My testament to pay off $18G in debt this year

[3Gs4Me]

We were doing so well with having very little CC debt and no car payments until this last year. Unfortunatley we needed to take out a loan for a new to us car and buy all new appliances for our new to us house and since our first contractor for our remodel took us for a ride and we are paying again to have all his work done over the above items had to go on a cc or through a bank loan.

It just kills me to have this much debt that isn't tied to a mortgage or student loans. My goal is to put $1500 a month on debt and have everything but our mortgage and student loans paid off by the end of the year. After this year I should be doing some massage and CST work so I am hoping that 2007 will allow me to start putting $2500 extra towards our mortgage each month since our other debt will be gone.

Our extended goal is to buy land in a couple of years, live in our current house until Gwen is in middle school (we are half a block from the school and the neighborhood is amazing so we would like to stay here until they are out of this school) and pay off our mortgage and student loans during this time. We will then build our forever home on that property using the equity in our current home. It is a long term plan that will take about 10 years but well worth the wait.

Has anyone else done or wants to do something similiar?

[Suzie]

yes, I plan to pay off our cc bills. We have about 8k in cc debt. We could pay it off, but we need some $$$ for the down on our next house.

I'll be done with nursing school at the end of April. By summer I plan to be licensed and working full-time as an RN. $$$ shouldn't be such an issue then and we should have our cc paid off quickly.

We are also planning on buying our dream home this summer. Something nice sized (not extravagent) w/a pool in a nice area. I'm excited.

So, we are on the debt elimination diet/savings plan. lol

[xt]

We're trying to knock out 2 car loans and a Home Equity line in the next 15-18 months ($30k total), and then we can adopt a baby. The house with land is in 4-5 years.

We started tracking the numbers on the fridge. Sort of a visual aid to keep us motivated.

[mamabear]

Not sure which part you're talking about...we paid off our CC debt with the sale of our house, moved up to Vermont, love it, and are now in the process of buying land and building our forever house using the cash from the sale of our house. We're renting at the moment. We still have a car payment and student loan just to keep flexibility in our budget for building but depending on how big a construction loan we can get, we might pay those off with cash and roll everything into the construction loan which will then become a mortgage. We will probably end up with $50-75k mortgage - we had been hoping to go all cash but at this point we are not willing to make the sacrifices in terms of comfort/space to go that low. (We want a 1300 sf house for a family of 4, possibly 5 or 6 in a few years. )

[Gloriel]

Several years ago we paid about $15,000 in student loans in a year. I put everything extra every month towards paying them off. It felt *SOOOO* good to write that last check! Right now our only debt is our mortgage and we're paying extra on that, but it's going to take awhile, lol.

[naturalmama]

We're working on that too. We payed off one CC in November and also our van loan. We own both cars now. We still have 1 more CC that we are working really hard on and should have it payed off at the end of April, if nothing big happens. LOL I am SOOOOO excited. The only debt we will have then is our mortgage. But we are also considering selling our land/home and buying somewhere less expensive and building a home ourselves. That would put us in a much smaller mortgage thatwe could hopefully pay off quickly. We will have some equity in this place to get our house started and then I'd like to build from our pocket. So, basically that would leave us with only a land payment. That would be less than half of our payment now.

[shanleysmama]

Our financial goals this year: (OK, they are lofty goals, but I aim high, LOL)

have $15,000 in savings
health insurance - all of us
term life insurance - DH, me
pay off DH's truck - $9,000
replace my van (which I paid off last year & now it's falling apart - GRRR)
buy camper

[Sunflower_Momma]

Just this year I (we) paid off my student loan. Seven years ago it was $140K and I had $15K in credit card debt. So, yup, I've really focused on paying ahead.

Currently, we have debt on my car and our home. We bought the car 12 months ago and it is on a 6 year repayment, but starting around June of this year (after my private practice gets off the ground), the goal is to make more than double payments and have it paid off completely by no later than Jan 2008.

As for the house, we make only about an extra $2K payment every year, but we've also been focusing pretty hard on paying off my student loan. We've had it for four years and the goal is to pay it off completely within 11 years from now.

Once the house is paid off, we will not be buying a forever home because that is how we see this home - we do not need anything more. Sure, I'd love a larger plot of land on which to have chickens and an orchard, but this house is plenty. I'm trying very hard to always remember the phrase "how much is enough."

