Cinstres' Personal Debt Cutter Thread

[cinstreshick]

Debt Cutters

How much debt do you need to reduce?

108248.70

How did you get in debt?

Husband out of work for 2 years, trying to sell a house and build on a smaller house on land that we already owned. Inability to get child support lowered from 1060.00 a month even though DH was out of work - drained our saving and forced us to live on CC's. It's lowered now to 705.00 but for 16 month we lived on may salary plus about $75 he had left after child support. For 4 months he had no income at all but we still owed 1060 a month and since we were trying to finance our home loan we had to stay current.

You've accrued debt. What are the main factors that keep you from reducing it now?

Dh's new job is at 1/2 his old salary and his weekly take home varies based on availability of OT. Being in our new house still has residual expenses - driveway - garage, etc.

Have you created a budget?

yes. bare minimum we need to meet minimums is 5200.00

List your top 5 budget busters?

1. not enough income to meet minimums some months
2. no OT available
3. unexpected expenses
4. home improvements
5. not using coupons!

What is your plan to get out of debt?

Currently snowballing but Christmas and In Vitro threw a kink in the plan. Everything is fairly low interest and we just got an equity loan to take care of some of the higher interest items. I am the main breadwinner and I may be losing my job at the end of February.

List your debt with balance, monthly payment, and interest rates.

Equity Loan 21241.00 6.5%~300/month

Truck loan 21500.00 0%~500/month

SUV loan 34896.34 3.5% ~600/month

Bank loan 6300.00 12.9% ~ 200/month

Citibank Card 5222.89 4.9%~80/month

Citibank Card 5150.00 0%~80/month

US Bank 4735.24 1.99%~60/month

Discover 3525.73 5.9%~120/month

Best Buy 2000.00 0%~ 20/month

Nebraska Furniture Mart 1700.00 0%~75/month

Orthodontist 1277.50 0%~75/month

Wells Fargo 2000.00 10.65%~ 50/month

Chase 500.00 16.9%~15/month

Amex 400 9.9%~15/month



How much will you try to reduce your debt by this year?

$35000.00

What kind of support do you need from fellow Debt Cutters to help keep you on track? advice, support and accountability



Debt paid up to 1/3/2011:





0% Debt Paid off

[xmas tree]

Looks like you have a lot af financial acrobatics ahead of you. We are also working on reducing debt. First thing should be to reduce some of the big things. What sticks out are your huge car payments. It there some way you can get rid of them and instead get a cheap used car without payments? Even if you loose on value in the cars now. In the long run it would be better not to have those payments. Driving an old car is certainly better than dishing out money you don't have.
Just trying to help.

[cinstreshick]

thanks xmas. I agree the cars need to go. I'm working on my husband to agree.

[My3sons]

Hi Cinstres! I second the vehicle suggestion. Even if you got 2 used vehicles that cost $200/month each, thats a savings of $700/month - and that amount would wipe out your entire Chase balance and half of your Amex balance!
Good Luck and keep us posted!

[puakinikini]

I agree with others about the cars - it is an obvious way to target more money toward your debt. We are a 1-car family. We sold our 2 cars, which we had debt for, and bought a used van. It was critical to our finances. Just this change alone reduced our debt by over 5000 over a year. It sounds like you could save even more. I think writing out all our debt and showing my DH how long it would take to pay it if we continued as is (minimum payment), really hit home. Also, seeing the emotional toll on me (my DH is less effected personally) was also helpful to him. I could barely sleep at night. I wish you the best in getting both of you on board with respect to a new budget.