Welcome to the forum Sillybilly.

Regarding your home - if it's owned by your wife (it's her name only on the title deeds) there should be no issues at all.

Regarding the car - when you say it's in your wife's name do you mean that the registration document (V5) is in her name? Who purchased the car? Who supplied the funds to purchase the car?

There's one other potential issue that might be worth looking at. Do you have any joint financial accounts such as a joint bank account for example. This might be relevant to your wife's ability to get credit in the future, but there are often ways to deal with this before you enter a trust deed (if that's what you end up doing).

Thanks for the reply
The v5 is in her name but I put up the funds to buy it,
Also if we were to sell and move house, how long would we need to wait to do that so they don't take the equity from the home? Is it just 3 years? Hope that makes sense
We don't have joint accounts, would I need to tell them we are married but any equity in the house belongs to my wife and not me?

Hi Sillybilly.

It's an interesting scenario with the car. Having a V5 in your name doesn't make you the owner - just the "keeper" of the vehicle. If you purchased and paid for the vehicle then that's possible evidence that you're in fact the owner rather than your wife.

It might not be an issue though. How much do you think the car would sell for currently?

If the house is solely owned by your wife she can sell it any time and keep the equity. A trustee would be obligated to investigate and deal with your assets only.

You would inform the trustee that your wife is the sole owner of the property and they'd verify this using the appropriate official records.

Cars only worth £3500 I would say,
Is it 6 years from the start of the td that the creditors can still take any money? As in from the sale of a car, boat or inherited money? I need to know how long it would be till I'm in the clear so they can't come sniffing for more money
Thanks sorry for all the questions I read 50 pages of the forum last night trying to find answers

Hi Sillybilly

TDA is correct, the V5 only shows the keeper and not the owner.

If the property is held in your wife's name only, then this can be sold at any point as creditors or a Trustee cannot claim any interest in this. As for inheritance etc, the Trustee would be able to look at this up to the point of their discharge, so in theory 48 months.

The Trust Deed contribution would be assessed based on total household income and expenditure, even though the trust deed would only take account of your creditors.

Hope this helps

Mark

Thanks very much that's help settle my mind a bit, just one more question what would they look at as being an asset to help pay the creditors, I have a few watches that were let's say gifted to me for argument sake, these could be worth more than enough to clear my debt if I were to sell them (Rolex being one of them which is over 10k alone) although I really do t want to have to do that, these are all valued items that were done for insurance purposes,

Hi Sillybilly.

You may well appreciate this already, but to be sure assets (like the ones you mention) fall into two categories:

1 - Things you own when you sign a trust deed. For you this might include your car for example.

2 - Things you come to own during a trust deed (after it began). This might be a windfall such as an inheritance for example.

For the first category, the trustee will review this at the start to work out whether they're assets that should be "realised" one way or another for the benefit of your creditors.

For the second category, up until the point that you're discharged, any such windfall you receive may well have to be paid into your trust deed. After you have been discharged your trustee would have no interest in new windfalls (the possible exception being pre-existing assets/entitlements such as old potential PPI claims etc which are paid later).

Hi Sillybilly.

If you can afford to repay your debts (through the sales of these valuable watches) then I cannot see how a trust deed would be for you.

A personal insolvency (like a trust deed or bankruptcy) should be a last resort.

Ok I see where your coming from, I just didn't want to have to sell the things that had sentimental value to myself to help clear the mess I'm in, perhaps if I hadn't once spent money on these things I wouldn't be in this situation,
Thanks for clarifying that, so anything I personally own that has of some sort of value that could help contribute to clear the debt would be taken into account before being accepted for a td

Hi again.

Yes - by signing a trust deed you'd be making your trustee legally responsible for recovering what you can afford to pay towards your debts. This would include the disposal of valuable assets that you own.

Basically you'd be going into a trust deed for no reason - your trustee would almost certainly end up selling these assets to repay your debts. You'd also be stuck with a personal insolvency on your record and potentially have to pay a load of fees for the trust deed that you could have avoided by selling the watches yourself.

I can understand that there might be sentimental reasons to keep these objects, but those reasons will not override the responsibility of a trustee to recover what they can for your creditors.

It's therefore really up to you to weigh up your priorities as per the watches and your overall financial position I suppose.

I can understand your reluctance to want to sell something that has sentimental value to you, Sillybilly, but as Trust Deed Assistant says a Trustee has a duty to gather in the value of such things if significant enough.

Are you sure about the value if they were to be sold second-hand? (no pun intended!).

There is the option of the Debt Arrangement Scheme that you could consider too. Assets such as watches would not normally have to be sold in this procedure. DAS freezes interest and charges and puts you into an affordable payment arrangement with protection from any further action by your creditors - a very useful option.

Hi SillyBilly

I was reading your post and replies with interest.

Having completed a Trust Deed and just at the end of the six years since I started it, I am happy it is all over.

HOWEVER, it was not an easy ride nor an easy way out and the implications are much wider than simply signing the Trust Deed and all your debt goes away. Plus, since I signed in 2009 the rules have been reviewed and it seems much tighter than before.

I also think that if anything was missed out at the beginning, and it came to light later, you would lose it anyway as well as what is agreed about the Trust Deed (the experts can advise if I am incorrect in this). If you receive bonuses or inheritances during the Trust Deed then those go to the Trust Deed also.

You could end up paying Debts, plus interest, plus additional Trustee fees. It really is not always the best answer if you have other alternatives to pay the debt off. Kevin suggested a Debt Arrangement Scheme (DAS). I don't know what happens to any additional income (inheritances, bonuses, windfalls etc) during that.

If it were me (and I know you are not me and we have to make our own decisions), I would sell anything I had to clear the debt and not have to go through at least six years of a Trust Deed situation with everything that goes with it. Sentimental or not, possessions are only possessions and for me, the Trust Deed was the very last resort with nowhere else to go.

The experts always advise that you take advice from a few (reputable) companies before deciding the course of action to suit you.

Thanks for all your help ,
I think I would rather sell my stuff and clear my debts, rather than enter a td and be found out later that I had possessions that I could have used, don't fancy paying any more fees on top of fees and the prospect of going to jail for lying about assets is fighting to say the least,

Sound advice, this is a great forum keep up the good work.

Hi Sillybilly,

Firewalker has provided some good advice from the perspective of someone who has been through the Trust Deed process.

A Trust Deed can seem like an appealing solution to help someone clear an unmanageable amount of debt within a reasonable timescale. If however someone has assets which can be sold to repay more of the debt then this can happen and they can end up paying back more than the original debt because of fees and interest.

As part of the process of establishing what the financial position of a client is and what assets they have we always ask this at the start. From this information we can then tailor our advice to fit with a client's circumstances. I do know that the Accountant in Bankruptcy under a Sequestration will request a copy of someone's contents insurance to see if they have any expensive items listed with the prospect of recovering these for sale.

If you have assets (watches) worth more than your debts then as others have suggested you could consider selling these to clear the debts. Selling sentimental items will never be an easy decision but the benefit of doing this will ensure that you become debt free.

As Kevin suggested, should you want to retain the watches you could consider a Debt Arrangement Scheme which will involve the total repayment of your debt over a period of time which is determined by how much you can pay per month. Can you give us an idea of how much your total debt is and how much you feel you could afford to pay per month to a plan?

I think it's positive that you are looking for different solutions to help you deal with your debts as by doing this you will be able to consider all of your options and the implications and then decide which option best suits your circumstances.