This is how a young (*cough *cough) woman got excited about paying off debt...
Once upon a time on a cold night in December a broke and indebted girl was fumbling through random internet sites about personal finance. One message board commented on something called YNAB. Now what could such a strange acronym stand for? Being accustomed to acronyms in medicine (CHF- congestive heart failure, OSH- outside hospital, SSI- signs and symptoms of infection, AKI - acute kidney injury) I thought I could figure this one out, maybe with another glass of wine in me....wine was poured, but still no definition came to mind. So I succumbed and went to my trusty friend google. A HA!
YNAB - YOU NEED A BUDGET!
And boy were they ever right.
We DID need a budget and fast. (I'm an immediate rewards type of person) After reading multiple success stories about YNAB and paying off debt, I downloaded the 30 day trial, put the free apps on both our iPhones and sat down and made a budget with the super awesome software and my super awesome hubby. YNAB is a budgeting software that is fairly unique. It does not link to your bank account to automatically add transactions because it wants you to be mindful of your purchases. The phone apps allow my husband and I to enter purchases as we make them (lunch, gas, etc) which then syncs via dropbox so everyone can stay on the same page!
Since that day we have never looked back.
Now I'm not saying we always stick to our grocery budget or avoid going out to eat completely (definitely anti-mustachian in that sense, I'll get to that later). But it puts it all in perspective and helps us to plan for those quarterly expenses, yearly expenses, save for things like auto repairs, and keep track of all our bills.
My interest in YNAB led me to a podcast by the creator of the software. During the podcast he talked about a man who
paid off $90,000 in student loan debt in 7 months by changing his lifestyle, selling a bunch of material items, getting some roommates, and cashing out his savings. His blog is aptly named
No More Harvard Debt (he's a Harvard MBA). This blog is inspiring, his attitude towards debt is that it's a war we need to fight, an enemy that needs to be destroyed. And really, he is right. Outstanding student loan debt now stands over $1 trillion dollars! Let's get it together people....this is ridiculous.
No More Harvard Debt led me to a post on his blog that talked about another
man who retired at 30 years old...now that's something I needed to investigate, so I checked out his blog too. He calls himself
Mr. Money Mustache, and he has a ton of cost saving ideas, plus I love mustaches, so this all works out nicely. Check him out, his ideas will blow your mind.
YNAB led me to No More Harvard Debt which led me Mr. Money Mustache, I hope by now you can see a pattern emerging. There is a community of people at war against their debt and all it takes is a little bit of initiative to seek them out.
And now, I "mustache"....
