Debt Dumpers 2025

[WDW_fan_in_TX]

I'm doing it right now, lol. Had to wait until pay day. Paying a couple from last month and will pay the other from last month on the paycheck in 2 weeks. I would've paid all, but January rent was due the 1st. So having to pay that today too.

I try and always say I get to pay bills today vs I have to pay bills today. Which I did this morning as I always do since I get paid weekly.

 

[Mrs.Reese]

I'll join in for the year. 2024 SLAMMED us. I had gotten my overpayment from public service loan forgiveness and had planned to use that to pay for my nursing school tuition. (PSLF was from when I was teacher). And in the humor that is the universe we had to use every penny of it for house and car repairs. Then hubby got laid off. It was not a fun year. Current goal is to use the EITC to pay off a credit card. Then to use what I was paying on that one to knock the Discover out. I graduate in September so hopefully I will be working by the end of October.

 

[Bellex917]

Can you put up a tension rod and shower curtain as a temporary fix? It may buy you some time.

Yup, this is what we are deciding on. We have to pay to have the frame and one glass door removed, but then we will do this.

 

[Bellex917]

Is it still under warranty? Unless it received some kind of direct hit, it shouldn't just shatter.

So, we did not put this bathroom in, it was put in right before we moved in 3 years ago... My contractor said they tend to shatter way easier than they should. He was trying to get it on the track and GENTLY hit it, but it must have hit just right.

 

[428mom]

Doing my week 1 update. I've been sick and home the last 2 weeks ( I work where my kids go to school) but I'm feeling better and ready to go back to work on Monday.

Finance

• Pay off $3500 credit card- 0/3500
• Add $5,000 to our emergency fund 96/5000

Personal

• Read 100 books 1/100
• Lose 20 lbs 0/20
• Finish the 75 hard challenge ( I decided to modify and just track my food since I've been sick)

HOME

• Clean and organize the backyard (Spring project)
• Seal our driveway (Spring)
• Get 2 tree stumps removed (Spring)
• Meal plan 1/52

Travel (these mostly are on pause until February/March

• Save for Italy plane tickets and spending money (We will be doing the 100 envelope challenge for this. 3/100
• Save for weekend trip for my nieces graduation in Indiana $600
• Birthday getaway for my kids (birthdays are 6 weeks apart and we started last year doing an experience instead of a party) $500
• Weekend camping trip $300

 

[Tygerlilly]

This year is already off to a rocky start.

Mom called me last night saying she was at urgent care because she was dizzy and kept getting black spots. Her pulse also kept dropping so they sent her by ambulance to the main hospital in the bigger city. She's in the heart hospital where they're doing multiple tests to look for heart or stroke problems. I'm trying to see if the kennel can take the dogs in after hours since they're closed today, otherwise I have to stay at her house for a couple days until I can get them in. I was planning to try and get her moved this weekend anyway, but now it's even more important. And just my luck, they're calling for freezing rain all weekend. I couldn't get anyone to cover me at work, so I'll be going down around 1 to get dogs out and clean up the messes, then down to see her and then stop back at house to load up my car and bring stuff to apartment.
I do not want her going back to the house where she's alone and an hour away. Then apartment has staff 24/7, a medical alert device on her, and I'm 5 mins away.

So much for less stress this year.

 

[focusondisney]

This year is already off to a rocky start.

Mom called me last night saying she was at urgent care because she was dizzy and kept getting black spots. Her pulse also kept dropping so they sent her by ambulance to the main hospital in the bigger city. She's in the heart hospital where they're doing multiple tests to look for heart or stroke problems. I'm trying to see if the kennel can take the dogs in after hours since they're closed today, otherwise I have to stay at her house for a couple days until I can get them in. I was planning to try and get her moved this weekend anyway, but now it's even more important. And just my luck, they're calling for freezing rain all weekend. I couldn't get anyone to cover me at work, so I'll be going down around 1 to get dogs out and clean up the messes, then down to see her and then stop back at house to load up my car and bring stuff to apartment.
I do not want her going back to the house where she's alone and an hour away. Then apartment has staff 24/7, a medical alert device on her, and I'm 5 mins away.

So much for less stress this year.

I’m so sorry. Hoping her issue is found quickly & easily manageable.

 

[OhMari]

I started with the Budget Board 15 years ago. We were hugely in debt, with 4 kids in college. We wanted to downsize and build a new house and I knew I had to get the credit cards and Parent Plus Loans paid off. I took a 2nd job, and did the Snowball. My lowest credit card was JCPenny’s at $800, Kohls, Sears, Disney Chase and a Master Card and the Parent Plus Loans. It took 2 years but we did it. It is now 15 years later and we have our new house. This is our last year paying it off, We paid off a 30 year loan off in 10 years and 10

52 week saving challenge
I do 2 of these a year. I have $15,000 in my savings. My husband traded in my paid off Tahoo and got me a Volkswagon Tiguan and he used $6,000 for taxes fees and licenses. It is nice not having car payments.

