Debt Dumpers - 2015

[Angeejoe]

Is this real?

Is what real?

 

[Miss Whimsy]

We're not going bare bones while we work on it. We're just thinking more consciously about our spending.

I finally realized I have to do this. When I was a bit younger, early/mid-20s, I would cut back DRASTICALLY on all spending and be like, "all I have to do is eat ramen and frozen peas for a month and that will get rid of half my debt." I also had somewhat less debt then, so it seemed more feasible that a short-term solution could work. You will all be shocked to know that it did NOT work, and I would go bare bones for like 4-6 days and then rubber band back with an enormous shopping spree. I can tell you are all shocked.

So now I am trying to balance living my current life in a thoughtful, budget-consicous way that enables me to be happy NOW while also paying for my past errors. Because I finally am figuring out how my brain works.

Planning the big adventures, even if it is for a long way off, helps too. DH doesn't have any vacation time to take until next June, which helps with the self-discipline of not trying to rush the process, but I am working on plans to check off a couple of wish list trips in 2016 and 2017.

My BF and I have gone to Disney multiple times as a couple but never anywhere else for a big vacation, so that is definitely a motivator. We both love London, and having that as a major long-distance goal will definitely help!

ETA: I'm on an anti-paper crusade so instead of a physical pin board as inspiration I've created Pinterest boards for several dream destinations and started saving links to hotels, attractions, restaurants, and other miscellany as I come across them from travel newsletters, Facebook posts, magazines and such.

That's a good idea! I don't really ever use my Pinterest account but my work computer has two screens, one of which I only use occasionally, so maybe I'll try to set up a rotating slideshow or something.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Is what real?

I should have quoted it but it was a long post that seemed like trolling but it was someone with several hundred posts, a countdown to their next vacay etc. The whole thing was weird.

 

[Angeejoe]

I should have quoted it but it was a long post that seemed like trolling but it was someone with several hundred posts, a countdown to their next vacay etc. The whole thing was weird.

Oh ok. I was so confused!

 

[SirDuff]

I should have quoted it but it was a long post that seemed like trolling but it was someone with several hundred posts, a countdown to their next vacay etc. The whole thing was weird.

I don't think it was a troll, per se, but definitely someone asking for a referral (or, I guess, someone to take his/her referral) which is not allowed.

In terms of budgeting, this plummeting Canadian dollar is actually helping me. I've been doing some consulting for a group in the US (I'm Canadian) and they pay me in US currency. My hourly rate keeps going up (well, when converted into Canadian)! It won't be so fun on my next vacation to the US though.

 

[IvyWinter]

I've just accumulated debt over the past several months from medical expenses, especially when i was unemployed for 6 months but still had to have certain things taken care of. Now I'm trying to just pay off the last amount in 3 more payments (from each paycheck, been making 2 payments a month!), and then continue taking the same amount of $ out and putting it right into my savings. My savings account, for a 28 year old, looks like a savings account of a stereotypical 21 year old, and I need to change that.

 

[dayvewc]

I've just accumulated debt over the past several months from medical expenses, especially when i was unemployed for 6 months but still had to have certain things taken care of. Now I'm trying to just pay off the last amount in 3 more payments (from each paycheck, been making 2 payments a month!), and then continue taking the same amount of $ out and putting it right into my savings. My savings account, for a 28 year old, looks like a savings account of a stereotypical 21 year old, and I need to change that.

Good going on getting the last paid off!! And great that you have a plan for after.

lol, I totally understand about the savings account. I'm *cough* quite a bit older than 21 or 28 *cough* and I have less in savings now than I did then.

 

[PrincessKymm]

I've tracked my spending for the last 3 weeks, quite successfully for once, and am actually not in terrible shape.

I've stuck to my budget for entertainment, clothing, and gas for my car.

I'm over budget on my eating out and my groceries but I knew this. I'm working hard to get organized and get a plan in place so I can stick to my budget for the next few months.

I've also paid over $1,000 to my debts!

