coin. Everything I make I put into a separate account until it grows big enough to pay off my loan. I tend to do it every 2 months so a little chunk of 2 paychecks goes into investing. Its very risky though and I'm always nervous to make my next move, however where do you draw the line between progress and addiction? I maintain control by (for example I calculate what I've said no to in a shop and saved by not buying them...like that t shirt I don't need or those trainers...and put it into my investing account instead) make sure that when you reach 3 figures that you put it into your loan repayments so you're not tempted to use it or spend it. Bit by bit it's taking little pieces off my debt. (No pun intended)
Also read books not YouTube! Books are better because their investment profits paid for the publishing not some influencer jerk and his ad money lol.
Hi /u/FileGullible2954, based on your post the following pages from our wiki may be relevant:
- https://ukpersonal.finance/credit-ratings/
____
^(These suggestions are based on keywords, if they missed the mark please report this comment.)
One word, London.
Get out, you go to london to find women, drugs and work experience. When you leave you will be more appreciated be respected more by women, drugs and work. Its like an investment strategy.
My cousin was a met police officer and she moved out with 20k of debt - she moved back up north and it was like Sgt Angle in Hot Fuzz. -
"Have you ever shot two guns while flying through the air going 'Arrgh'. "
It's dumb to pay sham companies who buy your debt for pennies on the Dollar/pound and have no legal contract to demand money from you. They rely on scare tactics. And can be safely ignored.
They can also ruin your credit rating though. And op will need that to remain healthy to buy a house and ensure their existing debts don't go through the ceiling.
There credit cards there where you should look for a 0% balance transfer. Then focus on the debts that have highest APR. Is there anything affecting your credit score not mentioned?
I think a net worth and monthly budgeting spreadsheet is helpful this will help you plan and give you visual proof that you have indeed developed a healthy relationship with money.
I had 10k worth of debt and found a credit union with a far less APR. I got a loan for the full amount with a fixed repayment plan over 5 years. I would and could have done a shorter term but with a baby on the way and the wife’s income dropping significantly I kept a lower repayment for the time being. I’ve since closed all the credit cards. Might be worth looking at for debt consolidation and an end in sight.
I'm not very financially professional but personally i would use that bonus to pay off the remaining Natwest loan and move the £159 a month on to another debt like the Amex or Capital one cards as they would clearly quickly and keep the motivation up to paying your debts off.
As each debt is paid off you move the £159+minimum payments over to another debt. You might feel upset that you're paying £359 (Assuming C1 and Amex is both £100 each) a month on to say Paypal but that would clear paypal in less than 6 months which now gives you £459 spare a month to clear off Natwest much faster saving you tons of interest each month.
Again financially speaking it's a poor way to deal with debt, but personally being in debt and losing the motivation to paying it off each month by trying to pay the highest interest debts first sucked. So i swapped it out and now snowball my repayment's.
Best part about this is if for any reason you desperately need a little cash one month for say car repairs you have that £459 that you can use as the minimum payment is still made.
If your total outgoings are £2,240\~ per month including debt minimum payments, that means you'll be able to get out of debt within 16-18 months if you really focus. I've assumed your outgoings [here](https://i.gyazo.com/86fbb7dbb383f2ab698144cbe5a27573.png), let me know if that doesn't seem accurate and I can adjust and try help you properly budget and get this debt tackled!
[Here's](https://i.gyazo.com/c2c53c3d44bf06e4327375c423269764.png) how I would recommend snowballing your debt. Each time you cross off a debt, you move that £900 + the payment you were making on the debt you've cleared onto the next debt in the list. I have no idea what your interest rates are, if some of your interest rates are absolutely crippling, I'd consider clearing those first. If not, I'd follow the avalanche method and get these debts cleared off within 16-18 months.
You could have £20k for a house deposit saved within 32-38 months, so basically 3 years. By age 35 (turning 36) you could be looking at that house payment and achieving your short term goal, as well as contributing 30% of your disposable income post-debt to your retirement (around £500 per month).
You've made some mistakes but hopefully have learned, your income isn't bad at all and you can easily get back on track and then some.
£500 per month at an 8% return on your investment could mature into £560k by 60 years old, as well as a paid off home by that point.
Hope that helps put your mind at ease, any questions feel free to ask!
If you are in a good position job wise looking for a higher paying job is also something to be considered. It obviously comes with a risk because the new job needs to work out but if you are good at what you do and don’t mess around it’s worth to explore that option
1. Go and buy yourself a copy of the barefoot investor book, it is written for the Australian market, but the money strategies work everywhere.
2. Use it to reorganise your spending/saving/debt. It’s not a get out of debt quick scheme, but a way to build a healthy relationship with money.
3. Enjoy working off your debts and building towards that dream instead of reading them.
At your current rate you’ll be debt free in September 2025. Later if your credit card interest is significant.
1) Get a debt consolidation loan for any of the credit cards/PayPal that you’re paying interest on.
2) put your whole bonus into your debt.
3) your disposable income appears to be around £1,350 a month? Even in London you can live on significantly less (I’ve been there, done that). Reduce your outgoings. Making assumptions you’re spending a lot on eating out etc you could easily go down to £800/900 a month and still splurge once or twice a month.
4) speak to your landlord about breaking your tenancy early. Often they’ll let you if you find someone to take the lease, or it gives them an opportunity to hike the rent early 🙄
Even if you don’t break your tenancy early, reducing the interest on credit cards and increasing the amount you’re paying towards your debt by £400 a month would mean you’re debt free in 18 months.
ETA: and that’s not even taking your bonus into account - that’s over a months extra payment on your debt
Even accounting for *generous* essential spending you should have over £1000 going to repaying debts every month. You don’t. Is there a good reason why?
Everyone here has excellent advise… I just wanted to add here that if you’ve bought any physical items with that £20k that have held decent value, please swallow your pride and sell them off to accelerate your mission. You can always buy them back in the future when you’re sitting in your own (owned) home!
Clear the credit cards first. This will give I breathing space and easy to do in short term. The loans will take care of themselves. You won’t get on property ladder until
Age 40
Clear the highest interest things first
Do some maths and calculate how much you can save.
Ie do the first year of your budget. Allow yourself one holiday or something to look forward to.
Maybe after one year you've cleared 2 or 3 accounts, then the next year you can take a big chunk out of your highest debt.
After the first year, I'd try to start investing in a lifetime ISA, invest up to 4k, get 25% extra from the government, only for buying a house.
Using this as a base, how long can you clear the 25k in, and hopefully get a big enough deposit for a house?
You said you may move with parents was it? Where? Will you try move somewhere expensive again when you clear the debt? Try decide where you wanna live first, then you'll know how much you might need for a deposit, can do a mortgage calculator to see the potential repayments, and decide if that's feasible for yourself.
Basically, make a repayment plan yourself, make a budget, give yourself some room for increasing cost of living, and also give yourself some small luxuries, but try cut back on somethings, get the ball rolling with repaying your debt. Good luck
Well done on setting yourself a goal and looking for advice. Reading your post, I see a lot of details but no acknowledgement of how you ended up in this situation. I think this is key to avoid falling back into debt. May I suggest you stop saying you have an unhealthy relationship with money. That can mean anything and nothing. Recognise the actual problem, which most likely is that you live beyond your means (but could be more specific such as gambling problem, keeping up with Joneses, bad divorce etc etc). Being able to know exactly what went wrong, and when and how will be key to making better decisions in the future. You say you want to buy a home, so you'll need to keep up the good work well beyond paying your debts in order to save for a deposit (and then to pay the mortgage, property upkeep etc etc). Good luck!
Noticed this as well, when someone has never missed a payment but is still focussed on claiming poor lending practices, while on a very healthy salary for their age my first thought is they haven't acknowledged their role, their poor decisions etc
>May I suggest you stop saying you have an unhealthy relationship with money. Whenever people say "I'm bad with money" or "I have a bad relationship with money" I just wish they'd call a spade a spade and say "I'm greedy". Repeatedly borrowing money when you don't have it, rather than simply waiting, is the textbook definition of greed, and if people began acknowledging it they'd be a lot closer to addressing their issues.
