Borrowing Money
Pensioners in debt
- Monday, 02 April 2012
Cash-strapped pensioners are £14 billion in the red and suffer from huge levels of personal debt, new research has found.
The national average level of debt for a retired man is now just over £9,000 compared to £7,350 for women.
Pensioners in Wales have the highest level of personal debt at an average of £13,857 followed by those in the South West on £11,758 and London on £11,255.
Ticking timebombs
- Friday, 16 March 2012
Homeowners in their 50s were being warned by the financial regulator yesterday (Thurs) that they were sitting on a "ticking timebomb" of mortgages.
Martin Wheatley, a director of the Financial Services Authority, raised fears about interest-only mortgages, handed out during the boom years, which are coming to the end of their life.
He claimed homeowners had no money to pay them off.
Around four in ten of the 11.2 million mortgages in Britain are interest-only, meaning the homeowners pay only the interest, not the actual loan.
Bank of granny and granddad
- Friday, 27 January 2012
Struggling young people are being forced to ask their grandparents for help with house deposits - as their parents cannot spare any cash, a report says.
The Taylor Wimpey study, based on interviews with 1,000 young people, found one in ten has turned to their grandparents for help to buy a home.