 

[barkley]

nice surprise in the mail today-dh's CPAP was part of that big recall a few years back which triggered us to be part of the class action lawsuit. CPAP was replaced ages ago at no cost to us and today we got a $155 settlement check

 

[princesscinderella]

nice surprise in the mail today-dh's CPAP was part of that big recall a few years back which triggered us to be part of the class action lawsuit. CPAP was replaced ages ago at no cost to us and today we got a $155 settlement check

Best surprise check I ever got in the mail was for $5000 a few years after the 2008 mortgage crisis. Chase who held my mortgage had falsely put us into foreclosure, I had to fight for weeks on the phone with various departments to figure out why this had happened. I had actually been paying more than our monthly payment to bring down the principal and had never missed a payment. I ended up finding the phone number for the assistant to the president on a website and called and spoke to her and she said she would get it taken care of and did surprisingly. I didn’t realize what they had done to us was part of a larger fraud they were perpetrating in the wake of the 2008 crisis and they had to do a settlement with all their mortgage holders and based on the problem they created for them they had to pay a settlement. I thought it was a fake check until I researched what it was for.

 

[WDW_fan_in_TX]

Finally got some time to sit down and pen out my goals for this season.

Financial:
- Continue budgeting/tweaking budget and stay on track with it;
- Get EF up to $1k and keep it there (unless an emergency arises of course);
- Pay off my credit cards and keep the revolving balance at $0 (not going to close them at this point because it'll help me credit score to keep them open);
- School loans ($18k) - keep paying minimum payment on those and move CC payments to the school loan once CCs are paid off;
- Up EF to eventual goal of $3k (would require $116 per paycheck to have that done by end of the year);
- Keep paying minimum payments on car loan until backup EF reaches $3k (then push everything we can at that since APR is 24.9 percent);

Personal
- Lose 20 pounds before summer trip to Chicago (I was up over 280 last week for the first time ever);;
- Cook more fresh items at home instead of eating out or buying precooked stuff;
- Exercise 60 minutes per week (with 30 of that outside);

 

[afan]

- School loans ($18k) - keep paying minimum payment on those and move CC payments to the school loan once CCs are paid off;

- Keep paying minimum payments on car loan until backup EF reaches $3k (then push everything we can at that since APR is 24.9 percent);

I would suggest moving the cc payments to the car loan until it's paid off and then moving that entire amount to the student loan.

I'm guessing your student loan has a much lower interest rate than the car does. Unless this is a case of "my debt/her debt, not our debt". And if that's the case is this a my emergency fund saved by me, an our fund saved together or an our fund saved by me.

We don't need to know the answers to this, but money is often a cause of issues so while I think you're goals are great, it's also important to have the correct understanding between the two of you for these goals. Especially since you've said she's doing the envelope thing, which is also great and a huge step, just want to make sure you are on the same page.

 

[WDW_fan_in_TX]

Good idea about paying more on the car payment. Right now, I'm just paying the minimum on that and not paying anything on the school loan. And I am working on the EF. I've been selling baseball cards, and I've been putting half of every sale into an EF. It's helped to build it up.

I would suggest moving the cc payments to the car loan until it's paid off and then moving that entire amount to the student loan.

I'm guessing your student loan has a much lower interest rate than the car does. Unless this is a case of "my debt/her debt, not our debt". And if that's the case is this a my emergency fund saved by me, an our fund saved together or an our fund saved by me.

We don't need to know the answers to this, but money is often a cause of issues so while I think you're goals are great, it's also important to have the correct understanding between the two of you for these goals. Especially since you've said she's doing the envelope thing, which is also great and a huge step, just want to make sure you are on the same page.

 

[firefly_ris]

2025 Goals
- Max out 2024 IRA contribution before tax season -- Done-ski. I hate doing it all in one big hit like that because I wince seeing that disappear from my account but just remind myself that it will help on my income taxes.

- Max out 2025 IRA contribution

- Lose 7 pounds

- Continue regular purging and de-cluttering (I'm good at this but one can never let up!) -- So far already took a load to Goodwill and 1 trash bag size of clothes to local church. Plus I went through the basement workshop, organized and threw away a big garbage can's worth of crap from there.

- Regularly re-examine and reduce discretionary spending -- Any low cost cell for child recommendations? Currently paying $15/month for 5GB and unlimited calls/text with Tello. Any better deals let me know.

- Sell off remainder of bins of eBay stuff in the basement

- Put $1,000 into personal brokerage account

- Add $500 to each child's custodial brokerage

- Read 1 book per month at least

 

[Tygerlilly]

Mom is still in the hospital. Nobody really has any answers for what's going on. I got the dogs to the kennel for a week ($1100), but her January rent is already paid at the apartment so it's not a super big hardship at this point, just inconvenient.

We were a month behind on our mortgage due to just trying to keep both households utilities paid and after speaking to our lender, they actually advised we purposely go late so we can apply to move the "past due" and upcoming escrow payment due ($2800) to the end of the loan and we won't have to pay January or February either. So we will do that just to give us some breathing space while I'm dealing with getting her house ready to sell. My goal is to have it on the market by the beginning of March. Since she is no longer needing to purchase a new house, I'm not concerned with getting the most I can out of it. I'm going to get it cleaned up, get a dumpster and trash what needs trashed, get an estate sale set up, and then round two with the dumpster and donate what's left. I'm not going to do any fixes, it will sell as-is. We should still end up with a nice amount left over after paying the mortgage off, so I'm happy with that.

