Hello,
Welcome to the forum.
Unlike bankruptcy, An IVA is not advertised in the newspapers, and the only people who will know about it are you and your creditors.
All IVAs are registered at a central database maintained by the government's Insolvency Service, and details of these are passed to credit reference agencies. During the term of the IVA you would find obtaining consumer credit very difficult, and even at the end of the IVA it is likely to remain on credit reference database for a while, depending on the credit reference agency's policy, usually 6 years from the date the IVA was approved.
If an IVA concludes successfully, your credit rating may be repaired more quickly than if it fails.
There are, however, mortgage lenders who specialise in offering remortgages to people in IVAs specifically for the purposes of paying off their debts in full. If this could apply to you, then you should take that option, as no lender will offer a mortgage to an undischarged bankrupt.
Kind regards,
Julia
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www.supersonicsquirrel.net