Current Financial Situation

In February, we started FPU with 6 credit cards, 2 car payments, and 1 consolidation loan (previous credit card debt). We also have student loan debt, that I will honestly admit that I'm being an ostrich with my head in the sand about right now. I'm paying the interest on my undergrad loans right now, but that's it. I'm focusing on all debt other than student loans while I'm still in school working on my MBA. Once we have the 9 debts above paid off, then we will worry about the student loans. Those 9 debts totalled just over $42,000 in February. Today, they total $28,513.17. In 10 1/2 months, we've paid off $13,486.83, and are down to only 2 credit cards, 1 car payment, and the consolidation loan.

Did I mention that this has been on 1 income? Yes, my husband has been unemployed, but it's not because he hasn't been trying. He had a temporary job during the month of July working at Fort Benning, but that's about it. In September, he started taking a tax class, and became certified as a Professional Tax Consultant in all 50 states. Last year, we used Turbo Tax to do our taxes. Had it not been for this class, we would have missed out on some exemptions and deductions we were eligible for. We filed an amended return right before Thanksgiving and got back an additional $1500 this week. If you're looking for someone to do your taxes this year - I have someone I can recommend for you!

He is hoping that he'll be successful this tax season. We're planning on using every bit of his paychecks toward debt. According to our Debt Snowball calculator, if nothing changes, and we continue to pay our debts as they are right now, November 2012 is our debt free date. I want to speed that up. I want a goal on 16 months from today, er, yesterday. May 1, 2011. I want to have all of this debt paid off by the time Jonny and I are both out of school, so that we can start looking for a house, and start working on the student loan debt.

We'll see how it goes....I'll discuss our monthly budget, and ways we can trim the fat and put more money towards our debt in a future post...

Until next time...