Debt Reduction Update

I am sure some of you, many of you (assuming anyone is reading LOL) are tired of this topic but some of you have let me know you are very interested so I will write on. We started our debt reduction program on Feb1 and so the first quarters update is from Feb1-Jul1 and WOW has our life changed.

In 3 months we have paid off 30.03% of our debt! We are no longer in any for cc debt and we have paid of almot half of our first student loan. Note when I read daves book Total Money Makeover I would read about people making rapidfire progress and I woudl say SURE but they are the exceptions blah blah blah. not so, anyone can do this, at any level, some progress will be faster, some will be slower but ti will be AMAZING compared to where you were in just 3 short months.

What do you have to loose? Get the book, read it, listen to it on tape, whatever you have to do. Anyway there is a part about focus and if you focus on things it will happen and I can say this is TRUE. Our income has went up just in 3 short months and our debt has went WAY down. We have made major spending changes in our life. We have sold everything we dont really love or need on ebay, craigslist, or in a garage sale. I no longer plan my meals then go to teh grocery store, I shop only sales and ONLY with coupons, yes of course I still get produce etc but there are deals on that too if you look around enough.

Dave Ramsey says women have a security gland that causes them anxiety when finances are not in order and even if we think we arent bothered by it we are, its always there, I never realized it except when we were having a problem and I say this is TRUE. Even though we could still hit catastrophe and loose every bit of ground we have made I think it is HIGHLY unlikely. We have just this week weathered one major storm and came through just fine.

For those of you thinking wow, that sounds boring. Not really. We still go out and do things, we still have our spending money to do with what we want. Occasionally we splurge on an entertainment fund. For instance we will still have a fun fourth of july but we wont blow a ton of money doing it, we will find other ways to have fun. Oddly planning what to do and then when we do go 'all out' it makes things seem SO SO much more fun and enjoyable kind of like if you eat brownies every day they are nto as good as a special treat! Our house and both of us are more peaceful, we are on the same page with a united goal and its wonderful.

Our storm this week was to find out that since we were idiots that thought we were being financially savvvy we have an ARM mortage that will reset next year (we were remodeling and then going to seel but with market and our new knowledge we decided to stay and pay off our house). Much to our surprise (joking) we have tried to refinance with 2 comanies and although we are approved our house is not. The appraiser loved our house and rightfully so we have redone it almost 100% BUT michigan market, especially around us with a huge # foreclosures is horrid he already told us we would get nailed. Our appraisals are coming in a whopping 40,000 less than 2.5 years ago (thank you michganistan) when we got the ARM which means according to them we owe more than its worth,,,,,ALOT more, like 20,000 more--ouch. So it is fine. We will hang with the arm because we have a PLAN. Before our lifestyle change this would be a major catastrophe but NOW we plan to finish paying of student loan #1 then throw every penny we can at the house and wihin a year of its resetting we should have it payed down enough to refinance and luckily it can only adjust a maximum of 4.0% that first year. Student loan #2 will have to hang out for a while longer but its at 4% so not a huge deal.

Note: just FYI my referral to michganistan is because my friend who goes to college for international relations with middleast focus of course goes to school wtih folks 'from a whole lot of coutnries ending in 'stan' and they read about and see michigans economy so they named it MICH-ganistan LOL indicating we are poor and in bad shape here, which we are. Thank you governor Granholm.