Monthly Student Loan Debt Roundup

I'm on the countdown to being in the $110's instead of the $120's in student loan debt. Oh for the day that it will be under six figures. I hope I'll still have some readers out there to celebrate with me when it hits a big fat zero. :-)

Unfortunately, a $200 payment I made a few days ago to my Perkins loan hasn't shown up yet so it looks the balance has increased instead of decreased. :-(

The good news, as always, is that the overall balance has gone down and I now owe $120,793.25 in student loans!

Here are the details:

12 Charities in 2011 - March

So far this month I've donated to two charities - my alma mater (undergrad) because they were running a matching program where every donation made would be matched by some richer alums. Also we were competing for the most donations against a rival school. Note for charities - make donating fun. So far I think we're winning but the contest ends tomorrow. I gave them $25.

I also gave $25 to the American Cancer Society because someone near and dear to me is running in a Relay For Life. I think they're a very worthy organization, and as my family has been touched by cancer, I support their efforts to research and possibly find a cure one day.

And giving back feels good. :-)

I hope everyone else participating in the challenge found a great charity to support this month.

Where it Went 3/02 - 3/15

I narrowly avoided my old nemesis, the Evil Overdraft Monster this pay period. All because I forgot I had to go to the eye doctor. Oh and I bought concert tickets, but since the latter was put on a credit card I just now paid them off (will be accounted for in the next budget).

In short, I blew my budget, but I needed an eye exam because of all the problems I've been having and while my insurance pays for all the opthamologists I've been visiting, opthamologists know nothing about contacts and can't give me a prescription for them. And, as I've explained before, while contact prescriptions are only valid for one year, most insurance companies (including mine) only pay for a complete eye exam every two years.

Today, I get to spend even more money ordering new contacts online. I opted not to order them from Walmart where I had my exam because I found the same brand for much cheaper at lens.com.

Anyway, long explanation over. Here are the dirty details.

Budgeted/Actual

Joint account - 400/400
Defaulted Student Loan - 260/260
Credit Card - 200/100
Groceries - 75/82
Health - 60/50
Gym - 33/33
Charity - 20/25
Misc. - 185/170

Concert Tickets - 0/200

Eye Doctor - 0/92

Which means I need to account for $117 in the next pay period so everything resets itself perfectly. Boo.

I am, however, very excited to be able to see again...especially with all the concerts and fun stuff we have planned for the warmer months.

Budget 3/2 - 3/15

The extra paycheck plan is in effect. Since the month of March will have three paychecks, there's a little breathing room in this one....which has to go to my joint account for our joint debt and fun stuff pay off account....including the upcoming Mexico trip.

There's a lot happening that I haven't been able to write about yet. One of us may be getting a new job. We owe taxes. We have a list of wants a mile long and are trying to learn about patience and compromise. Sometimes we're really freaked out or frustrated about money. Welcome to married life, I guess. I will hopefully have some news really soon.

In the meantime, I figured I'd make myself accountable and do a budget post while I dream of Mexico, a trip that's still months away but already being paid for thankfully and not so thankfully.

Starting Balance = $1233*

Joint account - 400
Defaulted Student Loan - 260
Credit Card - 200
Groceries - 75
Health - 60
Gym - 33
Charity - 20
Misc. - 185

*Includes $45 being taken out after taxes (boo!) for my pension buy back.

Miscellaneous seems really high right now but I'm hoping to make an even bigger credit card payment. Just don't want to set myself up for failure.

It snowed today so I have warm happy Mexican vacation thoughts on my mind.

Net Worth February 2011

I can't believe it's finally March! And I'm $1200 richer than I was in February. That feels good. My net worth is -$107,237.





Cash: This has stayed the same. I have more cash waiting to clear my account but then I'm sending it on to our joint account to pay off debt.


Retirement: My 457 account balance stands at $9,213. I have approximately $5258 in my pension (refundable until vested). And finally I have contributed $1000 in my Roth I.R.A. and for some reason that makes sense when my financial advisor explains it, it's only in a Money Market account now. This makes for a grand total of $15,471 saved for retirement.

Student Loans: These are at the LOWEST THEY'VE EVER BEEN at a whopping $121,418.

Credit Card: Not much progress yet as we're scrambling to pay off joint debts first.