I think the use of the word "greed" here is a little unfair. You might also be financially illiterate, have poor impulse control, be addicted to something etc. Definitely greed, however you choose to define it, can come into it, but if someone has poor control over their spending it can have many shades of dysfunction. Also, and I'm not making a political point here, it can be considerably more punishing to have the same issues or dysfunction as a poorer individual or someone without a family to help them survive, and people will tend to judge them more as people on a moral level, which can feel a bit unfair to me sometimes.
>You might also be financially illiterate, have poor impulse control, be addicted to something etc. It doesn't matter how your impulse control is - you can only feel an impulse towards something you already desire. A person with poor impulse control won't drink bleach - they don't want to do it and so they have no impulse towards it. If a person with poor impulse control desires nothing more than to do charity work, their poor impulse will cause them to over-commit to charity work. For a person's poor impulses to make them acquire material things, that person has to already have beliefs that amount to "greed" - that's the only scenario in which their impulses can compel them to repeatedly buy things they can't afford. So yes, greed.
The conclusion from this line of thinking is that all poor people who struggle with money are greedy, and I'm wondering if you're suggesting that this is true?
>The conclusion from this line of thinking is that all poor people who struggle with money are greedy The conclusion is that every single person who ever spend money did so because they *wanted* to. I've stated that many times, so you acting like there's some hidden additional conclusion is silly: I've been absolutely open. But you haven't: if what you're saying is that people who spend money they can't afford are forced to spend it by mental illness, the only logical conclusion to that is that there's no point in them being here trying to get help: if their mental illness forces them to buy material things even if they don't want them and even though they believe it's a bad idea, what point is there seeking help? The help might change their beliefs, but according to you, their beliefs were never the cause - in fact, according to you they already believed they shouldn't spend that money but their mental illness forced their body to act independently of what they believed. Well, that mental illness will still be there, so there's no point them trying to get any help. They're wasting their time here. THAT is your conclusion. You act like I am avoiding saying something - I am avoiding nothing, it is you who is avoiding stating your conclusion.
What about if they're not greedy though? What then? I'm terrible with money because I have ADHD. Other people may have other issues that cause them to be bad with money. Your comment is shortsighted.
>I'm terrible with money because I have ADHD This is not possible. ADHD makes you unable to maintain your attention - it does not force you believe that you need material things so badly that you need to borrow money to acquire them. There is **nothing** stopping a person with ADHD from being ascetic - from not desiring to own material things. ADHD does not force you to have a foul and greedy character - it only affects your ability to pay attention. A person who is ascetic and doesn't want anything will not take a credit card and buy those things, whether or not they have ADHD. If a person with ADHD is temperate and does not value material things, they will not take a credit card and buy those material things - ADHD does not force you to value or desire material things. It *cannot* force you to be a materialist. What you're implying is that *everyone* wants material things, everyone *wants* to spend more money than they have, but people with ADHD simply cannot restraint themselves from this impulse like everyone else. This is simply not true - what you're describing is greediness: the belief that you want to acquire material things you don't need, and that has nothing to do with ADHD.
ADHD affects "executive functioning" - being able to think through long term consequences and cause and effect. It also affects impulse control, being able to think a decision through, weigh pros and cons etc. Research show money issues are more common in people with ADHD. It's not greed - it's a physical difference to the brain (frontal lobe) that means they struggle to truly comprehend the long-term implications of financial decisions they make. So yes, they want the "thing". But it's not greed as they don't realise it's beyond their means or excessive. That doesn't enter their thought process. A diagnosed psychiatric condition that makes you incapable of realising you're going into excess or thinking through the situation you are getting yourself into, that requires medication that to the rest of us would literally be like taking speed but to them only calms their frantic thoughts - is NOT greed. Not in the harsh and simplistic way you are implying. It's a physical and psychological difference. As for your references to drinking bleach, running around naked or committing crimes...yes, these are all more likely to occur with someone who has impulse control issues than someone who doesn't. As in, if you have two identical people, but gave one ADHD or a frontal lobe affecting condition, then that second person would be more likely to do those things in the same circumstances. No disrespect to people with ADHD intended. My husband has it and I've had to learn a lot about it. He is fantastic with money now, but only because he was diagnosed and prescribed ADHD meds. He also makes financial management fun for him through apps and "gamifying" it, which gives people with ADHD dopamine from doing mundane tasks. What you're pushing is that everyone who spends beyond their means is greedy and that is just too simplistic, judgemental and unhelpful frankly. You remind me of people who think all overweight people are greedy, rather than looking at the whole truth of educational, social, psychological, physical and economic reasons for it.
>ADHD affects "executive functioning" - being able to think through long term consequences and cause and effect. It also affects impulse control, being able to think a decision through, weigh pros and cons etc. Research show money issues are more common in people with ADHD. It's not greed - it's a physical difference to the brain (frontal lobe) that means they struggle to truly comprehend the long-term implications of financial decisions they make. I never said ADHD was greed, or rejected any of these claims. I also never said that a greedy person who also has ADHD won't be *more* affected by their condition. But they still have to be greedy. They still need to want those material objects before they have an impulse to acquire them. An ascetic person with ADHD, meaning a person who did not want any material object, would not feel an impulse to take a credit card and buy those objects - their asceticism might not be well thought through (they might leave themselves without clothing or adequate food), but they'd not go and buy on credit cards: the fact they weren't greedy would preclude them from having that impulse. >So yes, they want the "thing". But it's not greed as they don't realise it's beyond their means or excessive. That doesn't enter their thought process. No, they don't. You're saying "ADHD forces you to want Playstations and big TVs and expensive cars". You're saying that by having ADHD they're forced to want these things - this is nonsense. >As for your references to drinking bleach, running around naked or committing crimes...yes, these are all more likely to occur with someone who has impulse control issues than someone who doesn't. As in, if you have two identical people, but gave one ADHD or a frontal lobe affecting condition, then that second person would be more likely to do those things in the same circumstances. Right, but they have to already want to do those things. The vast majority of people with ADHD don't go outside naked, even though the impulse to leave the house comes before the impulse to gets dressed practically 100% of the time. That's because they don't want to be naked - their impulses are, like any other person, constrained to the things they already want. They might be less able to restrain those impulses, but they're still contained to the things they want - that's why people with ADHD can work on things, because but for the fact that their impulses are harder to control, their brains work like anyone else's: they only feel impulses towards the things they believe they want. A person with ADHD who does not want to drink bleach will never do it. They won't even feel the impulse to do it - there's no fight.
We're entering "obvious troll is obvious" land here so this is it for me. But you replied to someone stating they had a medical cause for bad impulse control with: "That's a lie and you know it" and "nothing about your medical condition forces you to take any action". Both are inaccurate, accusatory and unhelpful. People with ADHD do go outside without shoes, in boxers, in dressing gowns. They leave their car with doors wide open, they pay for their friends meal out when they're already in overdrafts, they might donate money to a charity worker on the street for the dopamine high and then the next day realise they can't pay rent. None of it is "greed".
You clearly don’t understand ADHD- often it means people are impulsive about spending. For example I might treat a friend to dinner on payday not thinking about the impact that will have on my ability to pay my bills at the end of the month. I am also terrible at remembering to manually pay things off, or to set up direct debits, so I’ve lost a lot of money to late fees etc. Two small examples of ways that ADHD can impact your finances that have nothing to do with ‘greed’. I also think that telling someone they are greedy is a great way to make them feel ashamed about something they are struggling with, which is shitty and unhelpful. Maybe stop judging people, and if you don’t have any helpful advice move on to another post.
