Hi guys,
So long story short, I've found myself with ~ 30K of unsecured debt and due to a change in my circumstances, I'm unable to make the repayments every month (or if I can I'm left with nothing for day to day expenses).
I have no real assets or savings I can use towards these debts. And due to my now credit rating, I cannot re-finance or anything like that.
I have spoken with StepChange and after going through my I&E they have advised I enter into an IVA. My I&E means a DMP would be unreasonable in terms of timescales. Now I actually used to work for an IP so I do have a reasonable understanding of DMPs, IVAs, etc (although that was never my role there so I'm certainly no expert and could do with some input).
The people I spoke to at StepChange were very nice. They advised I could go for Bankruptcy or an IVA but they highly recommended that an IVA would be the best way to go. At the time I said I'd do whatever they thought was best, but after thinking about it and reading up I'm starting to think I should look into the Bankruptcy route.
To give you an idea of my situation, I do not own a home. I live in a house my Dad owns (he does not live here) and although he gave me a break from payments for a while, he's going to want rent/bills soon. I should add that there is no real agreement in place. It's not a rental property. It's his home we both used to live in. He moved in with his new wife a number of years ago but kept the house. He rented it out to a friend. He moved out and I lived with him, then with a friend as a roommate. In 2016 my Dad's friend was moving out, my friend was getting married so I moved back to the house by myself. The mortgage and utility bills are all in my Dad's name (although the council tax is in mine and will show a single person is living there). He has a short mortgage on it so the payments are high and he couldn't realistically rent it and make a profit, he just wants to keep it as an asset (It's left to me in the will). I just pay him money every month (less than what he pays) and that's my share towards the mortgage and utility bills.
This is one aspect that concerns me when they're verifying my expenses. I can show I'm making payments to him, but there's no kind of rental agreement in place as it's just a formal agreement with my Dad. I can't ask him to make it official as I can't have him knowing about this.
I've read that IVAs are best suited to those with assets like a home, car, etc. If I entered bankruptcy it would be over with much sooner. While I want to meet my obligations, with the stress this is causing me I want this over with as soon as possible so I can get back to saving my money. I'm 30 with no savings at all. I don't own a home or anything of significant value. I do have a car, but it's 16 years old and a clunker. Parkers say the average private sale for this car would be between £1,525 - £1,945. Now I know I would be lucky to get around £1K for this. It's in very poor condition with rust and lost of repairs required. There are much better examples available for sale. But if I was asked to sell it, I could do that.
Now the other option is to try and reduce my debts to uner 30K to get a DRO (I thought I had about 27/28K according to my credit score but after going through them with StepChange it was a little more than £30). However, I'd probably fail to make all payments in that time so I'm worried about them starting to take action in that time.
Anyway, any advice you guys could give me would be greatly appreciated.
