Why we started.

Debt. Debt. Debt. Normal right? Everybody has debt this day in age. We have car payments, credit cards, and student loans. We finance everything from furniture to vacations and more.  This is how I grew up, this is all I have ever known.  And anyone who didn’t have this normal debt, well they must have come from a wealthy family, or maybe they won the lottery.

This is what I had always believed, all I have ever known.  I mean, I’ve always had this little frugal part of me, that didn’t want to live this way, that paid my first car off early and paid my rent up several months ahead while I was in school. It just battled with the “I’m young and want to have fun” side of me, oh and the “I want some awesome shoes like her” side of me.  I think we all have  part of us, no matter how small, that knows better.  We like stability but we just aren’t good at managing to get there.

It came to a head a year or two after building our home.  My husband and I were both in steady jobs and we just weren’t where we wanted to be.  I started researching paying off debt and THAT my friends is where I found the key to our success this far, the infamous Dave Ramsey.  After listening to his program, and reading other peoples success stories on getting out of debt, I was sold. His program is super simple and after about a year of convincing my husband we jumped aboard his program with 2 feet. Well….kind of.

It took us a little while to be fully committed.  We would do really good for a few months, actually the first 6 months of 2015 we paid down 20,000 dollars in debt!  But it would then be followed by a slow period where it just seemed like things came up.  We had a drainage issue around our home, costing us several thousand dollars (Thank God for emergency funds!), shortly after paying down all that debt.  Then it always seemed like the kids needed this or that, or I would feel guilty for being a “cheap steak” (my kids new nickname for me) and give in to purchasing things that didn’t qualify as “needs”.

We would then recommit and get back on schedule.  Our goal was to be done by August 2017, paying off 80,000 dollars in debt.  We are now down to about 31,000.  The program works and I would definitely recommend it to anyone that doesn’t want to be a slave to the lender. But you may still be asking yourself why.  Why would these young adults want to sit home instead of eating out.  Buy used clothing instead of new?  Why would you want to sacrifice so much to be debt free?

Well, the answer is simple.  Matt and I have always had big dreams.  We have dreams to travel the world, help others, and help our kids graduate college without student loans. We have dreams to be comfortable at night when we lay down our heads that all the bills are paid and our four walls aren’t falling down around us. We had dreams to build a life we could enjoy to the fullest, and all the while be a good financial example to our children.  We have dreams to be free to find our life’s purpose.  And when we laid that out and looked ahead the road we were on wasn’t going to take us there.  So we found a new one.