 

[gracie1]

I've tracked my spending for the last 3 weeks, quite successfully for once, and am actually not in terrible shape.

I've stuck to my budget for entertainment, clothing, and gas for my car.

I'm over budget on my eating out and my groceries but I knew this. I'm working hard to get organized and get a plan in place so I can stick to my budget for the next few months.

I've also paid over $1,000 to my debts!

That is a great amount paid!! You should be proud of yourself!!

 

[DisneyMandC]

Joining in! Been reading through here and really amazed by everyone's progress!

DH and I are very fortunate to not have credit card debt, which is great! Unfortunately, I make up for it in my student loans... it's a number I'm not even fully comfortable disclosing. Let's just say I went to law school... so you do the math. I am very fortunate though that I got a job straight out of law school and am starting a new, much higher paying job in a week! So that will help a lot, but unfortunately will also mean my student loan payment will increase considerably. I did the math on my payment each month once DH and I and start filing our taxes jointly (we just got married). Uhhh... let's just say I think we'll be filing separate for a while! It's $500/month EXTRA over what my payment would be with filing separate! I can't imagine the benefits of filing jointly will be enough to outweigh the additional $6000/year in payments.

Additionally, I am on track for the Government and Public Interest Forgiveness Program. My next job is a two year contract term, so that means I'll have 32 of the 120 payments required done at the end of it! May not seem like a lot, but it's 25% of the way there!

I do have one other smaller student loan. The payment on it is $85/month, and it has the lowest interest rate of all of them. I upped the payment to $100/month recently because it's not eligible for forgiveness. I hate looking at it and seeing that it accrues $1 per day in interest! I'm considering upping it to $130/month so at least I know I have a solid $100/month going to principal. We'll see.

Our only other debt is DH's car payment. He's actually been considering trading his car in for something with a lower payment recently, but I'm not sure that will become a reality. We were fortunate to be able to purchase a new (to me) car in cash a couple months ago after my car finally bit the dirt at 265,000 miles

So just plugging along right now! I'll keep lurking on here and post if we have any updates!

 

[bcwife76]

Well I just bought school supplies for both my girls, grand total is $98. Not bad, I guess?? It would've been $15-$20 higher but my oldest brought home several items that were left over at the end of the school year so her sister gets to use them for Kindergarten. I shopped through a fundraising website our school uses and price matched at Walmart so I'm fairly confident I got the best deals.

We just got back from a 4 day camping trip to Oregon (the beaches of the Oregon Coast are most definitely my happy place!) With our CDN $ being so crummy right now we really couldn't take advantage of much tax-free shopping there. I did hit an outlet mall and shopped at Carters for the girls; 10 pairs of socks and one pair of running shoes was $32 which I thought was pretty damn good. With the exchange rate though it cost us $42 so not as fabulous. Boo.

Paid another $1k toward our our HELOC this month, though so at least that's one step forward!

 

[Eureka]

Well I just bought school supplies for both my girls, grand total is $98. Not bad, I guess?? It would've been $15-$20 higher but my oldest brought home several items that were left over at the end of the school year so her sister gets to use them for Kindergarten. I shopped through a fundraising website our school uses and price matched at Walmart so I'm fairly confident I got the best deals.

We just got back from a 4 day camping trip to Oregon (the beaches of the Oregon Coast are most definitely my happy place!) With our CDN $ being so crummy right now we really couldn't take advantage of much tax-free shopping there. I did hit an outlet mall and shopped at Carters for the girls; 10 pairs of socks and one pair of running shoes was $32 which I thought was pretty damn good. With the exchange rate though it cost us $42 so not as fabulous. Boo.

Paid another $1k toward our our HELOC this month, though so at least that's one step forward!

Ugh, I am not looking forward to school stuff. The kids start back a month from today, one in middle school and one in high school. The middle schooler needs a need backpack and I know pretty much what he needs from having gone through it before, but no clue what we need for high school. Some of their 3ring binders are ok from last year but most of them need to be tossed.

