As Gail Vas-Oxlade (and probably a bunch of other people) says, money is the last taboo. I’ve had frank discussions about so many topics, but money never really seems to be one of them. I think this is ridiculous, and part of what is fueling the fire of Canadian consumer debt. In an effort to combat this, here are the pure, unadulterated facts about my debt:
My Original Debt
Car Loan: $11,282.45
In July 2011, my husband’s trusty neon was hit on the highway by a driver who failed to check her blind spot. Read more about that here. As a result the car was totalled and we needed a new one. I was not yet a PF crazed lunatic, so we bought a used VW Golf. I don’t regret it, I love that car. Probably should’ve bought something more reasonably priced, but I was still under the impression that since I had just graduated from university, I deserved a nice car.
I paid that car off on November 1st, 2013.
Student Loan: $26,825.38
I’m so happy this number isn’t higher. I went to one of the most expensive schools in the country in the most expensive city in Atlantic Canada. I got some help through school from parents but still graduated with about 40k in student loans. I successfully paid off my student loans in June of 2013.
Read about how I paid off $16,000 of debt in minutes.
Learn how some internet searching helped me pay off my debt faster.
Read about my last student loan payment.
Learn More
I started out with this much debt, but I’ve been working to get rid of it for almost two years now. I’m happy to report my hard work is paying off, and I’m debt free. To learn more about getting rid of debt, check out these posts.
You can also read a synopsis of how I paid off $38,000 of debt in 24 months.