I have a friend who told me about her financial situation today and was looking for advice. I don't have the knowledge to do so so I'm hoping someone here will be able to help her move in the right direction:
She bought a house in late 2007 and currently has it rented out. She herself lives in rented accommodation in another city where she used to work. About 12 months ago she was cut down to 4 days a week in her job and it was at this point that she started to go into debt. This was exacerbated when she decided to go back to college as a mature student and lost her income. So now she works about 10 hours a week to pay her rent and her mortgage is paid by her tenants but this left her with no extra room for the inevitable incidental costs. In the meantime she has an unpaid loan, credit card debt, an overdraft, mobile phone bills and heating bills. She used her grant to pay mortgage arrears but she is now behind on that as well.
This has all come to a head with AIB closing her current account last week. So now her tenants can't pay money into her account as well as all the other problems that this entails. On top of this she believes that her house is in negative equity so that even if she were to sell it wouldn't help the situation.
What can she do?
Who should she speak to?
Her bank account was closed last week but she only told me today as she's been sticking her head in the sand through sheer feer of addressing the problem.
She knows she's made financial mistakes and I believe she's prepared to lose the house but the one thing that she wants to preserve is her college positions as she's doing a course that will (in 3 years) lead to a potentially lucrative career in the health services. Is there a danger that she can be convicted over non payment of loans?
Apart from MABS and organising a meeting with her bank manager I didn't really know what else to tell her.
She bought a house in late 2007 and currently has it rented out. She herself lives in rented accommodation in another city where she used to work. About 12 months ago she was cut down to 4 days a week in her job and it was at this point that she started to go into debt. This was exacerbated when she decided to go back to college as a mature student and lost her income. So now she works about 10 hours a week to pay her rent and her mortgage is paid by her tenants but this left her with no extra room for the inevitable incidental costs. In the meantime she has an unpaid loan, credit card debt, an overdraft, mobile phone bills and heating bills. She used her grant to pay mortgage arrears but she is now behind on that as well.
This has all come to a head with AIB closing her current account last week. So now her tenants can't pay money into her account as well as all the other problems that this entails. On top of this she believes that her house is in negative equity so that even if she were to sell it wouldn't help the situation.
What can she do?
Who should she speak to?
Her bank account was closed last week but she only told me today as she's been sticking her head in the sand through sheer feer of addressing the problem.
She knows she's made financial mistakes and I believe she's prepared to lose the house but the one thing that she wants to preserve is her college positions as she's doing a course that will (in 3 years) lead to a potentially lucrative career in the health services. Is there a danger that she can be convicted over non payment of loans?
Apart from MABS and organising a meeting with her bank manager I didn't really know what else to tell her.