💸 The Debt Diaries: June 2018
This month in money, mess, and progress... June was all about laser focus. We threw every extra dollar at the Visa, canceled that pesky Y membership, and crept closer to our first $1,000 payoff month. Let's see how it shook out.
💳 Debt Overview
Personal Loan
Starting Balance: $14,764.22
Payment: –$250.00
Interest: +$154.47
Ending Balance: $14,668.69
Debt Reduced: –$95.53
Visa Card
Starting Balance: $806.44
Payment: –$225.00
Interest: +$8.68
Expenditures: +$83.60 (Y membership — canceled this so it will be our last month on here!)
Ending Balance: $673.72
Debt Reduced: –$132.72
My Jeep
Starting Balance: $5,170.26
Payment: –$233.79
Interest: +$17.50
Ending Balance: $4,953.97
Debt Reduced: –$216.29
Jerry's Jeep
Starting Balance: $5,842.33
Payment: –$171.26
Interest: +$42.06
Ending Balance: $5,713.13
Debt Reduced: –$129.20
Mortgage
Starting Balance: $74,004.31
Payment: –$796.56
Interest/Escrow: +$677.03
Ending Balance: $73,884.78
Debt Reduced: –$119.53
Student Loans
Starting Balance: $51,012.24
Payment: –$400.92
Interest: +$275.28
Ending Balance: $50,886.50
Debt Reduced: –$125.74
📊 Grand Total Snapshot
Current Total: $150,780.79
💸 Where the Payments Went (Interest vs. Principal)
Total We Paid: $2,077.53
Went to Interest: $1,258.52
Went to Principal (Actual Debt Reduction): $819.01
That means only 39.4% of our payments went toward reducing the actual balance, which is just slightly down from last month’s 40%ish.
✅ Wins This Month
- No more expenses will be going on our Visa
- Almost hit a $1,000 debt reduction month!
⚠️ What I Struggled With
- We'll be losing a shift differential. Bummer!
💠Real Talk
This was a good month where we really made a concerted effort to throw any extra money we could at the Visa. Once that’s paid off, we’re going to snowball that amount onto the personal loan. We’d like to pay that loan down aggressively since the interest is so high (nearly 14%), so while the Visa is our current focus, that will be next.
We also canceled our Y membership that got charged to our Visa every month. That means — barring any emergencies — NO purchases will be made on that card any longer since that was pretty much it, and the balance will jump down a lot faster now! WAHOO! Looking forward to seeing how that impacts our balance for next month.
Getting close still to hitting a $1,000 debt reduction month. Could July be the one? Time will tell.
Jerry’s new daytime hours meant he lost the nighttime shift differential, so his checks will be the slightest bit smaller starting this month. Hoping it won’t impact our debt repayment too much, but even if it does a bit, it’s worth it for us.
I should also note that our sole focus right now is shared between debt repayment and savings. The reason behind that is because we’re saving for two things right now: Caleb’s preschool tuition and my maternity leave. Once those two things are over and paid for, I think our debt payments will jump up a bit. We will always continue putting money into savings, but we might lower that amount a bit to increase these payments when we can.
Looking forward to seeing how far we get in July!
No comments