January 28, 2022 marked my one year anniversary of paying off my student loans . Reflecting back on choosing to pay off my student loans leaves me with several take a ways that I want to share with you! In September 2020 I decided to become debt free by utilizing the debt snowball method to pay off all my debt. Before this I had struggled to save and really understand basic financial principles. As a first-generation college student, I received a scholarship to attend undergrad for free, but the scholarship did not cover summers. During the summers I took out student loans to cover costs without paying interest rates or how much I was taking out. By the end of undergrad I had amassed a little under $17K. Fast forward to graduate school I received another scholarship that covered my education. At the time I was a teacher in a new very expensive city and I had missed the cutoff to have my paycheck last me throughout the summer. So, I decided to take out a loan for two summers to ...
(This
a photo of me holding my hand up with my palm facing outward while looking serious used as a thumbnail for my YouTube video
on Stop Making Minimum Payments on your Debt.)
Stop making minimum payments on your debt! Sounds
crazy right? I know especially since I just paid off close to $4K in credit
card debt but hear me out. This past week we received our stimulus checks and I
decided to pay the remaining balance on a $4K personal loan that I had taken
out in 2018 for a certification that I did not even need. In hindsight, it was
a bad decision because I should have saved my money and paid cash versus taking
out a loan. So for the past three years I have been paying the minimum balance
on this loan. I even took “advantage” of skipping payments during the holidays
and summer months. I don’t even want to think about how much interest I willingly
paid to the bank.
After finally paying off this debt it dawned on me Duggan,
you could have paid off this loan much sooner! You SHOULD have paid off this
loan much sooner! Especially since, I paid off close to this amount in 6
months. That brings me to my point STOP making minimum payments on your debts! I
was able to pay off such a large balance in a short amount of time because I
paid double even triple at times!
I paid so much that I would even get an alert that asked
if I was sure that I wanted to make another payment! Uhh YEAH! Now I understand
that you may not be able to pay a lot in extra towards your debts however, if it
is only an extra $10 or $20 it all helps. Remember, the banks want you to pay
more so don’t fall into that trap like I did. You got this! Check out the video
below for more information on why you need to stop making minimum payments.
SUBSCRIBE: STOP
Making Minimum Payments on your Debt !
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