Do you live with debt?

It just seems to me reading all this economic doom and gloom that the misery has been stage managed by ignorant buffoons who really don't give a shit as long as they are in the clear. Governments have encouraged economic growth by urging consumption and this has led to lazy people being more and more willing to get into debt in order to satiate their desires. How many people have a mortgage? How many people bought their brand new car on credit? Who borrowed to buy their kids ridiculously priced new gadgets for christmas just to keep up with the neighbors? It's a massive encouragement to be frivolous and to fail to contemplate the future and be sensible by putting money away for a rainy day.

I was reading an article today talking about how Korean consumers typically have a debt of double their income and it just made me think 'how did it ever come to this?'. It's serious stuff and too many people seem to spend in the here and now, borrow up to their teeth and just hope to keep on muddling through. It is all wrong IMO, but I don't speak from the higher ground as I too was fiscally frivolous until my mid-20's. When did it become so wrong for normal people to try and save money? I see too many people with children and they invest everything into the child in terms of education, gadgets and clothing and it seems to me nothing more than a false investment. "I will live in debt until you grow up and then you will provide for me". Hmm, why not abstain from having children and provide for your own retirement and that way you can retire without placing a burden upon others.

It just seems to me that people have children without planning, they have no savings because they refuse to plan and ultimately we have decimated societies where the middle and lower classes have next to nothing. Now when the economic shit storm hits, where do they go then? Mind you it isn't great to be middle class and sensible either as governments are eradicating savings through inflationary policies. It's all a crock of shit to keep anyone outside the elite in difficulty, but I think it's foolish to just consume and copulate without a care in the world too.

So a mildly economic thread. Do you live with debt? I will admit that I used to, but I refuse to ever do it again. Interest rates and the difficulties of getting out of debt are just not worth it. You need to sacrifice in life and in order to stay above water you need to self regulate.

Views?

Furthermore, I hate the way when you start a thread similar old threads come up beneath. Every time I seem to have started a similar thread about a year before. How am I supposed to remember all these threads I have started? Clearly there are character patterns at work and my psycho analyst would have a field day with some of this material.

My debts are my house and i am £150 overdrawn in one account and about £500 in another

my wife is out of work at the minute so that why the overdrafts are creaping up a bit

A mortgage is something I can kind of understand. People do need a home to live in and rents can be expensive and you get nothing for it. But the interest over 20 odd years is a killer and you are pretty much tied to it. A mortgage is a seriously hardcore investment, you need to make sure that job is permanent and you can stay on top of things. I'm not sure I would ever want to take on that kind of debt. Extremely risky in this day and age.

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Originally Posted by miles

A mortgage is something I can kind of understand. People do need a home to live in and rents can be expensive and you get nothing for it. But the interest over 20 odd years is a killer and you are pretty much tied to it. A mortgage is a seriously hardcore investment, you need to make sure that job is permanent and you can stay on top of things. I'm not sure I would ever want to take on that kind of debt. Extremely risky in this day and age.

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you will always need somewhere to live tho, even if you rent you cant just decide you cant afford it anymore and stop

Also with these expensive tuition fees and banks lining up to fleece the new teenage consumers that debt is almost being ingrained into society. Debt is being seen as a natural state of affairs, unless you are the super rich and it shouldn't be that way. If schools can offer sex education classes, then they should also provide money management classes and counter the predatory financial institutions, but of course the state wouldn't really want to encourage that.

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Originally Posted by erics44

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Originally Posted by miles

A mortgage is something I can kind of understand. People do need a home to live in and rents can be expensive and you get nothing for it. But the interest over 20 odd years is a killer and you are pretty much tied to it. A mortgage is a seriously hardcore investment, you need to make sure that job is permanent and you can stay on top of things. I'm not sure I would ever want to take on that kind of debt. Extremely risky in this day and age.

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you will always need somewhere to live tho, even if you rent you cant just decide you cant afford it anymore and stop

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True, and I think that is a valid point. Mortgage debt is sometimes a necessary thing and I can see that. It is still fairly risky though and there is no guarantee that one is going to be employed all that time. At least with rent you can find something cheaper when things go wrong. There is never any excuse for never having banked some coin though and when things are tough you always need at least a little shrapnel to tide you over. A mortgage should be viewed as a life and death struggle and in many cases it probably is at some point.

I have about £600 of a debt which is going down each month.

