As the old year comes to an end and a new one is about to begin, many people make New Year’s resolutions. They vow to quit smoking or to lose weight or pay off debt. Here are some tips for making a clear my debt resolution stick.
First, as with diet and weight loss, you cannot go on a crash diet and keep up the regimen. Plan for a sensible beginning for changing your relationship with money. (Thanks to Suze Orman for this great exercise.) Start small to clear debt. Make a resolution that for a day, you won’t spend any money. You will not buy a single thing. No coffee, no snack, no lunch out. Either this will be painful for you or you already do this in general. Next step: pay cash for everything for a week. If you buy groceries, pay cash; fill up the gas tank? Pay cash. If you survive those two tasks, you will be ready for the third – don’t eat out at restaurants for a month. These three tasks are designed, in tandem, to capture the major bad spending habits that people have. Either their money floats away on a steady stream of daily coffees and lunches, or they just put everything on credit cards and when the bill is due, they pay the minimums or they spend way too much eating and drinking at restaurants and bars.
If you are serious about clear debt solutions, you cannot get much clearer than the above tasks. They will help you break out of what might be the habits of a lifetime. Clear debt comes with clear thinking. You can get debt help – if you need, it research debit consolidation or other clear debt solutions like loan modification. It also helps if you can write down your monthly expenses. Once you know how much money you need to support your current lifestyle, you can know, with certainty, if you need to cut expenses or beef up your income with a second job. Most people need to cut out indulgent expenses, but some people are in the rough position of not making enough money. They have an income problem, not a debt problem, per se. Take a truthful look at your situation and assess. Do you earn too little or spend too much? Only you know the answer to that.
Looking for Something? Search here:
(examples: auto, banking, college, credit cards, debt, frugality, insurance, investing, loans etc.)
