Ditch your debt this year with these 9 easy steps to becoming debt free in just 12 months.
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Why is it so hard to pay off debt? Why can you not get out from under those credit card bills no matter what income you make? Because debt payoff strategies take so long.
Getting out of debt takes so long, people get disappointed and give up. The fact is, paying off your debt doesn’t have to take so long and you can do it with a low income. You just need to know how to find extra money to pay bills, the secret debt payoff strategies that save interest and how to make your money go further.
In this video, I’m sharing exactly that, the nine strategies I’ve used to pay off debt. I’m revealing the most powerful strategies including the debt snowball and debt avalanche method and a secret strategy nobody uses. I’ll also show you how to find money in your budget you didn’t know was there.
I’ve used these tips to pay off debt and have interviewed people that have paid off $20,000+ in credit card debt in less than a year. The first six secrets to debt payoff will find money you didn’t know you had. The next two debt tips will help you pay off your bills faster and the last secret will put even more money in your pocket.
Stop being buried under credit card debt and get out from under it this year.
For more on the debt payoff strategies to get out of debt faster, check out this video
It’s controversial but debt consolidation saved me thousands in interest and helped pay off my credit cards. Check out this video to get my step-by-step
I used PersonalLoans to consolidate my debt after ruining my credit in 2009. Check your rate to pay off your debt –
1:53 How to Make Debt Payoff Goals for 2020
2:52 How Spending Challenges will Find Money You Didn’t Know You Had
4:15 How to Declutter and Ditch Your Debt
5:03 The Tough Decisions to Get Out of Debt Fast
6:33 The One Thing Keeping Everyone in Debt
7:54 The Cold Solution to Debt-Free Living
8:45 Debt Payoff Strategies to Save and Motivate
10:57 How to Save Money and Pay off Your Debt Quick
12:57 Making More to Beat Paycheck-to-Paycheck
Don’t Miss this Free Report – 5 Things about Credit that Will Shock You
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Joseph Hogue, CFA spent nearly a decade as an investment analyst for institutional firms and banks. He now helps people understand their financial lives through debt payoff strategies, investing and ways to save more money. He has appeared on Bloomberg and on sites like CNBC and Morningstar. He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation and is a veteran of the Marine Corps.
How to completely ditch your debt this year. By the end of this video, you’ll have the
nine-step process to get out of debt no matter What your income or how much you owe. I’ve used this strategy to pay off over
$15,000 in credit card debt and know others That have paid off tens of thousands more. We’re talking getting out of debt fast today
on Let’s talk Money. Beat debt. Make money. Make your money work for you. Creating the financial future you deserve. Let’s talk money. Joseph Hogue with the Let’s Talk Money channel
here on YouTube. I want to send a special shout out to everyone
in the community, thank you for taking a little Of your time to be here today. If you’re not part of the community yet,
just click that little red subscribe button. It’s free and you’ll never miss an episode. I’ve been wanting to put this video together
for a long time. We talk a lot about beating debt here on the
channel but I haven’t yet put together a Complete debt-free video so that’s what
we’re going to do today. I’m starting off with six quick ways to
find extra money to pay off your debt. Six tricks that helped me pay off over $15,000
in debt and that will help you find money In your budget. I’ll then give you three more steps to completely
pay off your debt by the end of the year, From payoff strategies to facing those biggest
challenges to debt free. At the end of the video, I’ll also be sharing
a link to a free report about five things You might not know about your credit report. I put this report together after building
my credit back up over 200 points and some Of the things I learned were really amazing
so be sure to stick around for that free report. I’ve got to put a little warning here first
though. Getting completely debt free in a year, whether
you’ve got five thousand or fifty thousand In debt, it’s going to mean some tough decisions. You need to commit to taking these ten steps
I’m going to share and seeing it through To your debt-free future. If you’re not ready to make that commitment,
I’d say you’re probably better off just
Clicking out to watch cat videos. Our first step here to debt free, and this
one is crucial before anything else, is to Sit down and make your goals real. Making those goals real doesn’t mean just
thinking them out for five seconds. It means sitting down and creating a story
with what you want your life to look like. What will you do on a daily basis when you’re
debt free? What will it feel like? How will your life be different? Write out this story on a piece of paper. Then start making your debt payoff goals. How much do you want to pay off in three months,
in six months? You’ll use some of the other steps in the
video to create these goals but the idea is That you have some shorter-term goals of how
much to save and how much debt to pay off. These smaller goals are going to feed into
your longer-term one-year goal. They’re easier to reach than that big goal
and they’re going to motivate you to keep Going when you reach them. With your goals done, it’s time to write
out your monthly budget, where your money Is going. Now I know I just lost half of you. This isn’t a budgeting video. We’re not going to be spending time skimping
and cutting from your budget but we need to Know where the money is going. Once you have that done, your first big money-saver
is going to be to plan spending challenges. I love these for quick little bursts of saving
money and they’re really going to reveal A lot about your spending. The way a spending challenge works is you
take one item from your budget, something You have a little control over like buying
clothes or other shopping. Then you’re going to challenge yourself
to cut that spending in half or cut it out Completely over the next two months. We’re not talking about going cold turkey
and not spending anything. We’re talking a short-term challenge of
a couple of months and on one or two spending Items at a time. These spending challenges work on so many
levels and I guarantee you’ll love them As much as I do.
