Debt free starting today! I dumped all my cash, which was drastic, but im on track to get it back at the end of April and its March 2nd. A short term feeling for a long term goal. I HATED seeing the payment come out. Now its only living expenses and all i see is growth. Looking to get a 2nd job to move forward at an accelerated rate. Like she said, i only see up from here.
Congrats! I’ve learned a lot from your videos! I’ll be debt free by 2027 & I started my debt free journey in 2023. Since I’ve started paying off my debt last year I’ve paid off over $20,000 so far!
Same here. Home and 3 rentals all paid off at 50. No debt whatsoever. Just wrote a $52k on my wife’s car. I will never borrow again. Now at 51 and hope to retire at 60……can’t wait.
I will be officially consumer debt free Aprill 16th! I’m 49! My mortgage is less than 49k however I’m married! This year 25 years! Love your content! ❤
I have $500 remaining and then I’ll be completely debt-free. I still cannot believe that I’ve paid off almost $15,000 of credit card debt and an auto loan. The best feeling was getting the car title in the mail. I remember the pure happiness of knowing I had accomplished my goal. I love watching these types of videos because it keeps me motivated to keep going.
Congratulations! If you haven't already, knock that $500! This is your first step to building wealth and financial freedom. Outside of my mortgage, I approximated I Have paid off around $100K in debt (school loans, auto loans, personal loans, credit cards, etc). When you are out of debt, you have more freedom and you are able to sleep better at night because you are no longer living paycheck-to-paycheck. If you don't already have one, build up that emergency fund (3-6 months of expenses, maybe 12 months in certain situations) and start investing at least 15% of your gross income. I used Dave Ramsey's Baby Step program to get my financial foundation built. I still follow Dave and his team consistently but I also have researched and learned new/different principles from The Money Guy Show. Both programs are sound!
I became debt free in aug 2023. Such an incredible feeling. Ive lived pay check to pay check my whole life.God helped me and blessed me. Now being debt free it gives you the opportunity to put your money to work for you. The biggest thing that fueled my anger about being in debt was when i thought about the fact that i was working hard only to give my money to someone else. I was a slave. They were kicking back relaxing and when i got paid i pictured handing over my hard earned money to people saying ill take that and spend it on what i want.when i pictured that it fueled the fire that made me not let up one inch til my money became all mine again
Debt (payoff) fatigue has definitely been hard to deal with lately. However, i know that this temporary discomfort will allow me to have the future peace I desire. 😊 Thanks for the video!! ❤😊
I’ve been debt free since 2019; that’s when I finished paying off my student loan…The freedom that comes from being debt free is awesome. I’m able to help my dad, who is on a fixed income, with some of his expenses and, I can buy whatever I want, but more often than not, I choose not to because I’ve realized that less is more!
Same here. My Mom who, unfortunately, is horrible with debt and money management in her mid-70s. Horrible. I watched the repeating sociopathic consumer overspending behavior and made sure to do the exact opposite like this girl here. ❤❤❤
I'm so HAPPY that you made this video. I try to explain things to my friends about this, why I don't spend on credit cards when I don't have the money to pay it back. I try sooo hard to make them understand. Sometimes they only will hear what they want. This explanation and testimony from you speaks volumes on how important it is to get and stay consumer debt free.
I am on track to become debt free this November. Started from $93k down to $40k all from sacrificing by downsizing my car, selling stuff, and just paying as much as I can every month.
Oh my goodness are you ever right!! In 2019, I moved back into a rental after owning my home for over a decade when I found myself drowning in debt, I had to sell my house in order to regroup. It was one of the hardest but also the one of the best money decisions I ever made! I'm back into home ownership and my only debt is my mortgage. My investments are now growing and stress is so gone, its unreal!
Hello, I hope you can see this question. I’m in the situation you were in. I have a nice size home of 10yrs. I live alone. I have 31k in student loan debt and the mortgage is in arrears with 100k of equity. I’m considering selling it and taking the money to pay off the student loans to be debt free. The student loans pay back is 12/2024 out of deferment. At the price of home now plus the interest. How did you get into another home? Did you get less house and use your equity to pay it down enough to have lower payments? How’s the interest factoring in? My house was 200k and now smaller houses are 400k 😅 Thank you, love 💕 from Texas🌵 Oh, I do have to dogs that I love and I use my home as my side hustle, I’m a hobby (dog) breeder… so if I sell then that is a decrease of 30k a year but it’s not guaranteed.
