About Our Debt

Debt Eradication

$0
$60,791

 

Our Debt

Updated: January 2016

Decreasing debt – 2015

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Student Loan Debt: $39,891

H’s Navient (Sallie Mae) Loans:

• Consolidation 1: $14,027.15 (January 2016) $16,663 (September 2015) $18,478 (May 2015) $22,658.52 (March 2015) $23,550.51 (Nov. 2014) 
• Consolidation 2: $12,356.40 (January 2016) $15,696 (September 2015) $18,016 (May 2015) $20,107.59 (March 2015) $20,234.75 (Nov. 2014)
• Smart Option Loan: DONE! $6,321.13

My Navient (Sallie Mae) Loans:

• Consolidation 1: $10,156.80 (January 2016) $10,396 (Sept. 2015) $10,559 (May 2015) $10,752,84 (March 2015) $10,915.14 (Nov. 2014) $11,516.08
• Consolidation 2: $3,369.51 (January 2016) $3,455 (Sept. 2015) $3,513 (May 2015) $3,582.38 (March 2015) $3,640.93 (Nov. 2014) $3,881

Notes: Currently, we pay the minimums on all four of these accounts once a month, then send an extra payment of $1504 + any money we are able to snowflake to the first two (the one that are at a 6.88% interest rate…).

Mortgage: DONE! (We sold our house in September 2014) $195,263.65 

Consumer Debt: $0

• Citibank Credit Card: $0 DONE! $314.18 (May 2015) $3,014.18 (Nov. 2014)  $3,196.91 $2,000.00  Note: We don’t put any charges on this card.
• We also have two Chase Cards (Freedom and Travel), an American Express card, another Citibank card (which we use to generate points that can be used to pay off student loans directly), and an Amazon card (which I just opened so that I could get a discount on an order I was placing).
• Car Loan: $0 DONE! $271.44 $2,842.55 $5,290.66 

Our Net Worth

Our net worth also includes the value of one of our cars and our retirement funds.

• $95,029 (January 2016)
• $77,181 (Sept. 2015)
• $78,313 (May 2015) 
• $72,683 (March 2015)
• $59,334.54 (Nov. 2014)

Debt Eradication:

Total debt decrease, beginning in January 2014 (not including our mortgage, which we had until Sept. 2014):

• $48,577 (calculated January 2016)
• $30,078 (calculated January 30, 2015)

Debt-Free Date:

This date is calculated by using the Debt Optimizer spreadsheet (which you can find a post about here); I only included our scheduled minimum payments and our budgeted extra funds of $1504 a month in this projection.

• October 2017 (calculated January 2016)
• December 2017 (calculated September 3, 2015)
• January 2018 (calculated May 17, 2015)
• February 2018 (calculated March 2015)

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For current Mintly Goals, please see the Goals page. (Below are previous years’ goals.)

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2015 Mintly Goals

1. Put a scheduled $8316 extra towards our student loans (in addition to our minimum monthly payment of $506). – SUCCESSFUL

2. Split tax refund 60%, 30%, 10%. – NOT SUCCESSFUL (we got nothing back on our taxes for 2014!)

3. Pay an additional $3150 to our student loan debt, beginning in June or July 2015. – SUCCESSFUL

• This refers to the $450 we pay on the Citibank card. It will be paid off in June 2015. If we can manage an extra big payment in May, then we can start paying that money to our student loans. If we can’t do the big extra payment, then we will have to wait until July to start the additional payments.

4. Snowflake at LEAST $600 ($50/month) extra towards our Student Loan Debt Eradication fund. – SUCCESSFUL (We snowflaked  $4,4870.02!)

Of course, these are all just parts of the same goal, which is basically:

Decrease our Student Loan balance by $18,138. – SUCCESSFUL (We decreased our Student Loan balance by $20,445!)

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2014 Mintly Goals

Debt Eradication Goals & Progress: (November 2014)

1. Sinking Fund… we’re still doing this and it isn’t hard, so maybe I’ll take this out for 2015!

2. Continue to pay $450 on the Citibank credit card – pay it off by Summer 2015!

3. Save $5000 for trip to France for H’s conference in July! (We’re close – only about $1000+ to go!) We’ve saved up!

4. Start putting more money into other savings (such as my IRA, other larger expenses that may be looming ahead, and maybe even L’s college fund)!

6. Figure out a food budget and technique that works so we can put it in place for 2015!

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Debt Eradication Goals: (Second half of 2014 – modified due to changes in circumstances!)

1. Set aside money for predictable expenses that don’t occur each month, called a “sinking fund.” We’re now setting aside $450 (which is split into different amounts that I keep track of on a Savings Spreadsheet) monthly. (This goal is the same as the first half of 2014.)

2. Continue to pay $525 a month on the balance of the Sallie Mae “Smart Loan,” which was transferred to the Citibank credit card to avoid interest. The interest comes due in August 2015, and I’m doubtful that we can pay it off before the end of 2014.

3. Sell our house!

4. Stay on top of our other credit cards as I transition to a new job and we move, so we don’t end up paying fees because we’re carrying a balance.

5. Snowflake all extra funds to our moving and travel funds. After moving, snowflake money to our emergency fund to build it to $1,000 (or even $2,000?) and travel fund.

6. If, by a miracle, we get our moving, emergency, and travel funds built up by the end of the year (which probably will not happen), I would start putting extra money into my IRA. This is a pie-in-the-sky goal, but maybe by the end of the 2014-2015 school year? We’ll see what happens….

7. PARTY!!!

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Debt Eradication Goals: (First half of 2014)

1. Set aside money for predictable expenses that don’t occur each month, called a “sinking fund.” We’re now setting aside $450 (which is split into different amounts that I keep track of on a Savings Spreadsheet) monthly. I started this in January 2014, before I read about Joan Otto’s suggestion of dividing your total yearly expenditures by 10 instead of 12 (see this) – what a great idea! However, we’re putting aside the most we can at the moment. Something to plan for in 2015!

2. Pay off our Citibank credit card first. (No interest until October, but we want this debt gone by the end of June.) Update: Original balance has been paid off, but now we have transferred our Sallie Mae Smart Option loan to this card with 0% interest, and our goal is to pay it off in 10 months (by February 2015).

3. After the Citibank debt is gone, we’ll turn our attention to the Car Loan, so we can get out from under that as soon as possible. This car is completely unreliable (though it’s been doing well lately – knock wood!), and we would like to feel free of this car debt in case something goes wrong. Update: Car loan is done!!!

4. After Citibank and the Car Loan, we’ll take care of that “Smart” Option Loan: $6,321.13 through Sallie Mae, since the interest rate is beyond insane. Update: see above – it’s now on the Citibank card!

5. At that point, I’d like to start splitting the amount of money we’re putting into debt in half – half will go towards our student loans (H’s first, as his interest rates are higher), and half would go into an Emergency Fund. Update: I’m still contemplating how I will divide our Debt Eradication funds at this point.

6. Once we have an Emergency Fund built up ($10K), then I’d put that half of our extra money into maxing out my Roth IRA. I don’t know at this point how much money that would be (it probably wouldn’t max it out over the course of the year), but it sure would be nice to do more than $25 a month. Update: see #5’s note.

7. PARTY (No update required!) 

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