This afternoon I scheduled our LAST payment to be made on our debt! We are thrilled!! It's certainly been a journey. About 16 months ago, we made a decision that we were done with debt. We were tired of having so much of our money going to pay for our school bills. At that time we still owed $37, 717.96 of our nearly $55,000 in school loans. The number felt overwhelming and impossible, especially trying to pay for it on an annual salary of approximately $60,000. Now, as we look back we are so happy we made that choice on July 27, 2010. It has forever changed our lives!
On that day, I made a chart to track our progress of getting out of debt. After counting up 38 boxes, I felt a little hopeless, but each time we marked another chunk off it just gave us hope and the enthusiasm to keep plugging away at it. All of the excitement hasn't fully sunk in yet. I'm looking forward to our next paycheck when we won't have to use ANY of it for debt! :) What a relief. Best. feeling. ever!
If you're just hearing our our debt story for the first time, you can find out more by reading
this page, or read the posts under the "Debt" labels.
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!!!! Chelsea, I am SOOOO happy for you!! I know it hasn't been easy for you guys. We are in the process of paying off our debt as well and we are using a chart for our last debt because it is SO big. We've been working on our last one (a car payment) for about year already and it's hard to stay focused when you are "stuck" like that. You are an encouragement! Are you going to celebrate in any special way?
ReplyDeleteThank you! I know you have been working so hard on yours as well. It will come, don't get discouraged!! Keep up your hard work. Yes, we will celebrate in some way, but it will probably wait until January. We have so many things on our calendar already this month! That's okay though, it will be fun to have another celebration to look forward to in January! :)
ReplyDeleteCongratulations! That is so exciting! I'll be looking to you for inspiration when my Dr. boyfriend and I are finally able to start paying his medical student loans. You guys are awesome! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the words of encouragement, Chelsea. We are hoping and praying to be debt free by April! :) We are planning to save up for an extra special vacation to celebrate debt freedom and for our 5 year anniversary in July. Hope you have a great celebration in January!! :)
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