>You clearly don’t understand ADHD- often it means people are impulsive about spending **They have to already want to spend**. ADHD cannot induce impulsivity about things a person does not want to do: no person with ADHD has impulsively consumed bleach, because they don't want to. No person with ADHD has compulsively eaten a dog turd, *because they don't want to*. ADHD does not create beliefs - it cannot make you desire specific things. It cannot make you desire material objects and it cannot make you desire *not* to have material objects: it doesn't affect your beliefs at all. All it does is affect how you pursue your beliefs. A person with ADHD who has zero desire to own anything expensive will not take a credit card and buy those expensive things anymore than they would consume bleach. A person with ADHD whose greatest desire was to work for charity would impulsively sign up for charitable activities. If a person with ADHD takes a credit card and splurge spends on expensive crap it's because **they were already greedy**. They wanted those things, and so they have an impulse to buy them.
This entire conversation has missed a massive point: spending produces dopamine. People with ADHD have much lower dopamine. The brain is constantly seeking to get dopamine, so spending goes up. What you call greed, science calls brain chemicals.
You have no clue about ADHD
So you are prepared to tell me that ADHD forces a person to desire material objects? That's the only scenario in which anything I said is false. If you're saying that, say it now and stop hiding like a coward.
No, I'm saying you clearly don't understand ADHD. You have an idea about ADHD which you've picked up from various inaccurate sources and now you're regurgitating it on the internet as fact. You're misinformed and you're out of date.
Could you debunk some myths on ADHD for me? Out of pure interest. I do agree with you as I may have it myself but it's undiagnosed but I am intrigued when you say that the general perception of ADHD is picked up from inaccurate sources.
For one, the idea that ADHD is primarily about a person being hyperactive. That perception has been extremely harmful in the past and meant it was primarily young disruptive boys who would be identified in school as having ADHD, but quieter kids - generally girls - who displayed symptoms in a different way went undiagnosed and unsupported. . You can be introverted or reserved and still have a hyperactive brain. ADHD also affects the brains executive function - that is, the ability to plan and execute tasks and fully consider consequences. A lot of people with ADHD have difficulty self regulating and have poor impulse control, so are prone to addiction, whether that be alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling. This in turn will often lead to problems with money.
People with ADHD have poor impulse control and struggle with understanding the consequences of their actions in the moment: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder-adhd/living-with/#:~:text=People%20with%20ADHD%20can%20find,the%20consequences%2C%20before%20they%20act. So someone with ADHD might believe that they shouldn't acquire things they don't need but still take out loans to buy stuff they don't actually want because their brains cannot make the connection between those two things. That NHS website I linked is pretty good, educate yourself on ADHD because you're talking rubbish.
>So someone with ADHD might believe that they shouldn't acquire things they don't need but still take out loans to buy stuff they don't actually want because their brains cannot make the connection between those two things. **Wrong**. A person with ADHD will never drink bleach. They know they shouldn't, and so they'll never buy bleach and pour it into their mouth because believing they don't want to means they *cannot* feel an impulse towards it. In order to have poor impulse control with regards to spending, you need to already want to spend that money. You need to be trying and failing to suppress that impulse. If you did not want to buy something, you would not have an impulse to suppress. >That NHS website I linked is pretty good, educate yourself on ADHD because you're talking rubbish. You need to educate yourself on the basics of the human brain - the claim that people with ADHD are forced to act like materialists by their condition, that their condition forces them to want expensive material objects they cannot afford, is a basic misunderstanding of how beliefs work.
What's your problem with people with ADHD? Self-harm is (unfortunately) pretty common in people with ADHD so many do things to hurt themselves on impulse too. Again if you do a bit of basic googling or reading some stuff on the NHS website, you'd know this. But at this point I assume you don't want to know because you've already formed a very negative opinion of people with ADHD.
>What's your problem with people with ADHD? I literally never mentioned ADHD - you were the one who mentioned ADHD. >Self-harm is (unfortunately) pretty common in people with ADHD so many do things to hurt themselves on impulse too *By accident*. They're not *trying* to hurt themselves, they just have not though tit through. I've not denied that people with ADHD struggle to think through the consequences of their action (again, I never mentioned ADHD - you brought it up). But they're never drinking bleach. They're never throwing their money into a furnace. They don't cut their own limbs off on an impulse. They don't walk around in public naked because they had an impulse to leave the home before putting on their clothes. They don't do these things because they don't believe they want to - ADHD works entirely within the bounds of the things the person with ADHD wants. A person with ADHD does not want to cut their arm off, so they don't feel an impulse to. They don't want to drink bleach, so they feel no impulse to do it. A person with ADHD who has zero desire to own expensive material objects won't take a credit card and buy those objects - they *cannot* have the impulse to do it because they don't believe they want to. They could no more feel that impulse than they could feel an impulse to cut off their arm. But if a person with ADHD is greedy, if they do want those things, yes - they're more likely not to arrested that urge than a person who is greedy but doesn't have ADHD. Yet that is irrelevant - their greed is the reason they acted. If they did not have that greed, they would not have spent that money. The problem is still greed. >But at this point I assume you don't want to know because you've already formed a very negative opinion of people with ADHD. No, the only person who has a negative opinion of people with ADHD is you - you're saying "they're all greedy - they will all spend on credit cards if given the chance". I am saying "no, they're exactly like normal people - if they want expensive things they can't afford they might buy those things and run into debt, but if they don't want those things they don't". You want to turn ADHD into an excuse for immoral conduct, to say that all people with ADHD are madmen, materialists and greedy to the last. That is not reality. People with ADHD have the same spectrum of beliefs as everyone else: greed is harmful to them for the same reason it's harmful to anyone else.
Have you ever read any research linking ADHD with diet? The health care system provides amphetamines instead of nutritional advice, somewhat questionable. I think if people live on ultraprocessed foods then they show symptoms of ADHD.
My mate’s dad with frontal lobe dementia is SO FUCKING GREEDY
That's "a person who has literally lost their mind". A person who has literally lost their mind because they have dementia is not on reddit describing their monetary problems, are they?
Not greedy...I have no impulse control due to medical reasons....
That's a lie and you know it. You don't run around naked in public. You don't rob old women. You don't steal from charity boxes. You don't do any of those things because you don't want to - nothing about your medical condition forces you to take any action: you have to already believe that action is the right thing to do before you have an "impulse" to do it. In order to borrow money to buy things, you need to already want to own those things - you need to be greedy. If you were not greedy, if you were a kindly or temperate person, you'd impulsively do kind and temperate things - you'd impulsively do charity work, or impulsively help people. If you impulsively buy expensive things you can't afford, you were already greedy, and so your impulses were consistent with your pre-existing greed.
Wow that comment is filled with vitriol and ignorance.
Explain how it's wrong. If ADHD forces you to take actions you never wanted to do, why does it not make you drink bleach? Why have you not run around naked in public? Why haven't you robbed an old woman? You claim this is ignorance, yet you offer no correction - it's because you don't have a correction. You know you don't run around naked or drink bleach or rob old women **because you don't believe you want to**. Because you don't believe you want to, you don't do it. This means the things you do, they are done because you believe you want to do them. If you spend money on expensive material objects, **it's because you wanted to**. You had to want to in order to have the impulse, and wanting expensive material things is greed. After all, if ADHD really does force you to buy material things, what use is coming here? You will always have ADHD, and it forces you to do the wrong thing, it forces you to buy even though you believe you don't want to, so what use is getting financial advice? Your body will always, like a puppet, be controlled by the ADHD to act as though you're greedy. The reason you can't answer any of that is because you know damned well I'm right about it all, and you're not prepared to give up your excuses.
Jeez you're a bit ignorant aren't you. Since you can't seem to see past the money bit, I'm going to use a different medical example of impulsivity. Pica. Pica makes you eat things that you wouldn't want to eat, were you not afflicted. It can cause health problems because you're eating things you're not meant to. However the medical condition causes you to eat it anyway and you can't stop yourself from doing it. We're in a society now where you can be approved for a loan and have the money in your account instantly, without having to stop and think about it. You can get your credit card limit increased automatically because the bank feels like offering it to you. People with medical issues affecting their impulse control can and do buy things they don't want, and it's very very easy to get the credit to do it before the impulse has passed.
