Had to make a change.......

Sorry you are where you are man. I was there too. In 2008 I was in your exact situation $53k in debt and nothing to show for it. Some how I found Dave Ramsey and started his Total Money Makeover plan...it has CHANGED MY LIFE. In 2 short (long while going through them) I am debt free except my house and on track to pay that off in under 12. I will never go back in to debt. My friends think I am NUTZ but I know who is nutz. You should look him up, he has alot of great advice and helpful website. Do a Google search.
 
Well did the packet this weekend. Took about an hour. One paper needed a notary. No biggie. That was this mornings task. All done and in the mail. First step done.
 
Dave. I am with Stokdgs on this one. I am a believer in God & faith! If he brought you to it, he will get you thru it. I have made my share of money mistakes & always came thru. I am not down playing you situation. But please keep the faith. You & your misses will be fine
 
dcjredline said:
Sorry you are where you are man. I was there too. In 2008 I was in your exact situation $53k in debt and nothing to show for it. Some how I found Dave Ramsey and started his Total Money Makeover plan...it has CHANGED MY LIFE. In 2 short (long while going through them) I am debt free except my house and on track to pay that off in under 12. I will never go back in to debt. My friends think I am NUTZ but I know who is nutz. You should look him up, he has alot of great advice and helpful website. Do a Google search.
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I concur with the Dave Ramsey recommendation. I am a previous Certified Educator in Personal Finance. I have taught Daves material and let me tell you it can be life changing. The $100 that you spend for his course will pay for itself many times over. You won't be disappointed.
 
Got a call this morning. GOOD NEWS!!! Looks like I am DONE! 37 months of monthly drafts are finished. Plan was for 42 months. They only have one account open, that I have enough in reserve, that they are working on to settle. So no more drafts starting this month. I COULD CRY. You have no idea how hard it was to have those drafts taken out each month. I was working for basically nothing during that time. Now I have more than learned my lesson about CC abuse. I should receive a completion letter with any monies remaining. Their plan erased a large amount of debt I could have never paid down in that amount of time. MY DAY JUSY GOT A WHOLE LOT BETTER!
 
Thats great news.

I hav always been very careful with CC and have made sure I pay them off every month. Recently my wife and I went through the Dave Ramsey "Financial Peace Univ.". I highly suggest it for everyone even if you are good with your money. I have been through a few different financial classes as I really like being smart with my money and I ahve found I learned new things in each class as I have been at a differnt point in my life.

Also Dave Ramsey has a ton of YouTube videos and content that hit and teach on the basics of his classes.
 
I was reading the thread and wanted to say great news and very good on you to do something about the debt. It is definitely not easy and sadly something that many people deal with especially I find in North America where Credit just seems to be how things are done. It is something I have also struggled with on and off throughout my adult life. We had about 14K in card debt last year. I still have a few thousand in card debt left but I will hopefully have them paid off in the next 6 months. Then it will just be mortgage, the one car payment, and our regular monthly expenses.

My wife and I now really budget everything monthly now and use cash for most everything we buy. Even if we use the CC for points/ cash back we make sure we have the cash first, use the card, then pay off off the card within the week. It is very difficult sometimes because I still get carried away buying detailing crap (really the struggle is real lol). I lierallaly have to tell myself "I dont need this! I dont need this!".

At times we still do the do not pay for 6 months to 1 year no interest promotions on the cards. I just did it for a big purchase from Home Depot for the house but then I have to be careful with what else I purchase so it doesnt send us over the top again.

Anyway, it feels like something a lot of us struggle with regularly. I wish you and the family all the best on the road to financial recovery and freedom!
 
PA DETAILER said:
Got a call this morning. GOOD NEWS!!! Looks like I am DONE!
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Congratulations man!!! You should feel really proud to have stuck with it and worked so hard to get it all paid down. Hats off to you.

This thread revival comes at a fitting time - I`ve been struggling with debt piling up, this really motivates me to get my $#!+ together and steer into it head on.
 
Congrats, nice to hear about someone being responsible and working hard and paying off there debt. Way to many people just file bankruptcy to get out from under debt and seem to have or suffer from no ill effects after 3-5 years.
 
Congrats on getting it paid off!!

My wife and I started tackling debt last year; paid off both our credit cards and the cars are paid off. Now onto her student loans.... groan.
 
PA - I`m no financial planner, but since you are already used to spending the money on debt payments every month, you might consider to keep "spending" that money and fund a Roth IRA or similar (either by opening up one or "super-funding" one you may already have). You could stock-pile a LOT for retirement that way. Certainly not telling you what to do with your money - hope that doesn`t come across that way. Just brought it up as that`s what I will be doing fairly soon. There`s also an argument to not paying off your mortgage early, and using the extra money to fund an interest bearing account instead. There`s a Youtube video on it somewhere with examples, the returns compounded over time were pretty insane. No matter how you do it, just keep on truckin` and major congrats on the pay-off

edit - found the video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR-SxrPPqRc&t=671s
 
trashmanssd said:
Congrats, nice to hear about someone being responsible and working hard and paying off there debt. Way to many people just file bankruptcy to get out from under debt and seem to have or suffer from no ill effects after 3-5 years.
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Well that`s the thing. So easy to file bankruptcy. But your credit is screwed for 3-7 years. This way, I still have a good CR. I have heard some people filing twice!! Dunno. Wanted to do the right thing I guess. But I will tell you right here, having that money drafted each and every month was HARD! Never missed a draft. Could have had a brand new car for that. I was working for the debt consol. place all those months. But now that income is back in my pocket where it belongs. And paid off all that CC debt. AMEN.
 
Well it is official as of today. Even tho my drafts stopped in August, there was one account still unsettled. Found out they do not do debt neg. So advised from the co. I worked with, they said let it go past the statue of limitations. I had asked if I could just pay off the account. They said you could, but then we could not legally represent you then. So that is what I did. Waited. And this way it`s more money to me. Well today was the day. I AM OFFICALLY DONE. I will be getting my completion packet in the mail plus money back I had in escrow. It was long process, but now that I am done it feels great.
 
Came into this thread by way of new post search. I had to go back and re-read it from the beginning. 4 years is a along time. YOU are the man and you should give yourself a pat on the back. I’m so happy for you.
 
Just saw this thread today. Congrats PA. Good for you.
Back in 2004 I sold my 51% interest in a small company to my partner. In 2010 it went into bankruptcy. I had no interest in it then but because I had co-signed on some lines of credit, the banks came after me. This is 6 years after I had sold it. (my old partner had used the lines of credit to fly multiple times to China to adopt some kids. he got in too deep). So they came after me for about $100k, right as my kids were getting ready to start college. I opened that bank letter in front of my wife and kids and balled like a baby. I hadn`t cried in probably 25 years. I felt that I was the failure. Good news is I was able to educate the bank that my ex partner had used business lines of credit for personal use. They dropped the action against me--which they had no legal obligation to do. Ever since then I`ve paid down all debt except my mortgage. I have a 25k line on my CC but only have a balance of $400.00 My daughter earned a 50% University academic scholarship and my son got an athletic scholarship. (he is now playing professionally). I went from the financial shock of my life to getting my affairs in order. Learn from this PA, get into good habits, or at least keep the good habits you`ve learned in the last 4 years so the leverage can stay on your side. There will be more speed-bumps, but you will overcome them. I highly recommend Dave Ramsey`s teachings, even though I think he`s an arrogant jerk at times.
 
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