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John Terry's mortgage made public - would your finances stand up to scrutiny?

Sarah Coles
Feb 8th 2010 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Celebrity Pockets, Budgeting & Planning

John Terry has not had the best 2010 so far. The crisis began when a woman famous for being out and about in her underwear was said to have had an affair with him. Since then, the knives have been out, and every aspect of his life has been fair game.

He has been accused of trying to make a little extra cash from renting out his box, although there's no confirmation he has actually ever done this. He has been accused of having a roving eye, and now the papers are focusing on his mortgage, which grew dramatically last year.

John has paid quite a price for all of this. He has been stripped of his captaincy, and suffered a huge blow to his reputation, and potentially his earning capacity. Who knows what is going on with his personal life, but it doesn't look terribly comfortable.

But the question is whether he is unusual. Are these unfortunate-looking activities the sign of a man who is too flawed to be relied on to kick a ball about the park, or would we all struggle if the heat was turned up on our finances?
There's no doubting some aspects of John's life aren't looking good, but what about his finances?

Exploiting his position
Firstly there are the unproven accusations about trying to exploit his job to make cash. Would you pass that test? There are plenty of people working for retailers who get a discount they don't think twice about touting out to friends and family. Likewise, if your job brings benefits like cheap shopping vouchers, who hasn't considered giving them as birthday presents, or passing them on to eBay?

Mortgage questions
Then there are questions over his mortgage. There's no doubting it's an unusual situation. He has a £3.95 million mortgage, which he took out last January - against a house he bought in 2003. There are questions over why he needs this, especially given that he makes £170,000 a week. However, he defends this, saying he took advantage of low rates in order to invest in property.

But how would you fair if someone started asking about your mortgage? Anyone on a variable rate mortgage, for example, should be overpaying every penny they can afford, to take full advantage of low rates and in order to provide a financial safety net if interest rates rise. Can you honestly say you are putting away everything you can afford?

Betting accounts
And finally, there are questions over gambling, and the papers are bringing up the fact that he has an account with a private bookmaker. Much has been made of this, but would you blush if the world and his wife found out about accounts you have and the money you could potentially be losing?

I have to admit I have a store card with a hideous rate of interest. I took it out for the special deals available to storecard holders, and I pay it off before I am ever charged a penny of interest, but the sheer fact I own a card with more than 30% rate of interest doesn't sound good. Likewise, I have an account with a bookie I took out to put a fiver on the Grand National last year. I can't deny it.

So while the world continues to chatter about John Terry, regardless of the rights and wrongs, maybe we all need to reconsider whether this level of scrutiny is fair, and whether we could stand up to something similar, before we join the hordes beying for his downfall.

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