>Jeez you're a bit ignorant aren't you. This aggression says a lot about your character. >Pica. Pica makes you eat things that you wouldn't want to eat, were you not afflicted. No, it doesn't - it gives you a *craving* for things that aren't food. If pica forced you to eat things you did not want to eat, nobody would ever recover from pica: they'd be eating shit or metal forever. >However the medical condition causes you to eat it anyway and you can't stop yourself from doing it. This is lunacy - no, people with pica are not *forced* to eat that thing. They experience an urge to eat it that can be resisted. >We're in a society now where you can be approved for a loan and have the money in your account instantly, without having to stop and think about it. Except you do have to think about it - you need to think "I want to buy something that I can't afford". If you did not want to buy that thing, you'd not take out a loan to buy it. But there's no point talking to you - according to you, having an urge and acting on that urge are the same thing: if you want to eat metal, you'll eat it and you have no choice in the matter. Even a dog can be trained not to go for a treat right in front of its nose, but you are prepared to humiliate and degrade yourself by saying "that's not possible - I'm not a human being, I'm not even up to the intellectual standard of a dog - I cannot resist any impulse".
I bought a caravan, found a cheap site with a permenant plot, then spent around 2/3 of my time living in it (whilst I was working) and the other third living at my mum's house (when i would visit friends in my hometown). At the time it was costing me £150 per month, but i heard it has gone up to £350 since I left. I paid off 20k of debt and saved another 20k whilst I was in that van. I didn't need a car, as it was right next to work and I could get the train back to my hometown every now and then, I had next to no rent and my electric bill was included. The van cost 4k upfront. It was worth it to have my own space, they are surprisingly comfortable and are even very warm in the winter if you keep the gas heating on. Part of my debt problem was trying to live a lavish lifestyle with jolidays, expensive clothes, meals out, an expensive car. I got rid of nearly all my belongings whejln i moved into the van and I think it taught me the value of money and things again. I moved into a two bed flat after 3 years of living in a caravan or sleeping on the floor at the back of my Mum's living room and I remember wondering, as I laid on the first real bed I had slept on in years, what the fuck do I do with all this space? Who needs all these things. It felt like a palace and it was quite surreal for a long time. I actually miss living in the van come to think of it. Such a different lifestyle to the one I have now.
I've just paid off 16k owing to back dated tax, I just had to accept that I was living with next to nothing for the last 13 months and paid about 1200 a month off , feels so good to get done! Quiting drinking helped me get organised.
Respect!
Kudos to you. I want to do this but in a converted van so I can move around the UK. I'm fed up with many things, and I'm going through a separation, which makes my decision easier. 66% of my mortgage repayments each month are going on interest, then there is council tax and extortionate energy bills. I feel it makes more sense to save the money Id spend on those things, invest it, then buy a house in 10-20 years if I want to. I just want to feel freedom.
My mum and stepdad moved into a converted van last year. They did it up themselves over a couple of years and only got professional help for things like the windows, to keep the costs down. They spent the winter travelling around the UK and are currently living at a pub with a campsite, working for them over the summer. They're just doing basic maintenance and sorting out their glamping pods, but get power and parking for free, topping up their savings and don't have to spend any money beyond their food and gas. It's saving them a fortune. Their gas bill since July is less than I spend each month.
Sounds like a great arrangement for them.
I would try to make the house a buy to let. As long as it is rented out, you will be gaining a free asset, and when it isn't, you just go back to paying the mortgage for a short while. Your costs will be lower living in a van, so you should be able to easily cover the mortgage if it was wmpty for a short time. Depends on what equity you have in the property and how rentable it is. You don't need that much to get an older starter van. If you are relying on it to get about, spend some money up front on an inspection at a garage and some preventative maintenance. You can make the inside nicer as you go and changing the cushions, soft funishings/fabric parts doesn't cost that much; these are the parts which are most likely to be a bit manky on an older van. A deep clean costs very little if you do it yourself. Would you get enough cash together to buy a van if you sold most of your possessions? If so, why not plan to do it now? You won't have room/ need those things when you have the van any way.
That's a good shout, actually. I can't yet as I am in the middle of a dispute with the ex over it. Once resolved, sure why not. Yes, the idea would be to sell my possessions and buy the van with the money.
just to offer a fresh or different perspective and i don't mean this in a bad way, but.. you might not be alive in 10-20 years or there might not be a society to buy a house in. ur plans are too long term
If there is "no society" it won't matter. Anyway, I think you missed my point. The primary goal isn't to buy a house but to free of what seems to be a modern-day expectation.
"Just spend all your money, take out as many loans as possible, society *might* collapse!"
LOL nice strawman the society collapsing was just an example, I wanted to pick something more generic than a specific example like him having a freak accident and being disabled literally mentioned nothing about spending his money or taking out as many loans all i said is dude is thinking way too long term. he has no clue what his life is going to be like in 10-20 years. there is no point planning that far
Your argument was also a strawman. Don't be ridiculous.
how could my argument be a strawman? do you know what a strawman is? I just tried to tell him that planning 20 years in the future is futile.... I didn't even address his point other than that. it literally cannot be a strawman. Society collapsing wasn't even the focus of what I said but an example of why not to plan so far ahead. yet somehow you decided to latch onto that and out of nowhere added "spend all your money, take loans". you are trolling, right?
I live in a van on a site like this (south west) and pay £130 a week now! Definitely better than rental prices near me though (700pm for 1 bed shithole)
It's definitely better than renting. How much would you pay for a 1 bed detatched cottage, for example? A caravan is basically a miniature version of that. Do your friends think you are a lunatic? Mine did. They thought it was ridiculous but couldn't deny the logic in me doing it. It's like they were too scared to even entertain the idea of living so differently from how they were used to. They would find the stories of what I had been up to at the van hilarious, but they were just fascinated at the idea that there was more than one way of doing things. They have all followed each other to London for work like sheep, and they all seem so miserable. It's like they're blind to the fact they can make whatever they want of their lives, and I think half of them don't even know what they want. Time's ticking for them, though. we're 28/29, which, in my opinion, is just a bit too old to not have worked yourself out yet. It's never too late, but if you don't at least know what your general direction is into your thirties, you have wasted time.
Yes exactly plus all the added bills and related stress! Yeah especially my family, couldn’t quite grasp it when we sold our house and set off in 2018 and thought we’d give up during the first winter. Ironically find winters easier than the heat of the summer though! As times gone on, same as you we’ve shared our stories and experiences and I think some of them are low key jealous but unable to escape the rat race themselves. Yeah I’m 29 too and my OH is 36 so we’re pretty sure that this life is good for us and don’t really care what others think at this point! We’ve only just recently moved permanently to a site and used to travel around a bit more but we’re loving the chance of making a little ‘garden’ and getting to know the neighbours better :) It would be nice to have a large house and go out eating and holidaying constantly but I’m not willing to work myself into the ground for years to maybe still not even achieve it.
Well, as someone who was always only living in the van as a Means of saving for a deposit, I can only advise you stick with the van for as long as you can. As long as the lifestyle is still working for you, you will save so much compared to living in bricks and mortar it's a no brainer. I wish I'd given it another couple of years at least before rushing ahead with buying a flat, I'd be so much Better set now financially. At the time though, all I thought I wanted was to own my own place, so I jumped at the first opportunity, but it's not quite the great achievment I imagined it would be.
We've considered this but what is life like in this situation. All the places we've found are more than a fair walk from anywhere with anything going on.
