Financial Services Professional & Financial Literacy Advocate

It was March of 2013, my wife and I had been married almost a year now and had just recently found out we would be expecting our first child. We were living the “American Dream,” or so we thought! We had just bought our 1st home. We were just floating through life without a worry in the world. At this point, we were both working well-paying full-time jobs with a combined annual income of almost $200k! Yet, at the end every two weeks, it felt like we were running out of money. So something wasn’t right!

I wasn’t a reader at the time, but I read Dave Ramsey’s book The Total Money Makeover in about three days. After I explained the high-level stuff to my wife, we began our debt-free journey. We got our $1,000 emergency fund in place and then started on our $110,000 non-mortgage debt! I mean we had everything on credit. Two new cars, a mattress, a dog knee surgery, engagement and wedding rings, credit cards… everything!

I traded in my new car because it had some equity! That was a huge success! In an instant, we got rid of about $20,000 in debt and had about $4,000 left over to pay off a credit card! Better yet, my dad was going to give me his truck to drive. Many will read this and think, wow what a generous gift. And I agree it was absolutely generous but the reason my dad gave me this truck was because he didn’t want any guilt if he sold me a vehicle that fell apart. This truck was not pretty. It was about 20 years old. No air conditioning. The frame was rusting through. Regardless, this truck was my debt free truck and I drove it proudly.

17 months later, other than our home, we were completely debt free. The emotions of being debt free are really hard to explain. It is almost anti-climactic. There are no fireworks. No angelic babies in diapers with harps. All your hard work is finished. Something you worked so hard for should be celebrated by all…right? Well that was not the case. It was then onto the second part of our journey.

Fast forward four years. We now have two beautiful biological children and are foster parents. My wife is able to be a stay at home mom. We have a new home, one we could have never afforded as DINKS (double income no kids), even though we now make far less than we did. Our financial lives are much more settled. We have no debt. We have an emergency fund. We give back. We are investing in our retirement and are setting ourselves up to leave a monetary legacy to our children.
It is hard work, but it is so worth it. It takes a plan and a path and you can achieve it!