pay off my debt

Well, I moved out of my house about a month and a half ago. Maybe I should have waited a little bit longer to get some of my debts paid off, as I realized after adding things up a couple days ago, that I’m sitting at a staggering 8,500 dollars in debt. I never realized that I let myself get so far in the hole.

With my new place, I’m being forced to budget a lot more. So at the same time, I’m working on getting things paid off as I go. I added a lot to this during the move, getting various things I needed for my place.

I’ve set an action plan into place, giving me until December 2012 at the latest to get everything paid off. With my tax return, I’m getting my new phone, and getting my car credit card paid off. So that is paid off now entirely.

Next step in is to get rid of the smaller credit cards, while hacking at the big ones as much as I can. I know I can get the two small ones paid off this year. I’m excited to get myself back on my feet again.

Starting debt-8014.

Since I got my job, and am actually making a full time income, I’m able to afford to increase some of my minimum payments on my bills each month. Since I’m still living at home, I’m able to concentrate on that a little bit more, but with moving out of the house being just around the corner, I have to start saving money as well, to have a security deposit and a couple months of rent put aside. This is what I’m sitting on right now:

Chase CC: 5501.72
Car: 1500.00
Credit Union CC: 477.26
Student Loans: 35,696.00

TOTAL: 43,174.98

I’ve started upping my payments on literally everything when I can. I sat on my tax return for close to two months, just so I wasn’t living from paycheck to paycheck, built up a small amount in the checking, and I’m making those payments from there.

I just double paid my car payment for the month, because I had the extra cash. I paid 100 dollars more on my larger balance credit card, and added another 40 to my loan payment this month. My car loan was initially a 5 year loan, but I’ve been keeping ahead of it, and trying to get it paid off before year 4 hits in January 2011. The student loans, I’m learning to live with the fact that they are going to be looming over my head for a while. I’m under a 25 year payment plan at the moment, because it was all I could afford at the time. I can’t afford to put 400 bucks a month down on my loans, especially if something comes up that makes money tight for a while. With this payment, I can manage things.

To me, it feels very good knowing exactly what I owe, and knowing how much I’ve come along with money management. I got used to living off 200 bucks every two weeks from school, and now that I have a full time income, I’m able to have some money left every two weeks, which adds up. I feel very good about this.

Well, I’d been unemployed and actively looking for a job since I graduated college back in March. Because of this, I was forced to use my credit card on most of the things that kept me going. I have 4700 on the card right now, 37,000 in student loans that have just gone into repayment, and 2600 on my other bank account for my car and a little bit I needed to pull.

37000
4700
2600

44,300 is about what I’m looking at. Fortunately I have a full time job now, so I’m making money to start getting this paid off. And to think less than 3 years ago, I had 0 dollars in debt. I’m gonna pick away at this little by little though. I know I can do it, because I was able to do it the last time I had a credit card balance.

The credit card is now paid off! I’m down to 3864.15, which is my car payment for the next few years. If I can afford to make payments larger than what I owe, I will. I did that this month, and hope to be able to keep it up!

Well, things are still going along well. I did just get a new credit card, with a 6000 dollar limit, that I do plan on not touching unless I absolutely need it. My other two cards have such low limits, that I needed to have something in case I hit an emergency. I’m down to 108.01 on my only credit card, which I hope to have paid off in the next week and a half, and 3991.94 left on my car loan, which I will work to chip away at more in these next few months. It’s nice to see that this can be done. I did it once, and I’ll continue to pull forward.

Still looking good!

Car-3991.94
Credit card-198.01

Total-4189.95

That card is so close to being paid off. I can’t wait. But it’s beginning to look like school is going to be a struggle for me this year. Looks like I may be living off ramen for 20 weeks.

I’ve been cracking hard at this. I’m down to the following:

4179.33-car payment
408.11-credit card

4587.44

That’s looking a lot more manageable. Feels good.

I’m just going to pretend I don’t have student loans until they come up. I just made another 50.00 payment on my credit card, so that brings me to:

Credit card: 735.51 (It seems surreal only having one card with a balance on it.)
Car: 4272.13

Brings me to 5,007.64 left to pay off on those. I’m slowly plugging away at the credit card first. The quicker I get that paid, the quicker the car will get paid. The money management needs to start now. Ebay has been treating me quite well this month so far, and i hope it continues that way. More money=less debt!

Had to get the car. I had no other real choice. Payments are 115 a month for the duration of the loan, and it’s a 4300.00 loan. On top of the other 2000.00 I racked up on the other car and getting it paid for. But I have a “new car” that doesn’t suck. 6800 dollars in debt now, with a year to pay it off before I graduate from college. It’s gonna be tough, but I can do it.

the “new” car died, so I’m pushing myself deeper into debt to get another car today. i sort of have no choice at the moment.