By only taking one or two items from your
budget, you’re not trying to skimp and save Every penny. You can still have fun. You’re just experimenting cutting back on
a few things at a time. Besides saving a lot of money, this is really
going to show you what you don’t care about In your budget. Even after the spending challenge, you’ll
find that some of these things don’t matter That much and you’ll keep saving money. A blogger friend of mine, David, used this
spending challenge idea for just six months And saved over $18,000! Because these spending challenges are only
a couple of months, they are super-easy to Keep. You’re not trying to go a year without spending,
it’s eight short weeks so you’ll always See the finish line. What’s great is that eight weeks is right
around the time it takes to build new habits And break old ones. Even if you go back to spending a little more
after the challenge, those new habits are Going to drive you and help you save easier. Next is to do a complete clutter cleanse. Don’t worry, I guarantee it’s much easier
than it seems. A clutter cleanse means going room-to-room
in the house and pulling out everything you Don’t need, everything you don’t use. This means that treadmill you never used,
those movies you never watch, even the furniture You never sit on. Anything that isn’t being used regularly
or making your life happier, it goes on Craigslist Or eBay or where ever you can sell it. Old clothes can go to a consignment shop,
videos and books to half-price books to sell. Not only are you making a little extra money
here to help pay off your debts, you’re Also seeing what you don’t use. It might be a tough reality to face that you
wasted your money buying some of this stuff But it’s that wakeup we all need to keep
from wasting our money on more junk. Our fourth step, and this is going to be another
tough decision but it’s one that a lot of People need to make, is taking that cold,
hard look at how you’re getting around every Day.
I like watching the Dave Ramsey show, the
call-ins where people talk about how much Debt they have and then Dave yells at them
for a few minutes. It’s kind of a stress-reliever, right? What always amazes me about these, and you
see this on 90% of the calls, is how many People have new car payments they can’t
afford. Seriously, people just don’t seem to see
how a $600 new car payment is wrecking their Budget. That’s the average new car payment according
to the National Automobile Dealers Association And when you compare that to the average used
car payment of $378 a month, that’s over $200 you could be saving every single month! The NADA estimates that buying a used car
just three-years old instead of buying new Will save the average person over $130,000
over their lifetime. We see here that buying the same car just
four-years older can save you over thirty Grand, for one car. Besides the payment itself, insurance and
registration are going to be more on a new Car. Now I’m not saying you can’t have nice
things or that you should never buy a new Car. Enjoy your money! We don’t have a lot of time on this earth
and you have to enjoy it. But you can’t enjoy life if you’re constantly
stressed out from the burden of that debt. So you need to take a look at what’s parked
in the driveway. If it’s a new car and you have more than
$20,000 in debt, sell that sucker or trade It in. Get a used car that’s going to save you
a few hundred a month and use it to pay down Your debt! Our fifth debt-free step here is going to
be to fight lifestyle creep. This isn’t like fighting the creep down
the block, lifestyle creep is how your spending Seems to rise along with your income so you’re
always stuck in that paycheck-to-paycheck. How is it that we get tax refunds or a raise
every year but never have enough to save. You work overtime but the money just seems
to evaporate into thin air. It’s that problem of lifestyle creep. Our budget always seems to grow to eat up
whatever income there is. Fighting lifestyle creep just means writing
out that budget, knowing how much you’re
Spending and then making that effort to not
spend more just because you’ve got a little Extra. The best way I’ve found to do this is to
assign all your extra money to that debt payoff Plan or to a retirement investing account. By having a place for that extra money, it
stops being extra and that temptation to fill The gap with extra spending goes away. It might not seem like it will save much but
I’d say this one has saved us the most money. I started the blogs and online assets in 2014
and we had to really budget our money tightly At first. I made just $35,000 that first full year but
have grown it to over $90,000 in 2018. By not letting our budget grow as fast as
our income, we save over $36,000 a year for Retirement. Our final money saving trick here before we
get to those three debt payoff strategies Is going to be to freeze your credit card,
actually physically freezing it. This might seem a little extreme but it’s
going to help in a few ways that most people Don’t realize. McDonald’s found that people spend 56% more
when they use their credit card, you just Don’t get that mental accounting that limits
your spending when you pay with cash. Now I’m not saying to cut up your cards. I’ve got a credit card I use for business
spending and it’s always good to have one For emergencies if you don’t have an emergency
fund. Sending your credit back to the ice age is
going to still keep that option but it makes You think twice about spending. Just those six money-saving hacks are going
to give you thousands to work with to pay Off debt fast. None of them are terribly difficult and I
guarantee you they will help put you back On track. Now I want to share three more debt strategies,
ways to pay off your debt and restructuring Your debt to get it paid off as fast as possible. The first is how to prioritize your debt payoff,
and it’s amazing here how just a little Tweak in how you pay your bills can mean a
huge difference in getting debt free. There are two debt payoff strategies that