[Linda]

Our only debt is our mortgage~we have a 25 year that we are automatically paying back to a 17 year.

I don't want to stay in this house. I want to have a bit of land, not much, because I do want to be more self sustaining. Trying to decide if we will stay in NZ or move back to the States. That will determine a lot in the next 12 months.

I really need to redo our budget and get control of our money situation. I want to up our savings contribution each 2 weeks. Currently dh pays the bills. I want to take it over again or at least share in it. He is not really a spender, but he never pays us first~lol!

[BlueRoseMama]

We have some smaller goals, but in a few years when we have been stable for a while I am sure I will have similar thoughts.

Right now we have more debt than we have in the past. We have about $6000 in CC debt, and $5000 on our car. Then I have my student loan which is $18,000. (Half of our CC debt was getting Don through school.) We also owe my dad some money and Don's dad too from when Don was in school. My goal this year is to get rid of half our CC debt, start paying the parents, and keep 3 - 4K in the savings account.

This is the 5th month we have had enough to pay bills, in about 4 years (besides the months after Tax Return in which we always caught up and then didn't have any left for savings for later). We have, quite honestly, been spending more than we should, but it feels SO good not to be behind that we have gone a bit nuts. And I have let us.

Don starts the State Patrol Academy in March. We will then have yet another pay boost (from $1920/mo Gross right now, to $2900/mo Gross in April) and a year after that we will have another large one (to $3400/mo Gross May of 2007). At that point I will make more space to pay things off faster, and soon we will be able to set goals like these I have read so far, and am inspiried by. For right now, we are spending to put nice things into our house again, and except for one HUGE purchase we are doing it all with cash. The fact that we can do these things feels good. I am keeping an eye on what we are wanting and writting lists before we purchase. (NO impulse buys... Dh has agree'd thank goodness) I don't think I will get into the "bigger better more" mind set, but if I do I know I will come here to help me get out of it. (dh is huge on that line of thinking, and he loves "toys" that cost lots of money... so I may need more help with how to deal with that than how to deal with my own spending, but we never know. I could go off the deep end. lol...)

I am so inspiried by you guys that are debt free.... but I have allowed myself to get rid of the guilt that comes along with having debt you can't work around. For months last year we bought food on my cc because our Food Stamps got cut off becuase we were $26 above the line. It was a hard time, and I feel that this time of mild exstravegance is helping our moral and giving us a bit of "we did it!" feeling. I will feel great to be debt free again (I don't include cars, houses, or Student Loans in that "debt"), but for now, I am loving where we are.

Val

[3Gs4Me]

For those of you that don't know our current situation. Dh got a new job in July with a big pay increase but it required us to relocate so we sold our ten acres for a more cost friendly home near his work and right next to a good public school. We used some of our equity from selling our other home to remodel the kitchen and bathroom.

The first contractor we hired took us through the ringer by quitting for no reason about 1/3 of the way through the job and doing what work he did do so poorly that it had to be redone (we also had given this idiot a large downpayment). Anyway we had to hire a new contractor to do the job and also had to hire a lawyer to deal with the first contractor so we are now behind because of all the above.

I guess my goal for the year is going to be closer to 13-15G now. Still a great goal but I am still a bit disappointed.

[BlueRoseMama]

How is that going now Bobby Jo? Is he still threatening you? HOw are your nerves holding up?

Val

[KimberMama]

We try to balance it all. We like to travel - a lot! Monthly long weekends and at least one timeshare week each year, plus a couple of camping weeks.

Our goal this year is to knock off a 13K HELOC. We only have the mortgage, HELOC, and a vehicle loan, but the vehicle loan is at 1%, so it makes more sense to pay the HELOC.

[3Gs4Me]

Since we sent a letter threatening to file a PPO on him he hasn't bothered us but he is now taking legal action (what an idiot). We go to meet with our lawyer on Thursday. We would have met with him earlier but we are just now receiving the bill from the new contractor.

I am hoping that he will just realize that he is in the wrong and drop it. If he tries to sue us than we will counter sue for the extra expenses we have had from being displaced from our home for an extra 6 weeks and also for the cost over his initial quote that it cost to have the job finished.
Thanks for asking.