New Year's Resolutions for Debt

[HistoryChick]

Attack my student loan debt with the force of angry god...thor's hammer, the bolt of Zeus, Joan Crawford's wire hangers...basically just go ballistic

[payoutless]

Attack my student loan debt with the force of angry god...thor's hammer, the bolt of Zeus, Joan Crawford's wire hangers...basically just go ballistic

That is hilarious. That is the only way to knock out debt. My wife is finally on board with the idea after almost two years. She truly wants to be out of debt now that we are expecting.

When a person is passionate about something they will usually find innovated ways to make it happen. DisneySteve also hit on a great point, goals must be precise. The more precise the goal the easier it will be to know when you achieve it. For instance if my goal is, "Save money in 2010", I might not be as serious about it. I can also put five dollars in the bank and achieve it. However when I qualify the goal such that it becomes, "Save 200/month for a total of $2400 in 2010", I have defined a finish line. Being exact can give you motivation if you do not set your goals too high.

[fruitbowlk]

My main one is to fund my EF 6-8 months of monthly expenses quickly due to the upcoming lost of my Job.

[Snodog]

We have 80% home equity and a low fixed rate so I'm not looking to pay any extra on my mortgage. No other debts to speak of. I guess my goal for this year is to max out a 401k and two Roth's. Last year we came up a few thousand short on the 401k because we replaced my wifes car.

That being said I'm not real fond of setting financial goals because too many things can happen that are out of your control.

[EconoMutt]

We want to increase our EF from 3 to 6 month's expenses and pay down $10,000 toward our massive debt.

[MamaBird06]

We want to be completely debt free except the mortgage by the end of this year, and have 12000 in savings! Last year was a very difficult year for us, but we still managed to pay off 21500$ of non-mortgage debt. My husband was in an accident, so we accrued some more debt in the summer and right now our current debt with the medical debt is at 35200$. We will be getting some type of settlement which will take care of the medical bills and probably more, but that could be another 6 months from now so we are still working on taming this debt slowly each month.

[bigredmachine05]

My question is for disneysteve. Being a physician, what surveys do you do for $100 or more an hour? Would I qualify for them even though I am not in primary care medicine. I was looking for some surveys to do while I am in my office waiting for a case to start.

[shibabigk]

Our goal for 2010 is to pay off the last CC.
We currentl owe $3500 on this very last card, and I am proud to say that in the beginning of 2009 we owed over $10K on several cards, which seemed absolutely impossible back then. We also both started Roth IRAs and my husband is contributing to te TSP. Its not much right now, but we are at least starting to get on the right track.
That will leave us with two car loans and one personal loan. I won't be working anymore as I will be a full time student, so the goal is to stick to our budget and once the card is knocked out to keep saving and working on the three loans one at a time. It won't happen as fast as last year since our income is cut in half essentially, but we are both motivated and not owing the cc copmany anymore will feel so darn good!!!

[Slandgie]

eh, it's still early enough in the year to make a resolution for 2010. Right now, we have about $11K in credit card debt, I want to see it at $6K by the end of this year.

[cptacek]

I want to pay off one credit card, my student loan, and the pickup loan DH's grandma gave us this year.

[nmboone]

I should pay off my car in the middle of this year (nearly a year early, yay!). Problem is, I need to move as well and find a better paying job than I have. I'm minimally paying on student loans until car is paid off. I'm grateful for no credit card debt.