unclebuck

Now desperate middle class families face huge debt crisis as more and more professionals plunge into the red | the Daily Mail

Cry for help from debt-ridden middle class - Times Online

If this is anything to go by..... it's crunch time....

sti-04!!

Some repo's on the way

SlimJ_2005

Autotrader will be flooded with X5's soon! lol

Snazy

Was just reading in the Mail actually, a retired bank managed in £120k of debt with TWENTY credit cards!

Shocking the situations some get themselves in.

unclebuck

X3s more like... Thing is though - if you've borrowed to buy your wretched 4x4 you can't sell it before you clear the outstanding debt - so you effectively stuck with a fast depreciating 'asset' that you must keep up the repayments on as well as footing the bill for expensive services etc... the only choice is reposession and losing the lot.

pimmo2000

iTrader: (6)

Is this from necessity or greed though ?

I mean I would probably class myself as lower/middle class based on mine and my partners wage, but we don't use credit cards or loans because as yet, we've had no reason to.

I would assume these people are trying to subsidize (sp) a higher life style and live beyond their means.

PeteBrant

That's exactly what they are doing. It is one think to get a car on finance. Quite another to have £100,000 across 6 credit cards.

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Bang on, see a lot of it round our way !

I am not badly off, decent wage and no mortgage but am feeling the effects of the current situation but I suppose my exposure is very limited based on not having any borrowing, the situation mentioned in the Mail is not surprising. Borrowing is ok if you have a bit of contingency * Just in case* but people have been sailing so close to the wind and were struggling before so the tripple whammy of Fuel, Morgages and shopping increases is bound to cause problems, trouble is the feckless F*ckers will just go bankrupt.

A lot of people have forgotten where they came from, a lot seem to think they should have the best of everything, for example upmarket wines, I have spoken to students who show disgust at anything less than 10 quid a bottle, thats just wrong, 10 quid a bottle wine is for those that have earned their way to being able to afford it. Basically we have got used to having so much good stuff, designer gear, eating out, nice cars etc but were not special, we are not the upper classes, landed gentry old money, we are just the peasants really !

It feels like a bit of old school make do and mend is on the cards, we have got to used to the throwaway, being able to drive where we please and buying way more food than we need, just binning it when it goes near the sell by date.

Its just whether people can adapt, I think the older generations will cope better as they saw the tail end of the wartime influence and lets face it, however bad it gets it pales into insignificance compared to the war and post war years.

I think that some good may come of all this, might not feel it but we may as well get on with it and learn from it.

Snazy

Or you can do what I did, and just sell it anyway, and pay off the remaining finance with the proceeds

On the whole though, the UK does indeed need to snap back to reality and stop borrowing SO much. I have a few things that I have borrowed for but all very small im comparison to income.

unclebuck

That's illegal. Did the buyer not carry out an HPI check first?

Snazy

Oh dear, did I break the law.... oops!
Yes he did, I did in fact, and made him aware it had outstanding finance, and we agreed how it would be settled to his satisfaction

Illeagal or breach of contract..... if even that.... out of interest.

unclebuck

Bloke must have been an idiot then. No wonder so many people are in finacial trouble....

Snazy

Not really, I think you may have jumped to a conclusion there
But I know what you mean.

Dream Weaver

Surely all these "facts & figures" reported by the likes of the mail ONLY show those that are in debt?

So it will report that x number of people are in too much debt yadda yadda, but they dont know how many people are NOT in debt and are doing OK?

Snazy

I think the figures are worked out on the good old law of averages etc, so a little inaccurate, however tone it all down a bit and you get a truer reflection of how things are.

If reposessions are up, defaults on credit agreements up, applications for re-morgages and refinancing of loans up, I think it paints a fairly bleak picture.

Not to say that life does not go on for the masses.

Turbo2

The Mail (and therefore by definition its readership) is only happy when it prints doom and gloom headlines. I think their editor feels he has a commitment to come up with a new front page story about how life is getting that little bit worse for each one of their readers every single day. On those odd days when they really can't come up with anything, they print a long-term front page weather forecast story (always later proven incorrect) or, better still, something about the McCanns or Princess Di!

Snazy

lol thats what I tell my mum about it too. Always say if she wants a real paper I will get her the Sun lol

Torquemada

Personally I just stopped reading the newspapers, they were all doing my head in too much to bear. Most I read newspaper wise now is the Metro on the train in the mornings and they've started writing retarded stories like blaming an iPod headphone volume for the guy who was crushed by a crashing helicopter, wtf!? lol.

Dunno how or why peeps keep thinking that they have to be living like a film star to be happy. I've got a couple of mates who are 40k or so in debt with credit cards, purely through buying what they want, whenever they want, regardless of what they actually earn....craziness and I tell them as much.

We're the wealthiest we've ever been due to all these loans and credit cards but as a nation we are the most unhappy we have been since pre-war apparently. Personally I'm a happy chappy right now even with having to get me ducks in a row money wise to make sure I can ride through all this malarky safely and keep a roof over my head without crazy credit. As long as I've got my mates, a roof over my head and food in my tum, I'll be happy. PS3's and 105inch HD tellies are awesome but they don't bring happiness etc., lol.

paulwrxboro

• A TV producer on £70,000 a year, with £26,500 credit card and other debts and £25,500 in loans secured against property

My hart bleeds for the poor fella only 70k a year how will the poor man survive

f1_fan

iTrader: (9)

Anyone who believes anything written in the majority of the British press is basically a fool and deserves everything coming to them anyway.

It's because of all the 'you've never had it so good stories' printed in the same papers 5 years ago that they are all up to their eyeballs in debt anyway. Let them rot I say.

Live within your means and you will be fine.

And no it doesn't matter which party is in power. The pigs at the trough will always screw up the country for their own personal gain regardless of whether their trough is red or blue.

Snazy

You callin my mum scum ?

NotoriousREV

I have to LOL at my brother in law. Decided not to trade in his VW Toe Rag when getting his new BMW as he reckoned he could sell it for more privately. Yeah, good luck in the current climate.

Sonic'

Im having trouble selling the Shogun, but then i havent advertised it anywhere but I have had two enquiries and a bloke coming tomorrow night

both enquires have asked how many mpg it does

I have told them both how many it is supposed to do

Dedrater

This is just up the road from me..

Repossessions UK :: repossessed car sales

bought 6 cars from them since my teens, savings are not always massive, but they always like a good haggle.

unclebuck

Strange that the Times and Metro and the BBC all carry the same story.

Perhaps they've all made it up too, and in reality long-term prospects are really rosey.

Vote Nu Labour.

Leslie

Looks like Pete Lewis did apply a bit of real pressure after all!

Furious customer smashes SIX display TVs in shop after staff refuse to replace his 8-month-old set | Mail Online

Les

PeteBrant

Classic most recent comment on the news item:

Come on, own up, which scoobynet member wrote this?

Leslie

My parents brought me up to believe that it was far more sensible to save up if I wanted some article or other and if I did that it would obviously save money and also you tend to appreciate that article more when you get it. They also said that it was far better to avoid getting into serious debt in case you could not service it as time went by. That was why mortgage companies used to restrict the amount borrowed to three times your salary.

Since we have all learned that you just cannot trust politicians in general any more and you have to assume that what appears to be a buouyant economy is often not what it seems, I think that I have to be grateful to them for that very good advice.

The authorities conned so many into believing that there was an endless supply of cash at cheap rates to make the economy appear to be so good when there was nothing behind it to back all that up. I believe that we have seen a long boom to be followed by an even bigger " bust".

Les