@@SanctifiedLady Hello Sanctified, my apologies for not getting back any sooner, I can totally empathize! I'm a single (mom) too.😊 First to clarify that we are in very different housing markets, but the housing market is kind of crazy everywhere; I'm in Canada and the prices are wilder out here - average house price is about $700K in Canada! That being said, I'm familiar with the US housing market as it's not very different from the Canadian market in the main. If you bought your house for $200K previously (assuming, I understand you correctly), I wonder whether it might have appreciated quite a bit over the 10 years since or is the $200K today's value. Because if you are not so sure about it's value today, perhaps you can work with a friendly bank to seek an appraisal to determine what it's worth and then consider "refinancing" which would allow you to roll in to your house all your other debt (making your mortgage bigger), but you will now have have one single payment - although with current higher interest rates, qualifying might become a challenge... In terms of getting back into housing, I decided to buy a new build (a condo) because the payment structure (for the purchase) over about 2 years, allowed me to keep accumulating more down payment as I waited for the unit to get ready (but remember I was already in a rental). With the condo it was like 1st payment is 5%, then another 5 % over so many months, then another 5% at the 1 year mark... but the interim closing (taking ownership of the ready condo unit) was a bit of a horror show. You can watch a video (Titled: Occupancy Fee - I believe process would be similar to buying a condo in the US) I made about it on my RU-vid channel... my name or handle on my original comment - is my RU-vid channel name. Definitely feel free to ask any further questions if you wish, happy to answer or you can leave a comment on my channel. Wishing you all the best and sending good vibes! Thanks for reaching out!😊 Stay blessed!
No lies told here. The freedom and options you experience while living debt free isn’t mathematical but mind blowing. For anyone who isn’t on the other side just yet, keep pushing cause I’m rooting for you!
I could not agree with you more! We just started paying off debt in March 2018 with the goal of simply reducing debt. Things got out of control as they will sometimes do and next thing we know we set the goal of paying off all of it including our mortgage. Our official debt free date was Dec 6 2022 (the day before the day that will live in infamy). Like you Leila no more debt for us and we are putting serious amounts into savings and investing. Literally everything you said about the great feeling being debt free resonates with me. We might borrow for another second home but no more consumer debt. As of now we have 10 months expenses in savings, a taxable brokerage account, Sue is putting 15% into her 403B and I'm maxing out my 401K at the 50+ feature. In 2023 our first debt free year we put $70K into investing and savings. Every other Friday my co-workers call that day "payday" I call it "opportunities to invest and save day".
I am almost debt free. I wish we were as young as you. It happened when we retired. But we also now have a paid off home. I still tend to be frugal with my money. My kids have to remind me that it’s ok to spend some of it once in a while, we are going on an Alaskan cruise this Summer. It’s hard for me to want to spend the money
Good for you , keep it up , I’m 57 . I’ve been debt free for 2 decades except mortgage and a decade totally debt free, you can really start saving for your future self.
It’s like night and day. Been debt free for three years now. Built up a 10 month emergency fund and now saving up for my Hawaii vacation in August. The amount of stress that has left me feels so much better. Keep grinding away and pinch those two pennies to make five cents.
Student load debt is an anchor around the necks of people. I was blessed that back in the '90's I was able to pay for the state school I went to while working.
Thank you for the motivation! I’ve made heaps of progress in 2023, and this month I’m really fatigued and just need a break. I’ve beefed up emergency fund, set aside some fun money and I’m going to take a break! I’m so happy and proud of how far I’ve come I dream of that last payment similar to what you mentioned.
I really struggled with what to do next when I became debt free. Ultimately I decided to make a new goal to save enough to be able to retire at anytime. That has given me a focus again. As for being debt free, yeah, I know I can pay for just about anything I might want to do and it wouldn’t be a big deal. Thats removes a lot less stress in my life.
The only "debt" I currently have is a 0% interest car payback to my parents. Still trying to pay it down in a reasonable time since I want to pay my parents back, but going from $12K in cc debt in Sept 2022 to $0 in debt in July 2023 is something that has been so incredibly freeing
The American way of living is VERY HARD! His Citizens it’s like a Machine NON- STOP WORKING! WORK WORK WORK just to pay your bills! Later you’re now drowning in debt! That is the LIFE in America! People are Living in stressful life! They are NOT HAPPY at all! So many Americans are Stressed because of the way of living in America..
Good for you. Being this young and debt free must be very liberating. Some of us are older when we hit this mark, and many never even hit the milestone. Being a debt slave sucks.
I agree. We are debt free and about to build our house. We were able to save half of our monthly income because we were not paying any consumer debt. It's amazing not having any risk (debt) attach to your name. We have more freedom to choose. Consumer debt is like a heavy chain weighing you down. We will never go back in consumer debt. 🤩 We can now focusing in building our wealth so we could live and retire with dignity.🥰🤩
Debt free since 2017. I now own my house( it’s only small). I have no kids no girlfriend no pets no car payment. I am currently stacking as much cash away as possible. Soon I will reduce my work hours to three days a week.😎
When I was spending so much money getting out of my consumer debt, I learned that discipline is the key to financial security. Now all I do is save more than I spend.