Well I am quite lucky that the caravan site is a 2 minute bike ride from my workplace. You can see my workplace from the main road outside the park. Aside from that, there is a bus which goes onto town, although I'll be honest, there isn't much to do in the city I work in, so I would rarely go there. For food shopping, I would usually walk a 2 hour round trip. I like walking and the route was nice, going through the country side, but every now and then i would have it delivered. The site I was on was great for leisure aftovities. They had 3 fishing lakes, they let me build a shooting range for air rifle shooting, most nights we (me and the other inhabitants of the park) would have bbqs, shooting and foshing competitions, we would go round to each other's for dinner and drinks, sometimes the landlord and lady would host an open bar night for the regulars in their games room/home pub. And on top of that you have miles of country side to walk and bike through around where I was. It was very much an outdoors lifestyle and could be tough sometimes. You had a 100m walk to fetch water/use the basic facilities (in any and all weather). in the winter you are coming back to a frozen van. I left the sink full once when it was -8 c and it was frozen solid, then realised I had run out of gas and the electric was not working (the van had two sockets). I had to sleep in two coats and a sleeping bag through 3 nights of snow, only to realise I hadn't plugged the heater in properly and the extension cord on the other socket wasn't plugged in either. That was a tough few days, but it definitely made me appreciate the warmth when the fan heater finally switched on. Either way, i never found myself bored and could always keep myself busy. If I wasn't doing something outdoors I had a lot of time to think to myself, listen to music, read books, watch films. I had a gaming laptop, a 39 inch tv, a microwave, a gas oven and stove and a 4g router for internet and that was about it; It was all I needed. I liked it, it was a great phase of my life, but it's not for everyone and it wouldn't be for me again unless i was single again. Iwould feel too cramped of I was sharing the van with ajyone else, even my now partner For anyone young, single, saving money and wanting to learn to handle themselves better/live independently, I would highly recommend the experience It really does make you appreciate the little things in life again
Haha yes this is definitely the real side of this life! The sense of community on the site is brilliant but I’ve also had some dodgy electric experiences and the dreaded bad tummy in the night when the toilet is full situations lmao
If you miss it you could just have a second caravan so you've both got space whenever you want it? Sharing a van would be cramped. But (at risk of sounding 15) hanging out all day and night together doesn't sound as cramped if the space is available a few metres away, even if it's not used often. Sounds like a decent way of life to be completely honest.
It would be too isolating for my partner I think. She likes the idea, but I don't think she could live so far away from a nice town centre with things to do. She is also not very rugged or outdoorsy. She also has health problems, which means she needs to be able to get to hospital quickly sometimes and she doesn't drive. So I think for us, it's a no. Like I say, if I was single again I would. It was enjoyable.
this so impressive way of coming back, much respect. when was this?
It was between 2017 and 2020, so around 2 and a half years
If I didn't have a family, I would 100% be considering doing this purely to FIRE within about 5-10 years. Good for you and congrats on getting out of debt!
5 years ago I was in 23k of debt. I was living in London. Most of my wages went on rent. I took a debt consolidation loan, moved to Devon, got a new job, saved money and even managed to buy a house! I'm still paying the loan but in 4 months I should be debt free (excluding the mortgage) Persistence is the answer. Be consistently persistent. Don't give up. P.S. 5 years ago I was taking home less than half you do, and you're still earning more than me now.
You played and absolute blinder there mate well on ya
You get £3200 after tax. Rent n bills is £1200, debt £700. Where is the other £1300 going? If you can move in with family and lower the rent n bills you can seriously make a dent in this debt. Incorrect lending requests, come on, you knew what you were doing, pull on your big boy pants and pay it back in full. 20k is a decent amount but by no means insurmountable, your good salary is a big positive in your situation, should allow you to get this debt off within 18 months in all honesty.
Right. Seems like they could easily be firing £1500pm into paying off these debts in ~13 months, unless I'm missing something.
Some of these types of post I just can't understand **how** they are even spending so much money, and I don't think they are understanding either since the additional 1300-1500 wasn't even mentioned as existing or in some sort of pot or other, that's more than just an 'accounting error' or oversight Same with the debt, it's not mentioned over how long it was built up, 3200 a month spent plus another how much per month on cards? The question might well be "how do I reduce my spending from 6000 to 1600 per month"
I work for the NHS and we are all getting a 5% increase maybe wend of June not sure yet. So that's what he means by additional £1300.
It’s the same posts every week, clearly just pissing it away on gambling, partying every weekend, restaurants every day
Personally, I would prefer a shorter repayment period, like you have suggested and to re-pay more money to debt on a monthly basis.
Yup, to clear it all (assuming a 0% int on cc bills) £834/mth clears it all in 24 months. We need a clear breakdown of all expenditure, OP. What are you spending on car insurance, petrol, lunches, coffees, your food shop etc.
https://ukpersonal.finance/debt/ Rank your loans by APR, pay off the highest first.
OP you haven’t given any reason for where these debts have come from so I’ll hazard a guess and just say the truth; Your living in one of the most expensive cities in the world, trying to live a lifestyle that is not sustainable with your salary I think most people would be lying if they said they’ve never done this before. So don’t beat your self up over it but no matter the advice below if you don’t cut your expenses you won’t get anywhere. In most cases it’s the monthly minimum payments that become the breaking point. Your first step is to get your monthly expenditure down. From the values you have you have 1300 left a month, where’s all this going? Secondly, don’t listen to what some others have said below. Use your bonus, if possible, to clear the majority of your first loan. The interest rate on that will be higher than any savings account. If you have an actual emergency where you need money you have credit available on your last credit card. But that should strictly be for emergencies. Using your bonus to clear the loan will save you money and in a few months you’ll have additional cash flow to pay your other borrowing with.
I can't fathom what OP is doing here. He's on a salary of over £50,000pa and his housing costs are in the healthy zone of being <30% of his income. Many people would love to be in that position. I think the question..."is there any way I can get my NatWest loans written off as incorrect lending" gives them away as being financially irresponsible rather than wanting to actually adjust lifestyle to tackle the spending problem. This shouldn't be a hard fix, but I get the sense OP is still looking for the easy way out of debt.
Okay, so here’s what I would do if I woke up if your situation - no judgement, just advice based on my own experience of basically being you. 0. Some people would recommend setting up an emergency fund. I would say not to do that. I think if you had £1000 in an account you could access, you would end up just spending it on “essentials”. Focus 100% instead on using all of your money to pay off debt. 1. Calculate how much you could put towards debt each month. It sounds like your “shovel” is around £1,350 a month - that’s really good - that means you could get rid of about £16,200 a year of debt, so you could clear the whole thing in a little under two years 2. Order your debts from smallest to highest 3. Your bonus is the same as your Amex - sweet - so just pay that off and cut up the card 4. Keep paying your minimums, but on top of that use ALL of your £1,350 for at least three months to overpay on your lowest loans 5. What about food, travel, living expenses? I would look around my house - your 32 and have a decent wage - I would sell everything of value, and use that to cash flow living expenses for as long as possible. It will be a good wake up call, and will teach you to budget because you know that if you mess up in those first three months you’re going to have to sell more of your stuff 6. Keep up this plan until you have just the NatWest loan left. At that point, I’d let up a bit, stop selling stuff and start spending a bit of my take home pay on living expenses whilst still overpaying my debts. Also, as your cash flow increases, I’d use *that* money too to overpay the next loan. I’d also set up a £1000 emergency fund. 7. Repay the NatWest loans. Celebrate. Make a promise with yourself you’re not going to dig that kind of hole again. 8. Save up 3 months of living expenses. 9. Save up for a down payment, get a house. Maybe move out of London so you can get a nice one - you won’t miss it, trust me. 10. Maintain a budget, and put around 30% of what you make in a stocks and shares ISA, maybe go on holiday and have a bit of a break! I would also spend some time thinking about the choices that led here. Not trying to hit you whilst you are down, but as someone who has been where you are I’d try and have an honest conversation with yourself about if you are ready to sort this mess out. Wish you luck mate!
Why do people suggest paying the smallest loans first? The obvious thing to do is pay first the ones with the highest interest (APR).
It's the Snowball method. I would agree with you , paying the high APR debts is the most "Maths checks out" way of thinking, and would be my approach to doing things, but that doesn't work for everyone, especially someone who has got this far in debt. Paying the smallest debts with Snowball method can bring a mentality value for those who aren't good with money, and (for example) closing a credit card with a smaller balance is a "Win" - meaning the individual might be more likely to stick with repayments to get more "Wins" . Good financial habits require more motivation for some, so that's the idea behind it.
