I am 24 days along the way towards my trust deed being protected. I want to say how much I appreciate this site. Looking back over the last 10 years I suppose I regarded easy access to credit a 'badge of honour' I had credit card companies falling over themselves to give me credit. At one time I had access to around 100k instantly, but I would say it has badly affected us as a family.
We sold our house to move city and I had hoped we would have cleared the debt. However, it didn't and I had 38k still to cover and decided after several months brooding that a Trust Deed would be the only option.
We are currently renting and I now expect that to continue over the next 6 years.
In some ways I am glad as it will now make me live within our means. It may seem strange but we were not big spenders it all happened gradually and I think availability of credit helped us to live in an 'unreal' world of having money.
Up to a year ago my credit rating was 999 but just in the last few months the credit card companies started to reduce my credit availability which made my 'game' of swapping money about for 0% deals ever more difficult. I used to think of myself as a 'stocks and shares' man but in reverse! I was playing with money I didn't have.

Anyway, my trust deed will ensure my creditors will get 50% of their money back which I think on balance of interest over the years is probably about fair.

I know the Trust Deed is not yet protected but the sense of relief that I have a solution at hand is tangible. For the future we will have to live within our means which is great.

Having lived like a trusted member of the community all my working live it feels a bit sad that I have ended up like this but all I can say to anyone reading this is stay away from credit cards - you don't need sonething you can't afford with your own money!.... DontDoDebt!