Can't think about it yet though; going on vacation tomorrow, our beach trip. Bringing a lot of groceries with me that I've gotten on sale, so I can minimize what I need to buy there. I go to the same supermarket chain as the one at home, but their store setup is different and they don't have all the things I like. We cook some but also go out to eat some, so money will be spent, but the house rental was paid off months ago, so it's just whatever we spend while we are there.

 

[LilSweetPeaPhoto]

There's always a trade-off, isn't there? Our local public schools are relatively good, not great, but they're in the midst of constant budget crisis thanks to the current political/economic climate as well as in constant curriculum flux thanks to the common core debate. So we have two of our three kids in private schools. My oldest is in small public school with a heavy focus on arts and community involvement, and starting a half day vocational program in the fall. He intends on going into a trade so it is the perfect fit for him. My middle child has her sights set on the Ivies, and is starting a private college prep high school because the public high school is so small that they're cutting AP and accelerated offerings due to of lack of interest. And the youngest is in a small Catholic elem that we love for the small classes and one on one academic support. Ironically, we moved here because it was the best school district we could afford to live in... 14 years ago when we moved out of Detroit. A lot has changed in that time, though, and short of winning the lotto and buying a home that cost 10 times what we spent on this one there's no way we could/would move to a public district I'd have confidence in. $8500/year in tuition is a bargain compared to what we'd spend on a mortgage and taxes in the affluent areas that still have top-rated public schools.

The other trade off, for us, is that we're in a blue collar small town/rural area about 60 miles out of Detroit. There aren't a lot of jobs, especially professional jobs, unless you are willing to deal with a long commute. I'd like to move closer to the city or relocate entirely when our older two (9th & 11th grade) finish school. DH would like to stay put forever and just travel a lot or get a winter home down south in retirement. But that's a long way off and any decisions we make will depend on what kind of job I find after I graduate, as well as on our parents' health as we get closer to a time when we feel like we could move, so we've put the whole debate on the back burner for a while.

Just wondering Colleen where you are in MI? I'm a teacher who's taught in Rochester, Ann Arbor, outside Grand Rapids and now I'm in Royal Oak. We live in Northville. When we looked for this house (now 10 years ago) we focused on getting into the nicest area we could....which means we're in the "crappy" part of Northville, with all the perks of being here and the great schools

When I taught in Rochester we took the opposite approach and went for a nicer house, so we built out in New Baltimore and grew to regret that FAST!

 

[LilSweetPeaPhoto]

Okay I'm back....I was here I think on the 2014 thread. People didn't like me and my spending, LOL.

Last school year I took a new job in a new district at a $20k paycut. The cut was worth it for my own mental happiness. And I SHOULD be making above the income I left within the next 3 years. So the cut is short term....

Anyways, we had gotten much better at not using our credit cards. Debit cards only. I moved some CC debt around to 0% balance cards too to help. But a $20k cut does take more changes then we made, and we've hit our bubble bursting. We're now juggling bill due dates to match my new paydays to make sure we have money when bill pays pulled. We went from one of us getting paid every week to now both of us paid every other week. Timing can be key.

We're looking at ways to get serious now about paying down our debt so we're not doing the juggling each month. Less debt, of course means less bills, and more money in the bank

We've looked at locking our adjustable mortgage, esp since our neighborhood is ON FIRE right now with houses selling within a week at a great price. But it still doesn't make sense for us even with $70k in equity to lock

So we're looking at maybe doing a debt consolidation. We don't want to hurt our credit (we have a great credit score). One payment would be lovely! And my husband would love if any of our balances could be negotiated down even. Has anyone here consolidated or recommend a company to look at?

We're taking a good hard look at our spending, and we are going to try and work a budget out that works for us. But not at the drastic measure many like to suggest, LOL. I've read Dave Ramsey. I'm aware of YNAB, etc. I'm looking right now more so at how to work these credit card balances/due dates into something that can work for us.

 

[gracie1]

Okay I'm back....I was here I think on the 2014 thread. People didn't like me and my spending, LOL.

