Stopping to smell the roses….
We were relaxing on the couch last night and I remembered that this Thursday is our debt-free anniversary. My husband and I had to think back to how many years have elapsed since we paid off our house. Six! Every year I have to count back to figure it out. DD was in kindergarten when we sent that last check off to Wells Fargo, and now she is in middle school.
It takes hard work to pay off your house and credit cards, but it is just as big of a challenge to stay out of debt afterwards because there is no “end” goal to count down to. It’s just — stay out of debt and keep staying out of debt.
Over the past 6 years we managed to re-side our house, buy a new car, and added a bathroom to the basement without going into debt. To accomplish these required a lot of saving and budget meetings week in and week out. It’s possible to pay cash for these expenses though when you aren’t making payments. Our next major expense is hopefully a trip to the UK in 2017. To accomplish this… saving, budget meetings every Saturday night, and using my part-time employment to put towards the vacation budget line.
If you are currently in the debt payoff process, keep at it with that gazelle-like intensity. Efforts like clipping coupons and having no spend days are fine, but none of these things can rival the amount of money you save when you aren’t paying interest on car, home, college and credit cards.
Thursday we will probably celebrate by getting take-out dinner of some sort, and perhaps a family activity this weekend like going for ice cream. . . or Chik Fil A 🙂
The Healthful Saver 
Bravo to you – I agree that getting out of debt and staying out of debt are both big challenges!
Staying out of debt… a good challenge no doubt.
Unrelated to this post… don’t know whether you read much middle-grade fiction but I want to mention the book “George” to you.
Good for you being debt free. I teach financial literacy to high school students, and really impress upon them how important it is to save, and pay cash for things.
That’s terrific that HS kids have access to financial literacy. My husband and I were just saying that when we were kids in the 70s we had more life skills than our middle school daughter does today. Of course, she spent 3-4 hours doing homework tonight so that’s where all the time goes. This coming summer I have dubbed “Adulting 101!” Stay tuned.
Good luck!
Congratulations on 5 years debt free. That is actually a MAJOR accomplishment these days. I agree that it is sometimes harder to keep on keeping on with a plan than when you have a concrete, visible goal (like a certain credit card to pay off, etc.) than when you are just “saving” for ??? It’s great to have a vacation goal–it gives you incentive to keep being focused, and gives you an awesome experience to look forward to.
Yes, the keep on keeping on is exactly what I mean! I guess that is the same thing that derails diets, exercise and healthy eating initiatives! Meeting on the budget together probably has helped us stick to it.
Congrats! I know how good it feels to be in that position and it makes me sad when I read the statistics on what “average” people owe. No thank you! Our only debt at the moment is hubby’s car, but we have been working on getting it paid off early. So far so good. The crazy part is we owe less on that car than many people owe on credit cards alone, so I guess we are still way ahead.
Nice that you are in striking range on the car payment. We have been lucky to not need a lot in terms of a car (small family, no boat, no clients to drive around for business etc.) I should be riding my bike to work because it’s like 2 miles. Maybe at the end of the school year!
Congratulations on your major accomplishment paying off all your debt and maintaining a debt free existence for many years after. Certainly not an easy task, so kudos!
Thank you!
Hi! I love your blogs and I can relate to the last article about The War That Saved my Life. I wonder what the future will hold and I feel that we all need to start being a bit more conscious and do some self farming. As for debt free, yahoo! We were debt free but purchased a little home, however, we bought it so cheap and used only a bit of our savings to fix it up. I feel really lucky.
Thank you! I really appreciated this book and want to dive into this era a bit more. I thought it was really interesting that ordinary people could do things to help their country, and how big a role “home economics” played. I’m all for living small. We have a small home… I think it’s great to have your kid(s) nearby, especially when eye get older!