I am not a professional at managing debts. I’m actually not a professional at anything, yet…I’m still in school.
However, for my debt-paying-back journey, being held accountable was the first step.
It would have been easy for me to push repayments back until I had graduated.
But that’s not my personality.
Once I held myself accountable (and freaked out) over the debts, I realized three easy steps I could do to help get on a healthy repayment path.
1) Have set monthly goals to repay debts, broken down by debt.
2) Have a set monthly goal to save.
3) Make 1 & 2 your priority, and the leftovers from every paycheck you can dole out between rent/food/bills/entertainment.
Every month, we spend 1/3 of our income on debts. Another 1/3 is on rent/bills. The last 1/3 is split between food and saving. Our entertainment money (and extra savings) comes from odd work I do on top of school.
We have never wavered on our debts repayment goals, because they are our priority. We have been forced to waver on our savings goals, but generally I try to take on as much extra work as I can do make the gap smaller (or non-existent).
And there you have it.
Happy make-your-tea-instead-of-waste-money-on-Starbucks-Saturday.
-Beau