Today is a proud day! I just got done pushing the button to send the last payment to ol’ Sallie Mae for my student loan, wiping out the last of my non-mortgage debt.
Tasha and I started on this goal together in January 2006, and received some quick help from our friend Dave Hickman in the form of Dave Ramsey‘s “My Total Money Makeover” book which guided our trek to debt freedom. At the time, this process began more out of necessity than anything. We had racked up some significant credit card debt while in college, and we hit a point where transferring balances around wasn’t cutting it and the minimum payments were taxing our budget.
The big key was the constant, intentional budgeting. Controlling where the money was going and focusing on one debt at a time until it vanished was actually fun for me in the beginning, the hardest part was keeping up the pace. Denying ourselves some of the small luxuries in order to get this under control was hard, but we’ve gotten very used to it over time. We lost a bit of focus as we got here to Colorado with so many fun activities to do, but we made it!
I’ve rarely spoken about numbers during this process, but now that it’s behind me I will. We paid off nearly $130,000 in 52 months.
That includes credit cards (paid off and canceled), both cars, computers, a debt consolidation loan that Tasha took out during college, an emergency furnace replacement in our old house, and all of our student loans. It was hard work, but totally worth it.
What’s next? Saving up an emergency fund of 3-6 months of expenses, then onward to investing and paying off our house!
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