Jen’s Journey

Well it’s almost here, so thought I would write my goals and thoughts down and see next year how close I get. First off this year has been somewhat stressful, and great at the same time! Stressful because of all the debt and still trying to get a final answer on our house, but we made hugh progress because of my unexpected bonus and hope to continue making progress in the new year. A recap -

My debt started at about $140,000 - not including any of the houses we own. To date this is what has happend:

14K - 401K loan - they told me I defaulted on this, (read my other post, basically I think they just screwed me but I’ll deal with it and move on) I will have to take the hit on my taxes this year so - $14,000 - gone

25K car - got this down to $23275 - and will keep making my payments

4K - other CC’s - paid these off

1K - reserve line - paid off

12K - Business CC - down to $11750 - will keep making payments

72K in CC - debt settlement - settled one for $6376 - settled 2nd one for $4100 - total $10476 - which leaves two cards -balance for both of these is about $49K - but I think I will need 20K to settle.

So using what I truely “owe” at this stage and the total of CC in debt settlement I know owe: $96025 and reduction of 31% of our debt - now using what I think I can settle the last 2 CC’s for about $20K - total debt would be about $67025 a reduction of 52%. Pretty good, but still not good enough, our house is still killing us so I need to get this back on track and then put every cent into this debt so we can try and work on our HELOC. I want to get our bills down to the point of just my income, not using any other sources. This would be a hugh relief.

So my goals for 2008:

Pay off Business equipment loan - currently at $8741 - I made both Jan/Feb payments to just stay alittle ahead

Pay off Business CC - $11,755

Pay off 2 cards in DS - $20,000 estimate - might need less maybe more

Make regular payments to Car (0% interest) year end balance would be $17995

Also- if we get to keep our house (working with the 1st lender now) try and pay at least 5K towards the 2nd loan - this also involves bringing it current and then paying down 5K on principal.Pay all the medical bills from my hubby’s surgery - Estimated 5K

Put $300 away per month in other investments. Total for they year - $3600

Total I need - $59,376

Well considering I only “take home” for the year about $60000 (after taxes, 401K etc) seems I have an uphill battle, but I’m thinking of getting another less phyically demanding job, also looking to my hubby to get a part time job, and my take home doesn’t include any of the bonus type things and embroidery $ we get through out the year. So all those funds can go straight to this plan. Lofty goals I know and if I don’t make it I’m not going to beat myself up about it, it did take time to get all this debt so it will take time to get out of it. But at least I finally made progress! Our debt is finally going DOWN! after years and years, having a plan, reading the Women in Red boards to keep me accountable and the DebtCC forum for all kinds of great information and watching what we are spending, we are finally seeing some progress. But I’m not perfect and with the new year also brings new temptations, so need to keep that all in check and move in the right direction.

So happy new year everyone! 2008 is going to be great!

Oh yea - one last personal goal - start working out again, I did so well until the end of Oct, lost 10 LBS now I need to get back on track and lose the last 15 I’ve wanted to for some time. Financial and personal well being, that’s a great 2008 goal!

Hello everyone! Well it’s a wonderful Sunday morning, I’m just sitting here drinking my coffee and surfing / reading as I always do multiple forums, finance info, etc and came across a post that had a great web site listed. This web site is a list of the “worst” collection agencies. As anyone who has been reading my blog knows, I have a Citicard that went into collections after only 3 months, and the collection agency it went to was Client Services, inc.

So this morning while surfing and finding this link, I thought I would check to see if this agency was on the list. Because my experience with them is they try to strong arm you and they were pretty rude, after I didn’t accept a settlement offer from them they called me back, I asked them to stop calling, to which “Trisha” the agent responded, “IT DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY”!! in that type of voice, I then proceeded to tell her “yes it does if I send you a cease and desist letter” and hung up. I then faxed the letter that day and sent one certified mail. Haven’t heard a thing from them. So I checked this company out and what do you know, they are listed on the site as one of the worst CA’s, pretty interesting reading, and the user comments are pretty interesting as well. Just basically mimicked my exact same dealings with this horrible company. But make sure you know your rights, and if you need to send a Cease and desist letter, in my letter I told them they could write me or email me, but NO calls. This has seemed to work so anyone with a Citicard, keep this in mind, also if you want to check to see if CA’s your working with are on the “list” here is the web site:

Bud Hibbs