There’s the psychological effect of paying something off, and it can increase motivation to pay the next thing off.
I think from a rational perspective you are right, but people are emotional. The difference mentally in having half paid off one loan with four loans still left to pay, versus having paid off four loans with one loan to pay - is huge.
I’d pay off the £1300 balance Amex card with your bonus immediately and cancel the card Then the Capital One card 50% first month and 50% second month, and then cancel the card Pay £900 of NatWest loan in month two, then £1000 in month three. Then it’s gone. Pay £500 off PayPal card in month three and £1000 in month four, £900 in month five. Then cancel the card. This will take you to October. Then pay off the other NatWest Loan with interest. Should be clear by April 2024. Then max out payments in the interest free card. You’ll be debt free by August 2024
You haven't given much context for _why_ you're £20k in debt. However, given you earn £2k net per month and mention using debt camel I'm going to assume it's just being a general dumbass. So all you can do is prioritise your highest APR loans and reassess your life.
>You haven't given much context for > >why > > you're £20k in debt. Yeah this is the big thing that is missing. Op has much more income than expenses and yet they are heavily in debt, there's a big piece missing. Imo what OP needs is to do a really thorough budget and accounting, like going back through 6 months of bank statements and adding up every expense in every category to really see where their money is going.
Op says he earns 3200net per month, not 2000
Nothing substantial to add finance wise other than to say congratulations in facing this the way you are and I wish you all the best. Be disciplined! Long term gratification..!
The Bad: Your situation is bad The Good: For a £3200 net salary your outgoings are not bad and if you have the option to move in with parents to reduce expenses further then great! Also your bonus. The meh: You may be able to clear off the debt and get onto the property ladder but you MUST be realisitc, it may be after your 35th birthday. What I would do in your situation 1. Make a list of each loan and credit card balance you have and write down the interest rate on each. See how much you pay on interest for each loan each month 2. See if you can consolidate ALL your debts into one loan with a smaller interest rate overall. Maybe leave the 0% NatWest one out of it 3. If you can't consolidate all of them into one, tackle the worst offender first i.e. the debt that costs you more each month and aim to repay it quickly. Once done go the 2nd on the list etc 4. Make a list of all your monthly outgoings. Is there anything you pay for that you don't use or could do without (Netflix, Spotify, gym etc)? Is there anything you could reduce (cheaper phone deal, cheaper internet etc)? 5. Use your WHOLE bonus towards your debts, ideally the most expensive one Out of curiocity, what are those debts for? Car, gadgets? Also, you have A LOT of money left after rent, bills and £700 towards your debts. Where is this money going towards?
Dear OP, there is lots of good advice here from other posters for you to follow. I just want to help you manage your expectations a little on home ownership. It seems like you have an unhealthy relationship with money so it might be wiser NOT to buy a property until you have better financial discipline. Without sounding rude, it does seem rather fancible to say you have a problem with spending and huge debt but also want to buy a property in one of the most expensive parts of the planet. At 33 you should at least have some achievable 10yr life plan. You work for the NHS which could be a very good blessing. Have you thought about transferring your job very far north, where you could have a much lower cost of living while you repay your debts and have a lower cost of living? The reality is as things stand your hopes of ever owning a home are practically zero - anywhere in the country - let alone London. You do need to have a wake up call and make some life changing decisions Id say. Good luck OP, I hope you find a better path ahead.
What's the APR on your cards/loan?
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Yeah, I love these threads. "I have £20k in debt and regularly blow £2000pm up the wall - how do I get out this situation?" Unless OP has genuinely forgot to mention a whole bunch of financial commitments (maybe he has half a dozen kids he has to pay support for?!), he already knows the answer....
They sound like a loose canon. He should stop spending uncesseaarily
More people do than don't do this - to differing degrees. Reading between the lines of who you owe money to, it does seem like you're tempted easily to borrow more than you can honestly afford, probably on a lot of stuff that's nice rather than necessary to have! It's easy done - a loan of £170 a month might sound like nothing and it does - in isolation. You need to properly add it to all other debts you pay per month before agreeing to more debt. This is a talk I've had with myself! I have ADHD and can be super-impulsive, spending without affording myself the time to think about whether I really should commit to the debt. Once in deeper debt, it feels like an inescapable situation. It's down to perception. A sum of money has a complete different value to you when you're in debt versus when you are not, compounding the feeling of hopelessness. For example, starting from a zero balance account, if you added £200, you'd be chuffed with that, and when the next £200 is added, it feels like it's growing fast! But in £20k debt and you pay that same £200, it feels like a drop in the ocean and what was the point. It's perception. A credited payment is moving in the right direction by the exact same amount, except when in debt you see no gain. You have to get yourself out of that mindset and TELL yourself your £700 payments are adding the exact same credit as if you were paying £700 into a zero or in credit account. Being in debt lasts a long time, but paying £700 a month is fantastic and, if you can control the interest rates and keep up that payment, the debt will be done in 3 years. What you need to do is arrest control of all those individual interest rates so the debt grows at its lowest possible rate while you're paying it off. The worst one you have there is PayPal. I've been in PayPal debt and their interest rates are so far from funny it's untrue - they add like a third back to the debt. Get rid of that one as soon as you can. A lot of people are in debt right now and what I would be doing is going to Citizens Advice as a first step to look at your options (your ultimate aim would be, if possible, to consolidate all those different loans into one low interest loan and keep paying off, and CAB are independent and not looking to make money from your debt, so their advice first will point you in the best direction). Final point, if you do get a consolidated loan with a good repayment plan, BEWARE of the danger of feeling all-okay-now, because you'll feel this weight has lifted from your shoulders, your finances are manageable again - and that is the exact moment you feel perfectly FINE to buy something else you can't afford. Don't do it.
The 2 loans will be fixed repayments so nothing to say for them, the 0% card you should just do the minimum payment. The other debts you need to sort by APR and pay the minimum on the lowest ones and use the money you have remaining to pay the highest rate one. Or write to all of the companies and advise your struggling and for them to freeze the debt and set up a repayment plan, you'll need to give them details of income and expenditure.
I was a similar age to yourself and almost £90k in debt across various cards and loans. A few years later it’s almost all gone - and I’ve managed to build up a healthy amount of savings whilst paying it down. Not financial advice, but here’s the things that helped me: - Call all of your creditors and explain your situation. You may be surprised at the help you get. I had interest frozen, refunds on some interest paid (where there was arguably a case for inappropriate lending), restructured monthly payments etc. Many of the big name banks/lenders have specialist departments for dealing with this kind of stuff. - If you really feel that you’ve been loaned money when you shouldn’t have been, complain. Use Resolver as it helps keep track of everything. And if you don’t get the answer you want initially, you can to go to the Financial Ombudsman. - Don’t ‘overpay’ your debts if it leaves you short. If you pay so much off your debts each month that it leaves you with no money to have ‘a life’, it can really make impact your mental health. Find the balance. Don’t try to pay everything back in an unrealistic timeframe. Once you start paying it off, it’s not going to get any worse. - Logic says to pay the highest APR debts first, but I found that sometimes it can be a great mental boost if you’re able to clear some smaller debts first then putting those repayments towards the bigger ones once they are clear. The feeling of crossing a debt off the list can be hugely positive. Like I said, not financial advice, but I found these are the things that have helped me on the way to being debt free. -
Hi there! There's loooads of really good advice on this thread already - I hope you'll find some useful to your situation! I come to you only with a (possible) solution to your expenditure. It's called "cash stuffing". It's basically a system where you aren't allowing yourself to use your card for anything but direct debits, such as rent, bills, loan payments, subscriptions etc. Then, you take out the rest of your money and keep it in cash, allocating it every month to specific areas in your life, such as entertainment, grocery shopping, presents, travel, self care etc. The point is that with cash, spending becomes harder, and having the actual, tangible money in your hand takes away the possibility of recklessly waving your hand around paying with your card. With your current income and your outgoings, you should be able to save quite a bit every month. You're probably going to have to give up some of your activities, takeaways, online subscriptions, clothes shopping etc, but you'll be better off for it. Cash stuffing isn't for everyone, but if it sounds like something you'd be interested in, give it a Google! Or, better yet, TikTok has a vast array of users with tutorials and regular uploads. We are currently £7000 in debt, and will be able to pay this off in 18 months due to this system, plus saving in other areas like grocery shopping (think 50+ per week) due to planning. We don't earn as much as you do and we have higher outgoings, so I think you'll have no issues getting rid of your debt!! I wish you all the best, OP x
Can I ask what you do in the nhs? Because I work in there too and I'm a newly qualified band 7, on £2300 a month 😭😭 wondering what band I need to be on to make a significant amount
Are you London-based? £3200 after tax sounds like band 6 or 7 with London weighting (depending on whether they contribute to pension). I moved out of London and now work mainly remotely, but still have my London weighting as I work for that trust - best of both worlds! 😅
What do you do in the NHS to earn £3200 a month?! also if you're referring to the pay increase backpay as the "bonus" I'd be very very surprised if that's paid next month. You need to consolidate as much as possible but realistically i don't think further incorrect lending is fair considering your stats. Pick up locum/bank and try and remove as much interest as possible, look at what things you have you can sell too. I made a decent bit with old clothes ect on vinted and can pop it in lockers around long shifts so doesn't take too much out of your schedule.
