We Are DEBT FREE!

*Disclaimer – We are NOT financial advisors or professionals. We do not have all the answers. There is no “one size fits all” approach to the debt free life, but please read our story and get inspired as to how you can become debt free and financially free yourself*

As of March 2021, our family is OFFICIALLY DEBT FREE!!!

No more student loan payments.

No more car payments.

No more credit card payments.

NO MORE DEBT!

We paid off $100,000 in six years!

Sounds amazing right?

This is something you too can accomplish if you work hard, stay diligent, and stay focused on your goal of a debt free life.

So how did we do it?

When I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2017, the life we once knew ended.

Being diagnosed with a disorder or illness will do that for you. It puts EVERYTHING into perspective. It shakes you internally and externally where you are no longer who you once were.

During my treatments and healing, I spent a lot of time at home sleeping and recovering.

I looked around at the house my husband and I bought together the same day I heard the words MS in an exam room and I felt an extreme amount of anxiety.

We were twenty-three years young and we have ALREADY filled a three bedroom, one and a half bath home.

HOW ON EARTH DID THAT HAPPEN?!?!

Thus began our families journey toward minimalism and the debt free life.

We read books, listened to podcasts, and read blog posts about minimalism and living with less.

We became very fond of The Minimalists, Courtney Carver, and Joshua Becker. They gave us motivation to maintain the minimal lifestyle and keep working toward the life we wanted.

Minimalism isn’t just about your physical items. We took a hard look at EVERY nook and cranny of our life and this included our finances.

When looking at our income and expenses, our hearts grew saddened to realize that we would be paying off our student and car loans WELL into our thirties – not to mention the house!

The dream began to come to light, “what if we worked together toward becoming debt free?”

This small seed of an idea began to take root in our minds and hearts and together, my husband and I, formulated a plan.

Dave Ramsey’s idea of “the debt snowball” spoke to us and we listed out ALL of our debt – largest to smallest and started attacking each piece.

At this time we were still living in our home and we became a one income family (I am fortunate enough to be a stay at home mom and a yoga instructor).

We had the debt free life dream in our heads, but it wasn’t coming fast enough.

So I had the crazy idea and pitched it to my husband, “What if we sell the house, lose the mortgage payments for now, pay off the cars, and attack the student loans?”

We did our research and decided to sell our first ever home and move BACK into an apartment.

At this time in 2019, we had an eight month old little boy and our adopted dog.

All of us were moving back into a three bedroom apartment until we could pay off our debt.

As fate would have it, we sold our house, lost the mortgage payments, paid off our car loans FULLY, and began to attack our student loans.

At this time, our ONLY debt was the student loans. And when I say “only debt”, I do want to state that we had $50,000+ STILL left on the loans.

When we moved into our apartment (which we love by the way), we created a firm written budget.

We listed out all of our income and expenses. We were honest with ourselves and each other about where we spent our money and where we could improve.

This written budget is CRUCIAL to staying on track and KNOWING your money.

If you don’t have a budget, create one now.

Back to our story.

We are living in our apartment as a family, making DOUBLE payments on our student loans monthly and slowly watching the loan amount come down.

Then, 2020 came. Yeah, that lovely year of a pandemic.

Our family was fortunate. My husband was able to keep his job and work from home. I was able to offer virtual yoga classes while being a stay at home mom. Our income didn’t change, but our expenses did.

Memberships, shopping trips, family trips, frivolous spending opportunities all stopped – more money was staying in our pockets rather than being spent.

I am going to share something shocking: The pandemic in 2020 helped our family become debt free SOONER.

We updated our budget for the quarantine life and we had more money to put towards the student loans.

We got to a point where our savings account had MORE than what we owed on the student loans.

We had to make a decision, do we deplete our savings to pay off the loans?

We decided against that route as we didn’t feel safe having nothing in savings to fall back on in case of an emergency.

We stayed true to our budget, continued to make double payments on the loans and continued to save.

We finally got to a point where we had the ability to pay off the student loans FULLY AND have enough in savings to keep us safe and secure.