I’ve talked about on the channel quite a Bit, the avalanche method and the debt snowball
method. Picking one of these two strategies is going
to help you save money on interest and motivate
You when budgeting gets tough. I’ve detailed these two strategies in another
video and I’m going to link to that in the Video description below but I’ll give you
the outline here. In the debt avalanche method, you list out
your debts in order of interest rate from The highest rate to the lowest. You still have to make minimum payments each
month but you use any extra money, money we Found from those six savings strategies before,
to make extra payments on those bills with The highest rate. This method makes the most sense financially
because by paying off those high-rate debts First, you’re saving money. A lot of times, these high-rate debts are
going to be the highest payments as well so Paying them off faster is going to free up
a lot of room in your budget. That other method, the debt snowball method,
means listing your debts by order of amount Owed from smallest to largest. Here instead of making those extra payments
to the highest-rate debt, you’re paying More on the debts with the lowest amount owed. That means you’re going to see these small
debts fall off your list faster. And while that avalanche method might save
the most money, that snowball method is hugely Motivating. You’re going to see those debts fall off
your list fast and that’s going to help You keep going with your budget and saving
money. But even if you’re not following a specific
debt payoff strategy, I want you to try just Putting an extra $15 a month to ditching your
debt. Do more if you can but even this small amount
is going to go a long way and save you a lot Of money. For example, here we see four payment plans
for a traditional 30-year mortgage. Making normal payments would mean 360-months
on the loan but putting an extra $15 a month To the loan, you pay it off eight months earlier
and save over $5,700 in interest. That’s almost six grand in savings for less
than the cost of that venti venti mochachino. Use some of those six savings strategies we
talked about earlier though and put an extra $200 a month to that same mortgage and you’d
shave seven years off the loan and save over $46,000 in interest. The next step after picking one of these debt
payoff strategies is to get your rates lowered On the debt you have.
The average American owes over $16,000 on
credit cards with an average rate around 18%. That means you’re paying almost $300 a month
just to pay the interest charges. That’s going to make it impossible to get
out ahead so we’re going to focus first On these cards to lower our rates. The first thing you can do is just call the
credit company and ask for a six-month introductory Rate. Tell them you’re thinking about a balance
transfer to a zero percent rate but you’d Like to stick with them if they’ll match
the offer. A lot of times, this is all it takes. Getting a six-month introductory rate on that
$16,000 average balance means you’ll save Over $1,400 on a call that takes all of five
minutes to make. If your credit card company won’t lower
your rate, then start looking for those introductory Rate cards and make a balance transfer. Either way, you’re going to be saving money
that you can put into faster debt payoff. Another option is going to be to just consolidate
your debt into a personal loan. This means taking out a signature loan from
a site like personalloans.com to pay off those High-rate cards. Even if you can lower your rate 4% on a personal
loan, you’ll still save hundreds of dollars And you’ll get fixed payment and a payoff
date instead of that hamster wheel of credit Cards. We’ve got a detailed video on using consolidation
loans here on the channel that I’ll link To in the video description as well. So now you’ve got six savings ideas and
two debt payoff strategies to help you pay Down your debt but I want to talk about one
more step that most people miss and one that Is critical to creating your financial future. The problem is that so many people living
paycheck-to-paycheck are only looking at their Finances from one side of the equation. They get into debt or are trying to get out
ahead and they immediately go to budgeting And saving money. But how realistic is that when your budget
is already cut to the bone? They say you can’t squeeze blood from a
stone and you can’t save money from a budget That is barely enough to make ends meet as
it is. Instead, what I want you to do is to look
at this from the other side of the equation. Don’t look at it simply from the side of
saving money but actually making more money
As well. This doesn’t mean getting a second job. It can be as simple as spending just five
or ten hours a week in a side hustle, making That extra $200 a week to help pay down your
debt faster. You’re not only going to be getting out
of debt, you’re going to be happier because Everything isn’t depending on skimping and
cutting your budget to live like a miser. We’ve got a couple of videos on the channel
about making extra money, one that I’ll Link to below on the ten best side hustles
anyone can start, as well as how I make money Online. Doing all this, you’re going to be amazed
at how fast you pay off your debt. I’ve talked with people in the channel community
that have paid off over twenty grand in a Year from using these ten steps. It’s a great feeling when you get out from
under that constant burden of debt and I want You to feel it. Look for the link to that special credit report
research in the video description below. These are the five biggest surprises I learned
researching and improving my credit score, The five ways your credit affects your life. It’s going to make you a smarter user of
credit and help you create that financial Future. We’re here Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays
with the best videos on beating debt, making More money and making your money work for
you. If you’ve got a question about money, just
subscribe to the channel and ask it in the Comments and we’ll answer it in a video.