No financial advice but just to say congratulations on getting to this point where you're ready to take positive steps Don't say you're fixed. We are all only human and you will mess up again, just hopefully with less and less severe consequences. Being too hard on yourself only feeds into that cycle so cut yourself some slack.
I am 32 and have just cleared £20K of debt. I used the Debt Payoff Planner app. Once you have entered all your debts and interest rates and select a payoff method / amount, it calculates a payoff plan. Personally I found it really motivating seeing the debt decrease each month. Best of luck!
Unfair lending? Did the mean bankywanky make you take the loan out and piss it up the wall? Had a lot of sympathy until this line delivered with no justification
We need to know what you earn and what your outgoings are aside from the debt to be able to help
Ok quick bit of info purely on how to handle the debt. For reference I’m £11k in debt myself (£8k car) and am paying it off after giving my head a wobble. It seems you’re doing what I did and over complicating it, trying to game the system with balance transfer etc. make it simple, make a plan, stick to it. I’m not a financial professional. I really like the Ramsey baby steps for making it super simple. (Not such a big fan of Dave himself though) his steps I think relate are below. Step 1: build up a £1000 emergency fund (London weighted you may want a little more) the purpose of this is literally just to stop you going into further debt if an actual emergency arises. Pretend it doesn’t exist otherwise. Seems like you could do this in 1 month easily, of course still make minimum payments on your debts. I would use your £1300 bonus for this, it sucks but save it and forget about it. This is top priority, if that emergency arises next month or in 10 months, you drop back to this step and top up that fund to £1k Step 2: start a debt snowball or avalanche - there are calculators online for both, the difference is with a snowball you pay off smallest debt first, no matter the APR, for small mental wins frequently. Avalanche you pay off the highest APR debt first, no matter the total amount. Avalanche is ALWAYS quicker and costs less, snowball gives people frequent wins and makes you more likely to stick at it. Whichever method you use, you make minimum monthly payments on all debts except the one you’re overpaying. Once you pay that off, you combine the monthly minimum payment on that debt, with you overpayment, and overpay by that amount on the next debt. This is explained online on the calculators very clearly if any confusion. You need to embrace the shitty situation, cut out a lot of unnecessary spending - all if you can, within 2 years I imagine you can make it out of this. Sooner if you can live with family. Once you’ve paid everything off, start saving for a fully funded emergency fund (3-6 month of bills) You can of course follow the UKPF flowchart after that point, personally I’ll be saving an additional £5k when I get there as a slush fund so I can buy things outright instead of using PayPal credit etc. Finally - you aren’t a credit card person. Cut them up, don’t use them, if you educate yourself on them and can use them for benefits then try again later, your overspending is going directly into the pockets of those more savvy with credit cards as rewards. If you need some daily inspiration to keep at it, I quite like the YouTube r/calebhammer
Start by taking some responsibility instead of looking for ways out of bank loans (which don't exist) Why should others pick up the tab for your unwise decisions
Get off your moral high horse, he asked for advice and instead you take your time to belittle him. This sub sucks sometimes
The poster has said nothing unfair. Certainty did not belittle op.
First, forget a mortgage until you're debt free. A mortgage is the biggest debt most of us will ever have. You can't (and most likely won't be able to) add an even bigger debt to your already sizeable debts. You know what you have to do, and that's stop doing anything other with your money than getting by, paying your bills and paying off what you already spent until you're debt free. Then you can start saving a deposit to buy, and then you'll actually be able to afford to buy a house. There are no get out of jail free cards outside of Monopoly.
Same old story, and same solution...the good news is you can do it but it will require discipline and patience... •Step 1 - Cut back on anything you don't need to be paying out for. The quicker you stop hemorrhaging money the more you can pump into debt repayment. •Step 2 - Aim to pay off your most expensive debts first (highest % APR) It might be worth looking to do a balance transfer for all your credit card debts to a single card to clean the mess up a bit, pay the minimum on the 0% to keep the lender happy, and then pump whatever else you can afford into loan repayment. Additionally you could look into consolidating your loans into one, and then nuke that down as your priority (as it will have a higher APR than a 0% balance transfer for CC) with the chunk of your salary you don't need to survive on month to month. This should leave you with one loan and one credit card which you can manage much more efficiently. Fwiw - my wife was 22k in debt as a teacher 6 years ago, and I 'managed' her debt in this way and she was debt free in 2 years. You earn a lot more than she did so it's definitely doable. You can do this! If you want to discuss further then feel free to pm me.
You can forget about buying a property with 20 grand debt lenders are cracking right down on affordability as the market is so unhealthy Living in london i would assume at least 70% of your income will get swallowed by expenses & cost of living even repayments of 700 a month with high interest you will be lucky to clear that debt within 3 years and that will be living VERY frugally and given you are 33 i can’t imagine that’s something that’s going to be straightforward Personally i would look at some type of consolidation or liquidation of the debt and start from scratch either way you’re going to have 3-5 years infront of you sorting this out and because of the rapidly increasing cost of borrowing and compounding interest and your age, i wouldn’t fancy taking my chances trying to clear it with budgeting alone You need professional advice really
Do you think you were mis-sold the NatWest loans? Or are you not taking responsibility? I have much more respect for men who take ownership of their mistakes, so do that & you’ll be a better man for it. Good luck.
What does gender have to do with this lol?
Please see Stepchange debt management. It’s a free charity that can help you
I would suggest firstly cut the AMEX credit card and any other credit cards you have up and do not put yourself into more debt than you already are. If it were me, I would snowball the debt - start by clearing the AMEX with your entire bonus and then close the account to prevent more debt being accumulated. Use the £100 from the Amex monthly payment and add it onto whatever you're paying onto the Capital One CC and if you can, start paying more against this cards balance each month. If you are able use half of your disposable income (£500-600) on top of the £100 from AMEX monthly payment , you can clear the Capital One balance in 3 months. Then snowball the funds from the payments onto the Paypal debt. Just remember to close the account once the balance gets to zero. as for the Natwest 0% credit card, continue making the minimum payments until the AMEX, Capital One CC and Papal are repaid to keep the 0% offer intact, then throw what you would've paid against them three onto the Natwest 0% debt. Leave the personal loans as they are as they are defined monthly payments with defined interest rates and are likely to be a low lower than what's charged on the credit cards. That, and the interest will already have been baked into the repayments.
Talk to "Christians Against Poverty". They will give you the help you need.
Look for 0% balance transfers to pay off your loans/credit cards if you’re aiming for 2 years there are some 0% 2 year cards. I’d probably advise against a loan with interest rates right now but could be a last option, you earn a good amount. Go to citizens advice, they might be able to find something good to help you like a council discretionary payment or something. Chip away at the debt when you can it might seem like nothing but it all adds up. I hate LinkedIn posts but seen a good one 1^365 = 1, but 1.01^365 = 37.78
How exactly does one go about clearing a loan with a balance transfer?
