One year ago, we made it. After struggling with debt since I went to college at 18 and when Senor Dog financed his car at 16, we are DEBT FREE.
We've now been debt free for a whole year. We don't owe anybody a dime. I don't worry about which bill to pay or whether I should pay it off or save. I don't think about whether debt is more important than retirement savings. I don't think about how much it cost every day in interest to pay Sallie.
When you're debt free, your life is your own. When I got laid off, it sucked, don't get me twisted, but we only had our own bills to pay. We didn't have Sallie demanding her pimp percentage. Nobody had any power over us. When I think about it, we owned our lives.
When you're in debt, especially when you have as much debt as we did, you feel like you got behind somehow. You feel like you'll never catch up. You feel like Sallie will always own you. But you will make it. When you finally catch up, when you don't owe anybody a dime, it lifts a weight you can't even imagine.
Now that we've been debt free for a year, I had to think back to those days when Sallie would follow me around and haunt my thoughts. It's been so long, I didn't even think about that weight any more. It was unpleasant to remember it -- I used to think about Sallie every time I bought coffee or the name brand toilet paper. She was like the worst roommate ever who trashed the house and told me how fat I looked every morning. Your life will be better without debt, without that baggage. I think y'all can all do it!
Friday, November 20, 2009
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14 comments:
Are student loans really all that bad? I keep seeing them villainized, but you wouldn't have been able to obtain a degree without them. Imagine a world in which it's cash-up-front or no education. Isn't that the way it used to be? At some time in the past (say, 100 years ago) I'm sure it was. At least you're able to increase your earning potential and pay later for a degree you obtained that enabled you to earn more money.
Wow that is great. I see you started the blog after you had paid off your student loans. Do you mind sharing the approximate total amount between you and your husband along with how long it took to finish off? You are one of the few bloggers that started with a high debt load like me so I am interested. Most others are in a much lower ballpark of ~30k.
Remember, you would not have the education and the opportunities that education afforded you, ex. being debt free and having a substantial savings, without those student loans. Like most, a student loan is the only way any of us would have had the education we have. As a holder of a professional graduate degree, I look at student loans as opportunity knocking.
Yes, I worked 3 part-time jobs at once in college and worked throughout grad school to pay for living expenses to keep my loans down and yes, I'm still paying for loans, but I sincerely appreciate the leg-up I received, even if it does make them a profit, from the lenders. While I will be happy like you when I pay it off, I'm humble enough not to be thankful for the help.
Wait until you take on a mortgage and home repairs! Then debt for the next 15 years at least.
Big congrats on 1-year debt-free-versary. :)
High debt makes life miserable and one must find ways to settle them early to lead a happy life. You can also find ways for debt consolidation, if you search for it.
on my way to get debt free next year, we all can do it!! i think any kind of debt is bad even school loans, sure they give u education, but the faster u pay them off the better, for emotoinal satisfaction
I'm not against student loans. Hell, I posted that I was proud of them. But I am against any kind of debt hanging around my life and limiting my choices.
Congrats! We have been debt free for almost a year now also. (In Feb)
It feels great. Debt is like a weight on your shoulders. I was always thinking about it. Trying to figure out finances in my head while walking around doing errands. I didnt want to spend a dollar on anything, i wanted to put every single red cent to that debt.
I dont ever want to be in debt again.
I love reading stories like this - so encouraging! I was very grateful for my loans while I was in law school. Now that I'm out, I'm busy hating them because that keeps me motivated to pay them down. :-)
I recommend holding on to this feeling a bit longer before getting a mortgage.
I actually have a small car loan right now plus my mortgage that I am about ready just to plunk the money down and get rid of it. I didn't want to do that last year even though I had the money because my emergency fund was not funded. Now I have 8 months worth of expenses without cutting out anything except netflix and the monthly savings we are doing (this is on top of retirement savings).
Now I didn't have student loans because I went to a cheap state school (and I mean REALLY cheap), got lots of scholarships, mom and dad helped, and I held jobs throughout school as well as co-op position. But last year we paid off my husband's student loans and his car, which was a great feeling for him.
Fantastic achievement, well done Dog!
Congrats! I am looking forward to this day!
Good fill someone in on and this mail helped me alot in my college assignement. Thank you for your information.
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