Last school year I took a new job in a new district at a $20k paycut. The cut was worth it for my own mental happiness. And I SHOULD be making above the income I left within the next 3 years. So the cut is short term....

Anyways, we had gotten much better at not using our credit cards. Debit cards only. I moved some CC debt around to 0% balance cards too to help. But a $20k cut does take more changes then we made, and we've hit our bubble bursting. We're now juggling bill due dates to match my new paydays to make sure we have money when bill pays pulled. We went from one of us getting paid every week to now both of us paid every other week. Timing can be key.

We're looking at ways to get serious now about paying down our debt so we're not doing the juggling each month. Less debt, of course means less bills, and more money in the bank

We've looked at locking our adjustable mortgage, esp since our neighborhood is ON FIRE right now with houses selling within a week at a great price. But it still doesn't make sense for us even with $70k in equity to lock

So we're looking at maybe doing a debt consolidation. We don't want to hurt our credit (we have a great credit score). One payment would be lovely! And my husband would love if any of our balances could be negotiated down even. Has anyone here consolidated or recommend a company to look at?

We're taking a good hard look at our spending, and we are going to try and work a budget out that works for us. But not at the drastic measure many like to suggest, LOL. I've read Dave Ramsey. I'm aware of YNAB, etc. I'm looking right now more so at how to work these credit card balances/due dates into something that can work for us.

Are you looking to do the debt consolidation for your cc? I'm too chicken to have an adjustable mortgage. It may make more sense to maybe keep transferring to 0% cards so your not paying interest, just the transfer fees?

 

[Colleen27]

Just wondering Colleen where you are in MI? I'm a teacher who's taught in Rochester, Ann Arbor, outside Grand Rapids and now I'm in Royal Oak. We live in Northville. When we looked for this house (now 10 years ago) we focused on getting into the nicest area we could....which means we're in the "crappy" part of Northville, with all the perks of being here and the great schools

When I taught in Rochester we took the opposite approach and went for a nicer house, so we built out in New Baltimore and grew to regret that FAST!

I'm not far from New Baltimore, actually. Marine City, if you know where that is - not many people do! I commute to Rochester for school and I can't imagine doing that every day! Two days a week is more than enough for me.

What we did wrong - if you can call it that, because I really like where we live even though I feel like the schools are in something of a "down" period right now - was sticking to what we knew. We're both lifelong eastsiders so at first we didn't even look outside of Macomb Co and then when we weren't happy with what we were finding there we went just across the county line into St Clair County. We likely would have done better to look at the west side or downriver, but we really didn't venture far from our comfort zone. And it has been nice having our parents close while the kids were small.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Good going on getting the last paid off!! And great that you have a plan for after.

lol, I totally understand about the savings account. I'm *cough* quite a bit older than 21 or 28 *cough* and I have less in savings now than I did then.

That's a lot of coughing! Got a tickle in your throat?
I agree! I think back to when we were first married and would think nothing of each of us tapping an ATM for $50/week "spending" money. OMG, now I'm scraping to hang onto an extra $15 in checking just so I can say there was something leftover.
Oh well, at least we're making progress and I'm still being strong in resisting our Escape From the Pope weekend. Now my work is closing that Monday too so it's a 4 day weekend. The Dream sails Friday to Monday which would be perfect but I will be strong!! I hope.

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Okay I'm back....I was here I think on the 2014 thread. People didn't like me and my spending, LOL.

Last school year I took a new job in a new district at a $20k paycut. The cut was worth it for my own mental happiness. And I SHOULD be making above the income I left within the next 3 years. So the cut is short term....

Anyways, we had gotten much better at not using our credit cards. Debit cards only. I moved some CC debt around to 0% balance cards too to help. But a $20k cut does take more changes then we made, and we've hit our bubble bursting. We're now juggling bill due dates to match my new paydays to make sure we have money when bill pays pulled. We went from one of us getting paid every week to now both of us paid every other week. Timing can be key.

