This post may contain affiliate links. Please refer to my Disclosure for more information.
4 Things to Do to Get Your Debt Paid Off
Do you feel like you can never stick with a plan to pay off your debt?!?
If so, this blog post is for you. Here are 4 things that will help you to finally get your debt paid off.
1) You need to know your “why”
You need to have a reason greater than just wanting to be debt free. It’s essential to have a “why” that is very strong. It may be so you don’t have anxiety every single day. Or so you have more energy and aren’t so exhausted from being stressed about your finances. It can be wanting to be able to spend more time with your family and friends. Wanting to experience other cultures and to expand your worldly perspectives. It can be wanting to break free from stress eating when you are stressed about your money. Or to be able to pay to take your family on a vacation. To be a positive role model for your children so you can teach them financial education so they don’t struggle as much as you have, etc.
Wanting to be debt free is great, but it isn’t good enough fuel to drive you to do what you need to do. It isn’t giving you a reason to stick to your plan, and it doesn’t remind you WHY you are doing it and what you will truly feel and experience when you have your debt paid off and you can do so much more and you have so much less stress in your life.
Related articles on speeding up debt repayment:
- 3 Tips for Choosing Which Debt to Pay Off First
- 7 Tips for Increasing Your Credit Score
- 11 Ways to Save Money on Groceries
2) You need to make your debt repayment a priority and you need to really commit to paying it off
This is one of the most common ones that I see with women. When you are doing 100 different things and saying yes to everything and everyone, you are actually saying no to you. You are saying no to speeding up your debt repayment. Look at it this way: the choice is yours. When you start to stand up for yourself and start saying no to things, that is when you start saying yes to making your finances a priority.
When you are starting on your money journey, you need to carve out space for you. In the beginning, you have many years of bad habits, misinformation and you don’t have the foundations of money learned yet. It is going to take some time to create new habits. If you never create time and space in your life to learn and implement healthy money habits and systems, how do you think you will be able to get ahead with your debt repayment and increasing savings? Saying no to other people and other things that you truly don’t want to be doing, that you don’t have to be doing, that you are doing to make other people happy, is saying NO NO NO NO NO to you. It’s time to start saying YES YES YES to you and your life.
You wish your debt was paid off. So far, you haven’t made the decision that I will have x debt paid off. You haven’t written down on a piece of paper that you ARE going to make it happen. I want you to write down on a piece of paper the date you are GOING to pay it off. Notice this is not the day that you are wanting to pay it off by. Write the month and year of when you want to have it paid off by. I also want you to write down a date to have a certain portion of it paid off by. This helps to break it down so it doesn’t feel so overwhelming. It also gives you little wins which will increase your confidence. These small achievements will help you build up momentum!
Money loves clarity and you have a much greater chance of reaching your goals if you physically write it down on paper. I am a HUGE advocate of writing down your goals by hand, it is actually proven scientifically that it has a lot more meaning and you do actually commit yourself more to goals that are written down in pen on paper.
Other Content You May Find Helpful:
- 6 Reasons Why Paying for a Financial Coach is the Best Money You’ll Spend
- How is a Financial Coach Different than a Financial Advisor?
- Frequently Asked Questions About Working with a Financial Coach
- How to Stay Motivated When Paying Off Debt & Saving
- How I Made Over $9000 Just by Selling Things I Already Had in My House
- How to Make Saving Automatic & Easy
- How to Plan Your Finances for an Entire Year (in under a couple of hours)
- Why You’ve Failed at Budgeting in the Past & How to Finally Succeed
- 9 Things You Are Spending Way More Money on Than You Think
- 3 Real Reasons You Are Overspending & How to Overcome It
3) You need to take into account your upcoming bills before putting extra money towards debt
You need to take into account your UPCOMING expenses and be saving for them, before putting extra money towards your debt payments. I know you won’t like hearing this, but this is a huge reason why you feel like you are getting ahead on paying off debt, but then a couple of months later you fall behind again, because you have a month with more expenses.
When it comes to expenses that aren’t fixed expenses or day to day spending (like groceries, eating out, toiletries, pet food, etc), these expenses need to be taken into account on a monthly basis. These are your “non-recurring” and random expenses, the ones you pay quarterly, twice a year, yearly, basically anytime but monthly. Examples of these expenses are: Christmas gifts, other gifts, car repairs, clothing, travel, vehicle registrations & insurance, yearly memberships, etc.
How you take into account these expenses is by writing down all of them that come up throughout the year and figuring out approximately how much they will cost you for the year. Then you take the yearly amount and you will divide it by 12, to know how much money you need to be saving every single month for that expense. Then you will open up separate savings account for each of those expenses and you will transfer, once a month, your monthly amounts into each of these accounts. [I highly recommend banking with a bank where you have no bank fees].
Then the money that you have left over after paying your fixed expenses, money used for your day to day spending and money transferred to each of the “savings buckets,” now that extra money is what you truly can put towards paying down your debt.
I know it probably sounds like it is going to be slower paying off your debt at first, but it is sustainable and progress towards paying off your debt!! Which is something to be excited abotu! Knowing that you aren’t going to be stuck in the cycle of paying off debt, getting back into it and repeating it for years and years like most people do.
Click here to download my Realistic Budget template!
4) You need to have accountability
If you don’t have accountability, you can easily give up on yourself. Telling your goal to someone else makes you work harder. You stick closer to your goals because you don’t want to disappoint the other person. Pick someone you trust. This can be a significant other, friend, family member, or financial coach. Pick someone and tell them your dollar amount goal and your date you are going to achieve it by. It’s the same as weight loss. When people tell someone their weight loss goal and have someone to stay accountable to, they lose more weight. They even do it within their goal time frame. As humans, we will stick to something better if we have told someone we are going to achieve something.
I know how you feel.
I decided to pursue both my Power Engineering and my Holistic Nutrition education. This was on my own terms. I did it without taking out any loans, paying for it myself and not working while I was away at school. I didn’t know how I was going to make it happen exactly. The most important thing was that I set that goal. I had a date of when I would start and when I would finish. I knew the exact times that I wasn’t going to be able to earn an income. Managing my finances very closely during those periods of time was essential.
Click here to download my Realistic Budget template!
Frequently Asked Questions about Financial Coaching
Enjoyed this content and want more? Follow me on Instagram: @mandyythomas
Do you have any questions or anything to add? Leave me a comment and I will respond back to you!