I saw an interesting story yesterday about a young woman who blogged her way out of $22,000 in debt. She had less than $100 in her checking account, just $100 worth of credit left on a card with a $6,500 limit and was trying to pay off a $10,000 auto loan and $4,500 in student loan debt.
Blonde on a Budget
She created a blog about her issues, which she initially thought she would keep private. However, she soon discovered there were many other people blogging about personal finances and their own money situations so she went “public” and found that this community really embraced her efforts.
”No spend days”
In addition to creating a budget, this young woman committed to having as many “no spend days” in the week as possible. These eventually changed into 30 day long “challenges,” in which she tried to buy just gas, groceries and necessities. She even gave herself an allowance each week.
The accountability factor
Once she started posting about her financial issues and weekly spending reports, she learned about the power of accountability. She was able to resist making numerous impulse purchases because she didn’t want to have to report them to her readers.
All of this work
Thanks to all these efforts, she has paid off more than $22,000 of her debt since June of 2011 and even saved a little on the side.
It’s not for everyone
While it’s commendable what this young woman was able to do just through blogging, this clearly isn’t something that everyone could do. In most cases, people find debt relief only through debt consolidation, a debt consolidation loan or consumer credit counseling.
Debt consolidation through debt settlement
One way to consolidate and eliminate debts that’s become very popular over the past 10 years is called debt settlement or debt negotiation. This is where you contact your creditors and offer to make lump sum settlements of your debts – but for far less than you owe. For example, you might contact one of your credit card providers where you owe $7,500 and offer to settle for $4,000. If you have not been making even the minimum monthly payments on that credit card for the past six months, the company might accept your offer. You will also have to convince it that you’re in really dire financial straits. And you would need to have the $4,000 ready to send off to that creditor to settle the debt. And this is where it can get sticky. Let’s say you owed a total of $21,000 in unsecured debts. Assuming you were able to settle them for $10,000, you would need to have $10,000 in cash to pay the settlements. Of course, if you had $10,000, you probably wouldn’t be having a problem with debt. In addition, you have to be a good “sales person” to sell your settlements as most lenders are not at all anxious to reduce your debts by thousands of dollars.
Put our partners to work
You can probably see from this example why so many people have chosen to put our debt consolidation providers to work to settle their debts. In fact, we are so sure we can get your debts settled in a reasonable amount of time and with an affordable payment plan that we offer a simple 100% satisfaction guarantee – if you are ever unsatisfied with our recommended debt relief programs you can cancel at anytime without any penalties or fees.
Call our toll-free number today or fill in the form at the top of this page. Let us get started helping you get debt relief. You’ll feel better knowing you’ve done something positive about your debt and you’ll take a lot of the stress out of your life.