www.iva.co.uk

We are in our 5th year and have overplayed our monthly amount since year 2 to the extend that during year 4 we reached our contractual amount.
We currently have equity in our house and having read some of the blog entries it appears it is unlikely we will be elligible for a new mortgage. Also considering the fact that due to initial delays setting up the IVA we ended up with two CCJ's.

In our circumstances what are our options for the following?
- a F&F payment?
- a 6th year? (We would like to avoid this. The contract states the supervisor can extend for an initial 6 months followed by another 3.)

Would you recommend we get separate legal advise to ensure completion is achieved to our benefit?

We feel that currently nobody is working on our behalf. Yes we got ourselves into this situation but have in the last 4 years made every effort to pay back as much as possible.

Everything depends upon how your arrangement was worded initially.

Reaching the contractual amount early does nothing apart from increase the dividend to creditors, during an IVA you always owe the full debt plus fees and only at the end is anything unpaid written off.

Whatever equity provisions agreed to will still be enacted. A F&F is possible, of course, but would have to be tempered according to the equity position.

The 6 & 3 month extension in the contract is for administrative purposes and is on top of any possible extensions required for other reasons ( in lieu of equity, missed payments etc).

You need to determine exactly what the position is regarding equity release.

Thank you for the information Foggy.

We are in the fortunate or unfortunate (depending on your point of view) position of having about 20k equity in the house. After fees etc there would be about 15k. However it is very unlikely we would get a mortgage on the house given we are in the IVA and have the CCJ's. I am also reluctant to go through applying for a mortgage as it will affect my credit record.

How is this currently being addressed?

Does your arrangement provide for an extension in the event that you cannot release equity ? Some are silent on this which can open up a tin of worms with IP's requesting secured loans as opposed to remortgages.

IP's requirements as to remortgage attempts ( rightly or wrongly) do differ, some will require you to attempt and be refused, some take a more realistic view and accept it isn't going to happen.

Hi and welcome to the forum. You say you have £20k equity in the house but what is the value of your house? The percentage equity you have may well be more relevant than the actual monetary amount.

When you say you have been paying additional amounts over the last couple of years, is this based on your IP's assessment of what you can afford to increase by at annual review stage, or have you been paying higher contributions on a voluntary basis?

@Shaun the amount is the money available based on the percentage equity.

@melanie both in our case we have managed to improve our salaries considerably over the last 4 years as well as paid in additional sums due to bonus payments and PPI refunds.

do you think these circumstances will be looked at favourably when it comes to ending the IVA?

It sounds as if the additional monies are already due to your creditors, so I am not sure you would gain much credit for these, especially if there was no hardship reason for you wanting to end your IVA at an earlier stage.