You made the right decision paying the debt vs investing and profiting off the difference. Being debt free comes with other benefits like greater cash flow and much better resistance to unexpected catastrophes such as job loss and market turmoil. You sleep better, you feel better and begin to have a taste of what financial freedom means. You will rebuild your investments and then some.
5 years ago I had over $50000 in debt from car payments, student loans, & credit card debt. Thanks to lots of work and some stock market luck, I got all my debts paid off just over 2 years ago & have been debt free since. In past year I went from having about $100000 in retirement funds to $144000+ thanks to investing more from my job & ira contributions.
Leila I hope this video motivates lots of people to start their debt free journey! I’ve been here for a while and it’s amazing the growth you’ve had!! Btw, do you have some tips on getting one month ahead? Or perhaps could make a video about it? I’m debt free but I’m struggling with my One Month Ahead fund for some reason (I’m still saving and have a smaller emergency fund).
Thanks for this… and congratulations! At 69 with a 10 million plus net worth, I’d still argue that being debt free is our greatest financial accomplishment. I may not have been “born free,” but there’s nothing like the work we put into becoming debt free! With the exception of our daughters paying off mortgages, both of them have no other debt either. So proud of them!
I personally had to dig out of serious debt thanks to my ex. The funny thing is, (it was an ugly split) he actually had the nerve to harass me after the divorce because he was having trouble paying his part of the debt. His lack of ability with his finances actually led him to file for bankruptcy, and he tried to blame that on me as well. Sadly, for him, the debt he had to repay was in his name alone, and a good part of it was incurred by him after the divorce! It took me 8 years to clean up the mess, but now that I'm debt free, I no longer have the cloud over my head of dealing with that constant reminder. I still find myself getting nervous about spending, but since I pay cash for everything now, I am able to roll with it. No sleep lost here for the last 3 years since knocking all of that out!
Ughh I hate that you had to deal with that but I'm so proud of you for getting through it!! 👏🏻 I also had debt at one point in my journey tied to an ex 🙄 Horrible mistake. We also had an ugly split (not married though) and he also didn't take responsibility AND filed for bankruptcy lol...
Thank you so much for being responsible and paying your student loan debt off. You took It out it’s your responsibility to pay it back. Not the taxpayers!!!
Interesting comment, but a fairly repetitive one. I agree wholeheartedly with what you said. It's just exceptionally rare for people to apply this same logic to billionaires or their enterprises. NFL franchises should not feel entitled to get tax breaks and other incentives to build stadiums where most working and middle class people can't afford tickets. The PPP loans were terribly exploited not only by members of Congress but other multi million dollar businesses and some charities, including Ruth Chris steakhouse and The Kennedy Center. This nation pays out billions in foreign aid every year. I don't generally hear the same rhetoric about those individuals and companies. Why can tax payer money be pooled to benefit the working and middle classes? Homeless vets. Seniors in the Medicare doughnut whole. Crumbling infrastructure. Student loans. Drug rehabilitation. Prevent medical bankruptcies. A CEO can run a Fortune 500 company into the ground and still get a golden parachute. Incompetence has much more severe consequences for the poor and middle class
This video was SO motivating. Thank you. I just happened upon your channel this evening but quickly hit the subscribe button. I am on track to be debt free by my birthday this September. I look forward to the freedom, stressfree-ness, and wealth building portion of the journey. I’m excited! Thanks for this video. I’ll likely save it as a reference or for continued motivation. ❤
Yea covid lowkey helped me out in that way. Saved up the amount I owed and waited to see if they would wipe out the 10k. The flopped then I paid that lump sum. Debt free @ 25 😎
Let me tell you what is rough - being 65 or 70 and broke and cannot work! So, do what we did, make that 10-15 year sacrifice, save and invest, build wealth, then in your 50's you will have an abundance! So many of my peers are in a bind in retirement. Pretty sad actually.
Most people buy homes with dual income, meaning that they have a spouse. To buy a home while single is possible but you probably will have to move to a cheaper area and build your life elsewhere. Basically, the government wants to force younger people and single people to populate areas of the country where housing is abundant and cheap. I would move, but I am already entrenched where I live and changes for me give me anxiety and I am not entirely healthy anymore to make the risk. But maybe my environment living in an expensive city is making me sick.
Lots of finance channels are laser focused on the ROI's. Many recommend calculating and leveraging more debt as long as the return is worth it. While mathematically that makes sense, you are completely correct in that we should factor in the "peace of mind" and "risk" as well. I like to think of myself as your past situation multiplied. I graduated with $250k of dental school debt, and decided to take on a $750k business loan for a practice. Mathematically, it makes sense; when I pay off the loan I'll own a valuable practice that well sell for a profit when I retire. But I never factored in the risk and stress of it. For years I was terrified of bankruptcy, and to this day I don't sleep very well (even though my business is doing just fine). No matter how great things are, I'm always a week from a disaster, like a recession or mass staff quitting. I actually am in the process of selling the practice for that reason. Financially, it likely would be better I stuck it out. But personally, the peace of mind for me is worth the lower net worth.