So we pulled the trigger, took out our $19,000+ from savings and PAID OFF THE STUDENT LOANS IN FULL!

(Please note we still had an emergency fund)

We made our LAST EVER student loan payment in March 2021.

It wasn’t a reality for us until we logged in to our back account to see $0 next to the loan.

It REALLY became a reality when my husband was paid and we were able to KEEP ALL OF THE MONEY IN OUR OWN POCKET.

We are debt free.

No loan payments and FULL financial freedom.

It feels amazing. I don’t mean to brag, but this milestone has been on our hearts for SIX YEARS.

It wasn’t easy, but it was and will continue to be worth it.

We just updated our budget and seeing how much we can save and invest made all of the hard work worth it.

Our decision to become debt free will not only enhance our life, but it will enhance our son and daughters life.

Financial freedom is truly a wonderful thing, and you too can become debt free with hard work, determination, and your budget.

*That was the long portion of our story.

We appreciate you reading it and we hope it encourages you to work toward the debt free life and financial freedom.

We would like to offer you some quick hacks, so read below and stay inspired.*

Quick Debt Free Hacks:

–Make a written budget and stick to it.

*Creating a written budget allows you to see where you spend your money. The more you know your money, the better decisions you can make to have your money work FOR YOU, not against you.*

*We used an excel spread sheet to create a budget, but free apps do exist out there to help you.*

*Actually do a WRITTEN budget. None of this “Oh I know where I spend my money” excuses. If you knew where you were overspending, you would have made a change by now. We humans need to be humbled and SEE where our money is coming and going. Create a written budget and be honest with yourself.*

-Live WELL below your means

*Spend less than you make.*

*Stop trying to keep up with all the influencers on social media and focus on PAYING OFF DEBT*

*Look for ways to increase your income – sell your un-used items (we all have items that can be sold). Have a skill that can help others – offer your services at a small price and tell them you are working toward the debt free life.*

*Buy used, don’t buy new – better yet, DON’T BUY AT ALL*

-Look at ways to save money in EVERY aspect of your life

*You have a written budget and there ARE areas you can save – cancel subscriptions, unfollow people who make you want to spend excess money, downsize, and sell the expensive home/car*

*Tip: You do need to eat, but you DO NOT NEED to EAT OUT. If you catch yourself spending a lot of money eating out/having takeout, get rid of the eating out portion of your budget and buy ALL of your necessary food from the grocery store.*

-Have an accountability buddy and work together

*If you need a buddy to help you when you feel like spending money or giving up, reach out to us or check out the debt free communities online. There is always motivation and inspiration to stay true to the debt free life.*

*Need a quick kick in the pants to stay on course – log into your bank account and see how much you owe on your loans. You have the power to pay this off now, or years from now. Choose to pay off your debt now and don’t hit that purchase button. (Seriously, back away from online shopping)*

-Check out Dave Ramsey and his team for free resources and inspiration

*We personally did NOT pay for a plan with Dave Ramsey, but they do exist if you feel the need for extra help. His team and website have a TON of free recourses and they even have a podcast that you can call in and get SPECIFIC answers to your money questions. We emailed Dave Ramsey’s team with a specific money question and they helped us find a solution.

-Becoming debt free isn’t the “end”

*Once you have become debt free, this is one LARGE piece of a beautiful puzzle.*

*Dave Ramey’s team has other steps to take AFTER becoming debt free (3-6 months of an emergency funds, investing, save for college, pay off home, build wealth and give).

*Your future self, your family, and your children will benefit from your decision to become debt free and have financial freedom.*

Now that we are debt free, our next goal is to save for a home. We already have 8-10 months saved for an emergency fund, we have been investing with Northwestern Mutual since BEFORE we were married, and we have savings accounts for both of our kiddos building.

We definitely DO NOT have all the answers, but we have found what works for our family and being debt free will make our lives less stressful and filled with MORE FREEDOM!

*If you know anyone who could benefit from this post, but sure to share it with them.*

We are honored to have you on Team Tanck and we CANNOT wait to watch YOU become DEBT FREE and enter FINANCIAL FREEDOM!

TANCKS for reading.