We're looking at ways to get serious now about paying down our debt so we're not doing the juggling each month. Less debt, of course means less bills, and more money in the bank

We've looked at locking our adjustable mortgage, esp since our neighborhood is ON FIRE right now with houses selling within a week at a great price. But it still doesn't make sense for us even with $70k in equity to lock

So we're looking at maybe doing a debt consolidation. We don't want to hurt our credit (we have a great credit score). One payment would be lovely! And my husband would love if any of our balances could be negotiated down even. Has anyone here consolidated or recommend a company to look at?

We're taking a good hard look at our spending, and we are going to try and work a budget out that works for us. But not at the drastic measure many like to suggest, LOL. I've read Dave Ramsey. I'm aware of YNAB, etc. I'm looking right now more so at how to work these credit card balances/due dates into something that can work for us.

Welcome Back!

I would start hammering on those 0% cc's before the 0% runs out. Most cc's will let you choose a due date so I would look into that. Or just pay it a week early. I do that with our mortgage every month. I can't spend that money and it's not earning much in my bank account so I might as well get the payment in and keep lowering the amount of interest being charged.
I personally don't know of any consolidator nor would I trust any. That's just me. I followed DR's snowball method though I didn't cut back so extreme like he recommends but the snow ball definitely works! The more you can cut back, the sooner it will be paid off.
In the beginning when it was harder, (overall more overwhelming & harder to resist temptation) I would transfer my snowball to my Capital One 360 checking account and pay from there. The sooner I got it out of our regular checking account, the better.

As time went on and I got more motivated and better at sticking to the plan, I just left the $ in our regular checking account but scheduled the payment online to occur the day before payday. So then on payday, the direct deposit would go in during the wee hours of morning, and the cc payment would come out by noon. I'd schedule them all for the month so I don't get any silly ideas about doing otherwise.

It took me just under 2 yrs to pay off $22k. That's with doing a few short cruises, long weekends in WDW, and a trip out west. If I gave up travel completely, I'd be miserable.

 

[Dentam]

As time went on and I got more motivated and better at sticking to the plan, I just left the $ in our regular checking account but scheduled the payment online to occur the day before payday. So then on payday, the direct deposit would go in during the wee hours of morning, and the cc payment would come out by noon. I'd schedule them all for the month so I don't get any silly ideas about doing otherwise.

I do this also - I schedule all of my cc payments for the month as the bills come in and I use the snowball approach. I pay the most on the one that has a 0% offer that will expire soon and the minimum payment on most of the others. I also pay them on payday and don't wait for their due dates. No point in doing that and it helps me to know that that money is spoken for so I don't spend it on something I shouldn't!

 

[dayvewc]

As time went on and I got more motivated and better at sticking to the plan, I just left the $ in our regular checking account but scheduled the payment online to occur the day before payday. So then on payday, the direct deposit would go in during the wee hours of morning, and the cc payment would come out by noon. I'd schedule them all for the month so I don't get any silly ideas about doing otherwise.

It took me just under 2 yrs to pay off $22k. That's with doing a few short cruises, long weekends in WDW, and a trip out west. If I gave up travel completely, I'd be miserable.

I do this also - I schedule all of my cc payments for the month as the bills come in and I use the snowball approach. I pay the most on the one that has a 0% offer that will expire soon and the minimum payment on most of the others. I also pay them on payday and don't wait for their due dates. No point in doing that and it helps me to know that that money is spoken for so I don't spend it on something I shouldn't!

I do something somewhat similar. I schedule all the payments at least a month in advance (some of them up to 6 weeks) in my Quicken program. This way, I can see what I have "left" at the end, and can still schedule the payments on the due date to get that fractional penny in interest from my checking account. But when I say I schedule payments, I mean ALL the payments - mortgage, CC's, utilities, phone, transfers to savings, transfers to my "vacation spending account", etc. If it will be money coming out of my main checking account, it is scheduled and entered in Quicken as far in advance as possible. Conversely, I don't show deposits until the day they happen. This way, I only see the money going out and not the money coming in.