@@markcrisp07 I agree to an extent. If I followed that concept (Have zero debts at all times), I would need to save $750k in order to buy my business. That would take decades, to a point where I have little time to enjoy the ROI of the business. I would certainly work to lower my risk next time, if I did it all over again. Maybe save $250k, then take out a loan for the business; that way I have a good emergency fund to last me for a year in case I have to close my doors. But now that I sold off my business and paid off all my student loans, I have ZERO desire for business ownership right now haha.
I was already on my financial thing before I found your channel but your videos definitely help me stay motivated. Thank you for all that you do 🙏🏽. Keep doing your thing .
Hey Leila I’m paying off a personal loan next week. Next month I will pay off my credit card balance and by April I will pay off my mom. Thanks to you and some other RU-vidrs I’ve been watching, I’ve seen the importance of making more than the minimum payments on my debt. It’s quite the sacrifice but I feel so good seeing the light!
In 2020 at age 60, I did the same thing except I jumped in the deep end. When I realized how much interest I was paying, I used my entire $30K savings to pay off my debt in one day. I figured if an emergency happened, I could use my credit card to cover it. Luckily, nothing bad happened and I was able to quickly rebuild my savings. Then I got to work on cutting expenses and investing the funds. 4 years later, I can retire comfortably with freedom and peace of mind.
What's the biggest flex? Being super attractive and capable? Being financially literate? Having a boyfriend that loves you? Nope, it is absolutely this. Well done!
I have one credit card left to pay off, although I have a car loan and student loan to pay off. I still feel good about, getting credit card payed off this year.
I have $3000 to go after being about $55000 in debt for many years. have been aggressively paying them down the last couple years. car is now wholly mine, no payments, and credit card completely paid off. moving forward i’ll be investing heavily and will never owe the banks a thing. i’ve learned my lesson! my first home will be paid in cash.
What I’ve discovered over time is that, if you proceed down a path that is right for YOU, it gets easier, simpler, and you start finding the world/universe working with you rather than you fighting against it. Been debt free for a decade or more now (mortgage was the last item to be paid off - 30 year paid off in 15)) and it is great! Congrats to all that have made it, and keep on plugging for those on the way, and for those needing to start, there’s no day like today!
10:10 Technically your net worth was increasing by thousands of dollars while you were paying off your debt. Even if your net worth was a negative number, it was improving by thousands per month. What you meant is your assets improved from zero to nearly 100K.
575 days until debt free including mortgage at age 51; currently 49 YOA with %1.86 interest on my five year mortgage term maturing in September of 2025. I’m investing the money I could use to clear it today and earning interest between now and mortgage maturity. It’s so tempting to erase all debt ASAP but patience is a virtue and a delay will pay off. The bank is losing at 1.86% and a money market investment currently doubles or triples that!
Leila thank for this video. Debt is sure a burden that nobody wants to shoulder. I think if Only I was a bit wiser and more frugal … I would not be in this situation. I had a lot of “opportunity costs” because of my indebtedness. I am planning to be credit card 💳 $7K debt free by end of 2024. Love the video and would be curious about you when decide on purchasing a home 🏡 👍
you made the right move by getting debt free over "Investing" most investments in 2024 are down. The more money is mostly "Theory" as in yes it does work for some people but most people are chasing the goal and don't actually get it. Just my thoughts and experience as an older person. To be clear, I know "Investment Properties" means debt, I'm referring to keeping consumer debt to invest. Lastly, Congratulations on becoming Debt Free! Kudos to you.
But you never know what the market was going to do, you were smart to pay off the debt. Well done! My only debt is my house, which actually has about 70k in equity now.
This was very motivational! I could relate to being emotional thinking about my last debt payment and the stress/sleepless nights. It’s a rough and sometimes lonely journey. I still have a ways to go but I am dreaming of that day 🌟
Haha… I’ve never seen investment interest big enough to outweigh the interest charged on debt. For that reason, paying off debt instead of keeping your money tied up in investment is almost always the right choice. The only exception I can think of is a low percentage intro rate .
Correction to what she mentioned about high interest rates. Even if you make the minimum payment, your debt goes down. It might not be a lot, but it will always go down. Your debt will NEVER increase (which she mentioned).
The "Paying down debt vs primarily investing" decision depends on how you feel. Personally, only cc debt truly bothers me and I didn't have any, so I was comfortable investing while paying down debt. But that's not for everybody
