Hi yokomilo and welcome to the forum.

It's not really possible to confirm whether or not a trust deed would be for you without undertaking a factfind exercise first, but we can certainly offer some thoughts on the subjects that you raise.

When you say your outgoings are ?ú3200 does this include your debt repayments?

How much are your debt repayments roughly each month?

If you factored in all of your bills and other household expenses (except the debt repayments) how much do you think might be left from the ?ú3700 earnings each month?

Regarding your property I see no reason why it would need to be put on the market necessarily. The key matter is the likely value of your property when this is assessed at the start of the trust deed.

The valuation type used will often be a little lower than people expect as it is in some ways based upon what the property might achieve if it needed to be sold quite quickly. Given the state of the housing market there would seem to be some chance that the figure could come in below ?ú189k. The same would apply to the flat. There are ways to make this assessment in advance of signing a trust deed so that you know where you stand and are not committed at that point.

If there were some equity assessed it would need to be dealt with somehow before the trust deed ended.
If it isn't a massive amount it might be dealt with by some extra monthly payments at the end of the trust deed, or perhaps by a third party paying a sum on your behalf, rather than the property needing to be sold.

Hi - thanks for the quick response. Of that ?ú3200 amount my debt repayments total around ?ú1000 per mth. The rest is spent on mortgage, car, bills etc.

Hi again yokomilo.

One of the key steps to providing debt advice is to work through all income and expenditure. The surplus amount remaining after all bills/expenses paid is one of the key pieces of information that determines which options might be suitable.

It would seem that your surplus income (often known as disposable income) might be reasonably significant once the debt repayments are factored out. If this is the case it may well turn out that other non-insolvency options (for example the debt arrangement scheme or a debt management plan) might be more appropriate for you as the debts could be repaid in a reasonable timeframe without having to involve your properties.

There are guidelines used when assessing what the contribution to a trust deed or any other debt solution might be. These include ranges for things like food, clothing etc on top of your more fixed bills such as your mortgage and council tax. It might be worthwhile for you to run through this assessment process with someone who is suitably qualified so that you can make a proper comparison between the options open to you.

Hi yokomilo

Best test is what you can reasonably afford to pay per month and how long it would take to pay off the debt in full. If you are struggling at the moment then there appears to be a problem.

I dont think the equity position, will be as big an issue as you think. Best advice is always to sit down and talk through the options and see what best suits.

Mark