Managing Debt and Improving Your Cash Flow
Debt management is a service program which helps individuals manage their debts by negotiating repayment terms with creditors.
Easy tip: Entering into a debt management program will freeze your interest and any legal action that a creditors is taking or will take.
Consumer are protected by law if they demonstrate that they are willing to repay their debts owed to creditors.
Your financial circumstances will determine how much you can repay but you should always aim to pay a lower repayment amount and then increase it over time.
This will give you time to get your cash flow back in form and when you have a bit extra left over every month, you can start increasing your debt repayments.
This may be one of the best ways to improve your spending or saving power as it does not require taking out another loan as it involves working with a debt management company to negotiate lower monthly repayments with existing creditors.
Debt management is usually more financially beneficial if you have more than one debt amounting to more than £10,000.
Generally, the larger the debt, the larger the potential saving on debt repayments as there is more room to negotiate with your creditors.
Once you have made repayments for a few months, you can try discussing debt reduction (settlement) with the creditors who can some times write off up to 40% of your remaining debt balance.
The debt management service providers usually charge a monthly fee which can be around 5 to 15% of your monthly repayments (depending on your debt).
However, if you have a knack for negotiation, you may be better off dealing with creditors yourself but be weary, this takes time and effort.
Once you enter into a debt management program, be sure to keep up with your repayments as the chances are the your credit rating is already poor and missing payments can further damage your credit rating.
If you are a home owner and home some equity in your home, debt consolidation loans are easy to come by and the the APR rates may offer a great deal as rates are usually just a few % points above with your mortgage rate.
A debt consolidation loan is a secured loan (on your property) and the security element makes is less risky and hence cheaper on the interest costs.