I think I would have done things differently. And I wouldn’t presume to give anyone advice on financial matters as I am so cr*p at that sort of stuff – except to say talk to experts.
My story … When I decided to stop gambling in the late 90s I was around 20K in debt. This didn’t seem to go down – even though I was stopped – I think partly to interest rates (most of it was on credit cards) and because I was spending so much in petrol getting to GA meetings all over the place (I tried for one a night at one point.) However I did have a mortgage which I was keeping up payments with – and as I had a good secure job in Local Government – I didn’t worry too much.
Ten years down the line and I have reduced my debt to around £10K – mainly by working evenings on top of my day job. I decided to leave work and go self-employed and quickly found various jobs which meant I was working 7 days a week – but all were either temporary or freelance. Then love appeared – over the internet and it was a long distance relationship. Very long distance – like 6000 miles. She came to the UK first and of course I had to go there and … well it was expensive to say the least. Also to get her into the UK – I had to prove I had a full-time permanent job so I could support her without recourse to public funds. So bang goes all the freelance contracts I had set up and once again I joined local government. By now I was struggling to make the payments on my credit cards – so decided to re-mortgage my house. In this way I was able to keep my head above water and support E***** until she found work (which luckily she did quite quickly.)
Then I found out that she was cheating on me – which was awful in itself, but this was after she had sworn that she wasn’t and so all trust was lost. I asked her to move out and carried on solo – but I soon sank into depression and had to take time off work. Over a few years I was down to half salary and had stopped taking on “extra” work – so my income fell. Then I was offered voluntary severance with a modest payout so took it and took some time out.
After a few months – my debt was still increasing and I tried to sell some of my “stuff” to pay it off. I enjoyed selling some of the books I had and decided to make this a career – so went full-time with it, but made very little money. I was still paying my mortgage though and the value of my house had gone up – so although I was in crisis cashflow wise I was at least asset rich. The book business went downhill fast and I was rescued several times but friends helping out with loans and a PPI payout.
I ended up with 2 options – either sell and use the money to pay off all my debt and then do the travelling I wanted to do – or take out equity release which would have paid off most – but not all my debt and then try and keep my head above water until retirement (in 4 years time.) It really was a no brainer.
So here I am – with money in the bank but no home. Only time will tell if I have made the right decision. I hope some of this might help you with your situation.