The Future's So Bright

Suck it long, and suck it hard. 

I have officially hit three major milestones in my debt repayment process. The first was that I have just passed my 2 year anniversary for paying off my debt. It is really amazing to see how fast time flies by and I am really excited to have a long blog record of all my progress! The second major milestone that I have achieved is that I have officially paid off my third creditor – Student Loans. I would just like to give a big “SUCK IT HARD!” to student loans. Never in my life have I had to deal with a more inefficient system, so it feels amazing that I will no longer have to make a payment to them again!

My biggest accomplishment however, is that I have hit the $30,000 mark in only two years! Not only did I manage to hit that mark, I blew that son of a witch right out of the ball park. When I first did my projections, I should only have paid off around $22,000 of my debt at this point! Can you believe that I am now $8,000 ahead of schedule and if I can keep this momentum going, I can be debt free by April! That means that I will have officially paid off $37,810.51 in two and a half years! This is surpassing all my wildest expectations.

$30,000! Holy $hit!

Now I am on a brand new high.  I have set realistic goals for myself, and then went above and beyond what I ever imagined. On Wednesday, I made my very last payment of $2,519.10 to my Student Loan, and to top it all off, I paid off the $949 I racked up on my credit card from my shopping trip in Montreal and my trip back home to Saskatoon. Where this new person with all this money came from, I don’t know, but I do know that I have a lot to be proud of. Not only have I paid off so much debt in such a short time, I have been able to maintain a healthy savings account, take 4 trips home to Saskatoon, a trip to Las Vegas, a trip to Halifax, a weekend getaway to Montreal, I purchased a couple thousand dollars worth of clothing, bought presents, costumes, had parties, participated in book clubs, and so many other wonderful things that most people would have never thought I would be able to do while still staying on track.

I posted on Facebook how I had paid off $30,644.44 in two years and I have never seen more traffic and more “likes” about anything I have posted on my page ever! There are some people out there who don’t understand how that it is even possible that I have been this successful so far, and I am promising that from this point forward, I will try to share some practical tips each week (or more frequently) about what I do to stay on budget.

There are a few things that I should state that are fairly obvious ways to demonstrate why I have been so successful though:

1. I have a great income for someone who just turned 30.
2. I don’t have a car (or any of the associated expenses that come with owning one)
3. I have a second job that also pays for my gym membership
4. I have an amazing support network (seriously, I love my friends and family so much)
5. My living expenses are inexpensive
6. I gave up my consumer whore lifestyle
7. My partner has helped me out every single step of the way

A few months ago, I wrote a blog entry where I questioned exactly what it was that I wanted to get out of this process and where should I start trying to get to financially and I was really stuck without any kind of clear indication where I will go next. Now, when I start to think about the what’s next part of my life, I keep thinking about where I can elevate my life with my partner. Getting rid of this debt means a lot more than just me getting less and less worried about the future, but it is opening my eyes to the kind of future that we could have together. I am learning so many valuable lessons and I hope to continue to share all these experiences with you so that you can find your way out of debt and move on to living a happier life without debt.

Thanks for coming back and tuning in to my blog! The journey on the path that I am on is going to be complete very soon, and I hope that you’ll continue to join me by spreading the word and converting my fellow consumer-debt carrying citizens.

Until next time.