 

[firefly_ris]

Mom is still in the hospital. Nobody really has any answers for what's going on. I got the dogs to the kennel for a week ($1100), but her January rent is already paid at the apartment so it's not a super big hardship at this point, just inconvenient.

We were a month behind on our mortgage due to just trying to keep both households utilities paid and after speaking to our lender, they actually advised we purposely go late so we can apply to move the "past due" and upcoming escrow payment due ($2800) to the end of the loan and we won't have to pay January or February either. So we will do that just to give us some breathing space while I'm dealing with getting her house ready to sell. My goal is to have it on the market by the beginning of March. Since she is no longer needing to purchase a new house, I'm not concerned with getting the most I can out of it. I'm going to get it cleaned up, get a dumpster and trash what needs trashed, get an estate sale set up, and then round two with the dumpster and donate what's left. I'm not going to do any fixes, it will sell as-is. We should still end up with a nice amount left over after paying the mortgage off, so I'm happy with that.

Amongst all of the other stresses you are currently dealing with, not worrying about doing material improvements on the house will hopefully take at least a small amount of weight off your shoulders - It will sell just fine as-is. A good clean-out and cleaning will help it show well. My dad's parents passed away in 2008 and my mom's mom sold her house and moved to an apartment in 2009 and it was basically 2 straight years of dealing with cleaning out and selling both of their homes; it was a crap-ton of work getting them emptied out (plus my grandfather's multiple giant sheds of stuff) but they sold fairly quickly after just a nice clean-up, no updates were done. Good luck with everything.

 

[afan]

Good idea about paying more on the car payment. Right now, I'm just paying the minimum on that and not paying anything on the school loan. And I am working on the EF. I've been selling baseball cards, and I've been putting half of every sale into an EF. It's helped to build it up.

Even more reason to put it to something other than the student loan. I used forbearance a couple of times early on with my student loan when not paying it meant I could pay other things. I took over 20 years to lay mine off, it had a lower interest rate and they can be flexible when needed while other loans can't be.

 

[Nettlelondon]

Our budget took a hit yesterday, though fortunately funds are available to cover it without too much difficulty. Whilst I was doing a wash of some very large bath towels the breaker tripped. Took a while to get everything back up and running again but it quickly became clear that the problem was with the washing machine. It was making a lot of noise but the drum was not turning.

I managed to get it to drain and hauled the soaking wet towels out but today has been spent searching for a replacement. Why does everything have to have an app or connect to Alexa/Google Home/random other stuff? Just feels like a problem waiting to happen.

New one is arriving Wednesday so not too bad.

I know some would say I should look at getting it repaired but it is probably 15 years old - we have been married for 33 years and it is only the 2nd washing machine we have owned - so I am not sure it would be economically viable, a fix now may by a little while but it has probably done its job for us now.

 

[barkley]

Our budget took a hit yesterday, though fortunately funds are available to cover it without too much difficulty. Whilst I was doing a wash of some very large bath towels the breaker tripped. Took a while to get everything back up and running again but it quickly became clear that the problem was with the washing machine. It was making a lot of noise but the drum was not turning.

I managed to get it to drain and hauled the soaking wet towels out but today has been spent searching for a replacement. Why does everything have to have an app or connect to Alexa/Google Home/random other stuff? Just feels like a problem waiting to happen.

New one is arriving Wednesday so not too bad.

I know some would say I should look at getting it repaired but it is probably 15 years old - we have been married for 33 years and it is only the 2nd washing machine we have owned - so I am not sure it would be economically viable, a fix now may by a little while but it has probably done its job for us now.

I get you on all the app/techno stuff with appliances these days-i'm not into them either. in fact, when we purchased a new stove/oven a couple of years ago we paid more to purposely go with one that had the least 'extras' that could go out. on the new washer-yeah, probably best to go new vs. repairing and you may find that with all the advances in energy efficiency that you end up with lower water/utility usage.

 

[firefly_ris]

Our budget took a hit yesterday, though fortunately funds are available to cover it without too much difficulty. Whilst I was doing a wash of some very large bath towels the breaker tripped. Took a while to get everything back up and running again but it quickly became clear that the problem was with the washing machine. It was making a lot of noise but the drum was not turning.

I managed to get it to drain and hauled the soaking wet towels out but today has been spent searching for a replacement. Why does everything have to have an app or connect to Alexa/Google Home/random other stuff? Just feels like a problem waiting to happen.

New one is arriving Wednesday so not too bad.

I know some would say I should look at getting it repaired but it is probably 15 years old - we have been married for 33 years and it is only the 2nd washing machine we have owned - so I am not sure it would be economically viable, a fix now may by a little while but it has probably done its job for us now.

Bummer. Our set is still hanging in there, we got them just before we got married in 2007. However we have repaired the washer (ourselves) twice in that time. It's not my favorite set but new appliances don't impress me much either. Our LG dishwasher is about 4 years old and half the lights on the LED timer display don't work anymore already.