I have a few hundred on a credit card and I'm usually a few hundred overdrawn.

My out goings are pretty much the same as my income so I spend what I earn. Most of the debt came from when I was in between jobs and it's not going down quicker because I've been investing a lot into my business recently.

When I was 23 years old I had £23,000 of debt in loans and credit cards, now I have virtually nothing and don't even use a credit card (the evil of the world!)

No I own it all.

Interesting reading.

I was just curious really. I read my media everyday and see things around me and just wonder what the deal is for real folks on here.

Andre sounds like he's done very well for himself and so he he should being one of the more mature adventurers on here. Also good to hear that Big H is taking control and that Adam is becoming entrepreneurial too.

In my early 20's I was a bit like Big H and owed a fair bit and had nothing, but with a lot of hard work over the years and a serious mental overhaul I have eradicated the entire concept of debt and it just frustrates me when I read articles talking about the issue.

I drive a second hand car because I am not shallow enough to think that a new one really matters beyond getting to a destination, but it seems too many are stuck in the vain pursuit of empty consumerist goals at the expense of any guarantee of a decent old age. Governments are supporting very little when we are old and it's good to wise up to that sooner rather than later. And governments play the same game at the expense of younger generations when it comes to their own borrowing. It's quite sickening really.

A life without debt is the first aim for anyone and to then to try and at least guarantee some kind of future without government interference. Only then is anyone somewhat free. Government insurances are ponzi schemes that could collapse at any time. As are currencies too. They are worthless according to the whims of any government.

I started a thread an age back wondering if gold was the way to go for investment. The price has rocketed! I never invested and that frustrates me a fair bit, because I would have done well. Currencies are more kamikaze than ever. I am deviating from the thread somewhat, but just contemplating my own missed opportunities, which are on the whole, careful, but perhaps too careful.

Im the same as Andre, plus Im Happy with what I have. ;D

I have a home mortage of 130K and I think we have about 10k left on my wife's student loans. We have financed a couple vehicles but we have always put more than 50% down and paid them off quickly. We almost never have a balance on the credit cards. Really the only time we use them at all are for emergencies. So outside of my home and for the next year or so the rib's student's loans, we avoid debt like the plague.

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Originally Posted by VictorCharlie

I have a home mortage of 130K and I think we have about 10k left on my wife's student loans. We have financed a couple vehicles but we have always put more than 50% down and paid them off quickly. We almost never have a balance on the credit cards. Really the only time we use them at all are for emergencies. So outside of my home and for the next year or so the rib's student's loans, we avoid debt like the plague.

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Sensible behaviour. I do use credit cards, but only to order certain bulk products online and I pay it off immediately. I refuse to pay interest on that junk.

Credit is too easy and IMO people are too stupid and uneducated and I include smart, educated people in that list too. I watch TV and see loan commercials everywhere. However, I also read Russian literature of the 1800's and the money lenders are there too. Seemingly omnipresent and impossible to truly ever wipe clean.

I'm paying for a modest car on finance... it would take me too long to save for it I need it for business reasons. I would never take out any other form of loan though. That's one of the reasons my PT/Boot Camp Business has been a slow burner. Everything... and I mean everything, every bit of kit is something that I have either saved and paid for, or built.

I'd guess that about 3 quarters of what I have earned has gone back in to it and then I work paid hours on top of it to keep ticking over. I'm just about at the point now where it's all starting to turn in to income.

never had a credit card as only spend what i have

have a mortgage

but as i say to a guy at work who goes on and on about the perils of mortgages and how stupid people are with them......whereas mine will be clear by time I am 60 he will be paying rent till he dies.


Ok I may drop dead at 60 its not guaranteed to anyone but he is paying same on rent as I am mortgage and at end will have had effectively a 60 year mortgage if he lives to 80.

Giving up work for him will be hard. Will be easier for me - add to the fact that I am an idle bastard too

My car, owe a few grand on that. I'll never finance a car again, I love the car and I know its going to server me long after Ive finished paying for it but I just dont want to be tied to something like that again.

I see people's incomes daily and EVERYONE has at least one form of debt (not including mortgage).

Imagine if this country returned to the days of the late 80's where interest rates rose to 16%. All of those credit cards and loans and of course the mortgages would break everyone.

No debt, no mortgage and no pension. :-\

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Originally Posted by Master

No debt, no mortgage and no pension. :-\

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I have no debt, no mortgage, but kind of have an eye on what I need for retirement. No state is going to be bailing me out and I have been aware of that for a long time now.

