OUR DEBT SNOWBALL IS GROWING!!!
A debt snowball is the collection of "extra" money from our budget that we can apply toward paying off debt. I believe the term was created by Dave Ramsey, and is part of his Baby Steps plan for achieving financial peace. Paying off debt is Baby Step 2 in his plan. That is the step we are on.
We have been gathering snowflakes of money together, in an attempt to pay down our debts for the past 8 months. We shredded our credit cards last July, and made the commitment to become debt free. It has been a slower process than I wanted. There were so many unexpected expenses along the way, that really thwarted our efforts. It took us a while to even recognize where our biggest budget problem (medical expenses) was in the first place. Even when we finally got our budget to a workable level, every extra penny we can find has been going into savings toward expenses for Jersey #2's upcoming heart surgery.
Just making the change to not acquiring new debt has already moved us in the right direction. Even paying just the minimum payments, the debt balance goes down. It just takes a really long time. Now that the new credit card laws are in effect, the statements we receive in the mail are telling exactly how many years (or decades) it will take us to pay off our accounts if we only pay the minimum payment each month. So, we are moving along the right path, one snowflake at a time.
Six weeks ago, The Referee took on a weekend job driving a tourist shuttle. He makes a nice commission for each driving run he does, plus any tips that may be given. He has worked hard every weekend, and some late evenings or early mornings during the week. We decided to put his tip money into savings and apply the commission checks right to our debt snowball, attacking the first credit card on our list.
The commission checks arrive once a month. I have had the joy of getting to write checks out twice now, to make extra payments to our credit card balance. Since The Referee worked every weekend in February, that commission check achieved snowball status, not just snowflake!
It was just the inspiration I needed to keep moving forward, up this challenging financial hill.
A debt snowball is the collection of "extra" money from our budget that we can apply toward paying off debt. I believe the term was created by Dave Ramsey, and is part of his Baby Steps plan for achieving financial peace. Paying off debt is Baby Step 2 in his plan. That is the step we are on.
We have been gathering snowflakes of money together, in an attempt to pay down our debts for the past 8 months. We shredded our credit cards last July, and made the commitment to become debt free. It has been a slower process than I wanted. There were so many unexpected expenses along the way, that really thwarted our efforts. It took us a while to even recognize where our biggest budget problem (medical expenses) was in the first place. Even when we finally got our budget to a workable level, every extra penny we can find has been going into savings toward expenses for Jersey #2's upcoming heart surgery.
Just making the change to not acquiring new debt has already moved us in the right direction. Even paying just the minimum payments, the debt balance goes down. It just takes a really long time. Now that the new credit card laws are in effect, the statements we receive in the mail are telling exactly how many years (or decades) it will take us to pay off our accounts if we only pay the minimum payment each month. So, we are moving along the right path, one snowflake at a time.
Six weeks ago, The Referee took on a weekend job driving a tourist shuttle. He makes a nice commission for each driving run he does, plus any tips that may be given. He has worked hard every weekend, and some late evenings or early mornings during the week. We decided to put his tip money into savings and apply the commission checks right to our debt snowball, attacking the first credit card on our list.
The commission checks arrive once a month. I have had the joy of getting to write checks out twice now, to make extra payments to our credit card balance. Since The Referee worked every weekend in February, that commission check achieved snowball status, not just snowflake!
It was just the inspiration I needed to keep moving forward, up this challenging financial hill.
I am so proud of you! Hopefully when the Referee's extra work slows down, you will have enough of a snowball effect from paying off other bills that you can still be snowballing!
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