Hi again
Well I managed to talk to my wife and explain the situation to her, I poured her a glass of wine first! I will say one thing, if you are reading this and are in a similar situation talk to your other half if you can as soon as you can. I am so relieved and feel a bit stupid that I did not go to her before now. She was so understanding and a little angry but only because I had kept this from her.
She said she knew something was going on for a while now and just didn’t know what it was, I think she thought I was having an affair or something! I now feel that we are in this together and I don’t feel so alone and ashamed anymore.
Once I told my wife she agreed that bankruptcy did feel like a possibility and arranged a couple of estate agents to come round while I was at work. We asked for a quick sale valuation like James had suggested. We have established that we have equity of about about £2500.
I spoke to James again about this and he said that if I go Bankrupt we have 2 options. We could do nothing. If the equity remains similar or just goes up a little after 3 years then the OR will probably just take a charge out against the property for my share of the equity at that time and then return the property to me. Alternatively we can buy back my share straight away but my wife or someone else would have to pay an amount equal to may share of the equity so around £1250 plus fees to the OR of around £200
I have to say that I would be concerned about the potential risk of future property price rises so we are talking about speaking to my parents and asking about borrowing the money from them to buy back the equity straight away.
Given the way the valuation has turned out myself and my wife both now feel that bankruptcy is the right solution to the debts after all.
We have looked into the cost of going bankrupt and it’s more than we can afford upfront, its £705 so I have decided to bite the bullet and put my car on ebay and auto trader. I was slightly reluctant about this at first as I would be a bit embarrassed driving around in a cheap car but my wife pointed out that pride should not get in the way of clearing our debts! As my car is worth a bit it is likely to be sold by the official receiver when I go bankrupt anyway, but this way we get to benefit from it instead to pay for the bankruptcy. I am hoping for a quick sale. Once we have the money I will then apply for bankruptcy.
I had wondered if I could use the left over car money to buy back the beneficial interest in the house instead of borrowing from my parents as if I get a good price for it after I have bought a cheap car there should be enough left over. My wife also made a good point, she wondered if my employers would find out and how it would affect my job if so.
As it turns out my employer will not be informed. Fortunately or unfortunately I am no longer working in financial services and my current retail employer will not be informed and I do not have to tell them.
As far as the car money, it seems that the money to buy back the beneficial interest has to come from a third party and the official receiver will want to know what happened to the rest of the money from my car so it’s best to use it to pay for bankruptcy and a cheaper car. Then be upfront about this and not spend any money that is left as it’s likely that I will need to hand this over.
The next step is to start filling out the bankruptcy forms while waiting for the car to sell. I read about the bankruptcy assistance service that James and beat my debt supply. It’s a few hundred pounds but after downloading the forms from the site and reading some reviewers of the service I am going to use this as I think it will help reduce the stress at the beginning and throughout. James has already helped so much and not charged a penny!
I am speaking to my parents later to ask about borrowing some money from them.
Until next time
Rambling on
