The Slow Squeeze of Debt

Debt

The Slow Squeeze of Debt
April 16, 2018

Welcome to blog post #2 for today, hope you liked the first one about CARS . If you didn’t, or you disagree, make sure you let me know on Instagram or through the info I have on my Home Page!

I had a whole post written about credit cards and debt in general that I just deleted. It was full of math, and insights, and it was all fine and good. But it just didn’t get the point across like I had hoped it would. So here’s the point:

The debtor is enslaved by the creditor.

The debtor is enslaved by the creditor.

The debtor is enslaved by the creditor.

Repeat after me.

THE DEBTOR IS ENSLAVED BY THE CREDITOR.

If you have credit cards, mortgage payments, car payments, you are the DEBTOR and the billionaires running Chase, Wells Fargo, Citi Bank, etc. are the CREDITORS. Now what does that mean?

It means The Debtor (you) is enslaved by The Creditor (them).

Here’s what it means for your pocket. You have $1,000 in credit card debt. Your minimum payment is $14/mo so you pay just the minimum on time every month. The annual interest rate on your card is 17-22%, but we will go with the lowest of the two. So you paid $14 of your $1000 balance and now you only owe $986, wonderful. Tack on the interest for the month (17% annual interest charge divided by 12 months in a year), and your outstanding balance is back to $999.

You paid $14. Your balance only went down by $1. This is how many people live their lives. Every month they make their payments on time and still find that they can’t break the chains of debt. It would probably take these people 30-40 years to pay off their $1000 balance, and they would pay a total of over 6k. This is a short and simple example about how destructive minimum payments can be. Remember:

The debtor is enslaved by the creditor.

Now let’s say you have a traditional 30 year mortgage with a 4% fixed interest rate (WHICH IS HISTORICALLY LOW) on the house you just bought for $500,000. You put down the traditional 20%, so your mortgage debt is 400k. You make the minimum payment every month, just like you’re “supposed to”. After you’re done servicing your mortgage, you would have paid out almost 300k in interest to the almighty creditor. Paying a few bucks a month extra can SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the amount you pay over the life of your mortgage, and can reduce the term from the original 30 years to less than 20. If you had chosen a 15 year mortgage, the payments would be higher by about 1k/month, but you would pay 150k LESS in total interest. It SEEMS more expensive at face value because the monthly payments are higher, but it is actually 50% cheaper!

I am not going to stand by and allow people who were never taught these concepts to be enslaved by the people that do understand them.

If you have debt, it is an emergency. You should be running around like your pants are on fire to pay it off! You CAN NOT make the minimum payments. You have to pay above and beyond your expected payments if you will ever have a chance of releasing yourselves from the shackles of compound interest working against you.

We all work hard, we all want to go out to eat when we’re tired and don’t want to cook at home. If you have debt, you literally can not afford to waste any money on anything. You need to use all of your little green soldiers to service your debt and fight the battle to FREEDOM.

If you don’t want to be enslaved, get OUT OF THE MINDSET OF MAKING PAYMENTS.

PAYMENTS = DEBT = SLAVERY

I recommend reading The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey. Reason being that highly effective habit #1 is to be proactive, go out of your way. Apply Steven’s Habit #1 to your debt and you will be infinitely better off for it.

MDAS

If you thought this was helpful, terrible, or somewhere in the middle, please leave me feedback in the form of a Direct Message on instagram @MakeDollarsAndSense, or feel free to send me an e-mail/text to the information on my Home Page. I truly appreciate constructive criticism and opposing views, so bring em on!

P.S. New blog posts coming your way every Monday!

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