[ZenGum]

Originally Posted by BigV

A clarification:

wrt the credit cards--I do feel they were used in the situation when they were most needed, and mostly in a responsible way. But my reference to "melting" them was an allusion to the affect on the poor little plastic rectangle from *heavy use*. Industrial freakin use, and it was not an industrial grade tool.

I'm in the position now of having lived on credit for, say, three months. My new income isn't twice my previous level consumption, and I will have to live well below my means to retire the debt. That's the only way, of course, and I know that, and I'm really ready to do it. Looking forward to it. But I can't retire it at the rate I accumulated it, probably not at half the rate. :frown: But. I have a well established habit of paying down debt. It has been steadily diminishing since...dunno, maybe ten years. The unemployment caused the total debt level to increase, and there have been some high dollar expenses that increased the level as well (college for two, a new roof), but the number will go away.

Possibly tmi--as much as a I hate the debt load, I will not sacrifice our savings to accelerate the debt retirement. I have to save for retirement too, and there are no loans for living expenses when you're 80.

Originally Posted by BigV

Update:

Two credit cards have just been paid off!!!

Both cards were on auto-pay auto-pilot with the credit union, and so I didn't "really" see the money each month. But now that I don't have to pay them anymore, I could easily "see" the money again, and be happy for it. But.

But I still have a couple of credit cards to go. So I'm redirecting some of the cash flow previously used to pay off credit cards A and B to credit card C. C is also on autopilot, but now I'm able to shift it into a higher gear. By the way, I did some back of the envelope math on that card... The minimum payment meant that the balance forward would be reduced by 0.1% or so. Is that legal? Moral? Usurous? I digress. I am now paying at about 3.9 times the minimum payment. This one will take a couple more years to disappear, as I have no more low hanging fruit to harvest and redirect towards its retirement. Plus I have no guarantees that the balance will only go down. This is the last card to pay off (well, the last one that's an open account. I'm still paying down another closed account :sigh: ).

I mentioned that I'm taking some of that newly available cash flow and putting it toward this last credit card. What of the rest of that cash flow? Well, I have increased (not intitiated, but increased from an already respectable number) the amount I'm contributing to my 401k account. By a lot. I expect the net cash flow to *decrease* measurably. But for the first time in my career, I'm going to be within spitting distance of the Federal maximum dollar contribution limit. It feels scary good. Well, it feels good now, I have only just turned in my form. Check with me again after a couple of paydays...

Dear USA,

Please put BigV in charge of your economy. That is all.

Z