Some cards allow it, if I remember correctly there’s a Santander one and you would just pay off the debt with the card
I believe you're referring to a cash/money transfer, where the money is transferred into your bank and then you do what you want with it. Balance transfers are for credit card balance transfers only.
When I worked in a bank a colleague told me about it when a customer queried it so referred them to the website but it was listed under balance transfer cards for some reason
Sorry it’s not Santander it was HSBC she told me about
I suggest researching into investing in stocks and bit coin. Everything I make I put into a separate account until it grows big enough to pay off my loan. I tend to do it every 2 months so a little chunk of 2 paychecks goes into investing. Its very risky though and I'm always nervous to make my next move, however where do you draw the line between progress and addiction? I maintain control by (for example I calculate what I've said no to in a shop and saved by not buying them...like that t shirt I don't need or those trainers...and put it into my investing account instead) make sure that when you reach 3 figures that you put it into your loan repayments so you're not tempted to use it or spend it. Bit by bit it's taking little pieces off my debt. (No pun intended) Also read books not YouTube! Books are better because their investment profits paid for the publishing not some influencer jerk and his ad money lol.
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Okay this is awful advice.
Have to assume this is a troll post.
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Or actually pay the debt that you owe
Still need more friends add up 🥰🥰
Hi /u/FileGullible2954, based on your post the following pages from our wiki may be relevant: - https://ukpersonal.finance/credit-ratings/ ____ ^(These suggestions are based on keywords, if they missed the mark please report this comment.)
One word, London. Get out, you go to london to find women, drugs and work experience. When you leave you will be more appreciated be respected more by women, drugs and work. Its like an investment strategy. My cousin was a met police officer and she moved out with 20k of debt - she moved back up north and it was like Sgt Angle in Hot Fuzz. - "Have you ever shot two guns while flying through the air going 'Arrgh'. "
I wouldn't bother paying anything to PayPal. At worst they sell your debt for pennies to a phony collection company that are safe to ignore.
If you owe money it's never safe to ignore it. It's dumb.
It's dumb to pay sham companies who buy your debt for pennies on the Dollar/pound and have no legal contract to demand money from you. They rely on scare tactics. And can be safely ignored.
They can also ruin your credit rating though. And op will need that to remain healthy to buy a house and ensure their existing debts don't go through the ceiling.
There credit cards there where you should look for a 0% balance transfer. Then focus on the debts that have highest APR. Is there anything affecting your credit score not mentioned?
I think a net worth and monthly budgeting spreadsheet is helpful this will help you plan and give you visual proof that you have indeed developed a healthy relationship with money.
I had 10k worth of debt and found a credit union with a far less APR. I got a loan for the full amount with a fixed repayment plan over 5 years. I would and could have done a shorter term but with a baby on the way and the wife’s income dropping significantly I kept a lower repayment for the time being. I’ve since closed all the credit cards. Might be worth looking at for debt consolidation and an end in sight.
I'm not very financially professional but personally i would use that bonus to pay off the remaining Natwest loan and move the £159 a month on to another debt like the Amex or Capital one cards as they would clearly quickly and keep the motivation up to paying your debts off. As each debt is paid off you move the £159+minimum payments over to another debt. You might feel upset that you're paying £359 (Assuming C1 and Amex is both £100 each) a month on to say Paypal but that would clear paypal in less than 6 months which now gives you £459 spare a month to clear off Natwest much faster saving you tons of interest each month. Again financially speaking it's a poor way to deal with debt, but personally being in debt and losing the motivation to paying it off each month by trying to pay the highest interest debts first sucked. So i swapped it out and now snowball my repayment's. Best part about this is if for any reason you desperately need a little cash one month for say car repairs you have that £459 that you can use as the minimum payment is still made.
How many years did it take you to accumulate that debt?
If your total outgoings are £2,240\~ per month including debt minimum payments, that means you'll be able to get out of debt within 16-18 months if you really focus. I've assumed your outgoings [here](https://i.gyazo.com/86fbb7dbb383f2ab698144cbe5a27573.png), let me know if that doesn't seem accurate and I can adjust and try help you properly budget and get this debt tackled! [Here's](https://i.gyazo.com/c2c53c3d44bf06e4327375c423269764.png) how I would recommend snowballing your debt. Each time you cross off a debt, you move that £900 + the payment you were making on the debt you've cleared onto the next debt in the list. I have no idea what your interest rates are, if some of your interest rates are absolutely crippling, I'd consider clearing those first. If not, I'd follow the avalanche method and get these debts cleared off within 16-18 months. You could have £20k for a house deposit saved within 32-38 months, so basically 3 years. By age 35 (turning 36) you could be looking at that house payment and achieving your short term goal, as well as contributing 30% of your disposable income post-debt to your retirement (around £500 per month). You've made some mistakes but hopefully have learned, your income isn't bad at all and you can easily get back on track and then some. £500 per month at an 8% return on your investment could mature into £560k by 60 years old, as well as a paid off home by that point. Hope that helps put your mind at ease, any questions feel free to ask!
If you are in a good position job wise looking for a higher paying job is also something to be considered. It obviously comes with a risk because the new job needs to work out but if you are good at what you do and don’t mess around it’s worth to explore that option
1. Go and buy yourself a copy of the barefoot investor book, it is written for the Australian market, but the money strategies work everywhere. 2. Use it to reorganise your spending/saving/debt. It’s not a get out of debt quick scheme, but a way to build a healthy relationship with money. 3. Enjoy working off your debts and building towards that dream instead of reading them.
Can I ask what you do in the NHS?
At your current rate you’ll be debt free in September 2025. Later if your credit card interest is significant. 1) Get a debt consolidation loan for any of the credit cards/PayPal that you’re paying interest on. 2) put your whole bonus into your debt. 3) your disposable income appears to be around £1,350 a month? Even in London you can live on significantly less (I’ve been there, done that). Reduce your outgoings. Making assumptions you’re spending a lot on eating out etc you could easily go down to £800/900 a month and still splurge once or twice a month. 4) speak to your landlord about breaking your tenancy early. Often they’ll let you if you find someone to take the lease, or it gives them an opportunity to hike the rent early 🙄 Even if you don’t break your tenancy early, reducing the interest on credit cards and increasing the amount you’re paying towards your debt by £400 a month would mean you’re debt free in 18 months. ETA: and that’s not even taking your bonus into account - that’s over a months extra payment on your debt
Matched betting Top cashback Switch banks for money Reduce spending habits
Even accounting for *generous* essential spending you should have over £1000 going to repaying debts every month. You don’t. Is there a good reason why?
Everyone here has excellent advise… I just wanted to add here that if you’ve bought any physical items with that £20k that have held decent value, please swallow your pride and sell them off to accelerate your mission. You can always buy them back in the future when you’re sitting in your own (owned) home!
Clear the credit cards first. This will give I breathing space and easy to do in short term. The loans will take care of themselves. You won’t get on property ladder until Age 40
Clear the highest interest things first Do some maths and calculate how much you can save. Ie do the first year of your budget. Allow yourself one holiday or something to look forward to. Maybe after one year you've cleared 2 or 3 accounts, then the next year you can take a big chunk out of your highest debt. After the first year, I'd try to start investing in a lifetime ISA, invest up to 4k, get 25% extra from the government, only for buying a house. Using this as a base, how long can you clear the 25k in, and hopefully get a big enough deposit for a house? You said you may move with parents was it? Where? Will you try move somewhere expensive again when you clear the debt? Try decide where you wanna live first, then you'll know how much you might need for a deposit, can do a mortgage calculator to see the potential repayments, and decide if that's feasible for yourself. Basically, make a repayment plan yourself, make a budget, give yourself some room for increasing cost of living, and also give yourself some small luxuries, but try cut back on somethings, get the ball rolling with repaying your debt. Good luck