Debt

I just wanted to thank you for your amazing book. I happened to see it on a web broadcast on Yahoo. I bought it and have read it at least 4 times now. We implemented many things you said in our lives. Within two months of reading the book, we had paid off two of our major debts — our son’s medical bills and my student loan. We were also putting savings aside at the same time.

We had been working hard at getting out of debt when my husband quit his job. We had to cut back to just the minimum debt payments for a while and unfortunately accumulated more debt while we struggled to get by. After reading the your book we did many of the things you suggested. We cut out as many non-essentials as possible, had two yard sales, three months apart, and sold other items through the newspaper and word of mouth. Our church and friends helped us out  with food and some other expenses.

We bought our first home in 1993. It was 1800 square feet and we paid it off in just seven years. Not bad — I thought. Both my husband and I were working and once we got serious, all of my paychecks went to paying off the house. But over time, things changed. We had two babies 18 months apart and we began to feel cramped, and then our area was re-districted into a less than desirable school district. So after ten years in our home, three without a mortgage, we bought “the big house” including a corner lot, with a pool in the back.

One afternoon in the early years of our marriage, Annette sat on one of our old, dilapidated, orange-and-brown plaid couches, which we purchased from missionaries for $25, and cried.

She cried because we were committed to living within our means and those means were pretty meager at that time — just $838 per month take-home pay.