I save a minimum of half my income and usually more and I put that towards various things. My job provides my accomodation and I will inherit a plot of land when I am old, so I don't care about the pitfalls of a mortgage really.

I live frugally with no children and only enough luxuries to fill the time that I have available. I spend on nothing frivolous. When I decided to re educate myself it was because I had saved the money, no silly loans for me. And a sensible education in the field that I work today.

If I plan a trip overseas it is because it is planned with money that is already earnt. More people should live in this manner as it is sensible.

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Originally Posted by 0james0

I see people's incomes daily and EVERYONE has at least one form of debt (not including mortgage).

Imagine if this country returned to the days of the late 80's where interest rates rose to 16%. All of those credit cards and loans and of course the mortgages would break everyone.

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But it shouldn't be that way. People should live with mum until they've saved enough to move out. They should save and buy a second hand car first. They should skip university as it is a waste of time etc. If people were given a basic grounding in how to be careful with the one lifetime that they have, there would be far less need for debt, but it's against all the wishes of powerful financial corporations and government figures with vested interests.

If I knew now what I knew a decade or so ago, I would have lived a very different life financially.

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Originally Posted by 0james0

I see people's incomes daily and EVERYONE has at least one form of debt (not including mortgage).

Imagine if this country returned to the days of the late 80's where interest rates rose to 16%. All of those credit cards and loans and of course the mortgages would break everyone.

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You dont get to see the ones who dont have debt.We slip under your radar. Aside from continual debt to the tax office but thats an inescapable fact unless your a cash only dude.

I don't view tax as debt, I view that as my valid contribution to society. It is what I hope will be given to building roads, schools and assisting the poor. To me that is not debt, but a contribution based upon what I am earning at any given time.

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Originally Posted by 0james0

I see people's incomes daily and EVERYONE has at least one form of debt (not including mortgage).

Imagine if this country returned to the days of the late 80's where interest rates rose to 16%. All of those credit cards and loans and of course the mortgages would break everyone.

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Most of the credit cards etc are already on rates of way above 16%, it's just the balance transfer 0% deals and other discounts that are making them seem artificially low to some.

A one bedroom flat in my area is six times my annual income. I'll need to be promoted another two levels before I will be in a position to even get a mortgage on the most basic and downtrodden apartment in the area, and that's if I can scrape together nearly double my annual wages for a big fat deposit.

I think I'm renting for life.

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Originally Posted by superheavyrhun

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Originally Posted by 0james0

I see people's incomes daily and EVERYONE has at least one form of debt (not including mortgage).

Imagine if this country returned to the days of the late 80's where interest rates rose to 16%. All of those credit cards and loans and of course the mortgages would break everyone.

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Most of the credit cards etc are already on rates of way above 16%, it's just the balance transfer 0% deals and other discounts that are making them seem artificially low to some.

A one bedroom flat in my area is six times my annual income. I'll need to be promoted another two levels before I will be in a position to even get a mortgage on the most basic and downtrodden apartment in the area, and that's if I can scrape together nearly double my annual wages for a big fat deposit.

I think I'm renting for life.

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The cost of buying or renting is something that really puts me off ever wanting to return back home on any permanent basis. I know for sure I would be in poverty and with debt had I never left the UK. It's a hard place to make ends meet.

My sister pays 700 pounds a month rent, it's no wonder they can never save anything. Mindblowing.

Excluding Mortgage

£3k on credit card and £2300 overdraft across 2 acc's that gets spanked every fookin month ;D

I was 20K+ in debt from age 19-26 years old and never even tried to pay it off but now im 29 and have started paying it off fast.
down to 7k in credit card debt and 3k in a car loan. Once its paid off I will never use a CC again maybe only for booking hotels and things like that. My rent is only $800 and that is a steal for the place I am living, it should really be 2k+/month.

I figure by the end of next year I will be completely debt free. hopefully

I currently have a mortgage that's remaining at about 75K.

Aside from that I have $2K on a new washer and dryer, I got 18 months same as cash so my money in savings makes me more in interest than I would if was to just pay it off right away. If the shit hits the fan, I can just pay it off from my reserves no problem.

I have a 401K plan that's been going consistent for 10 years now and I have a brokerage account that I'm building for a transition from working life to retirement.