My 29th birthday gift to me: No more credit card debt

A co-worker read a poignant quote yesterday.

Do one thing every day that scares you. – Eleanor Roosevelt

Well, I did something very scary today. I am trying to transfer $3,000 from two credit cards onto one with a 0-percent interest rate for 15 months. Meaning that I’ll have to stick to my Debt Dash/Snowball plan and budget to the T in order to pay this off by March 2016.

I’M FREAKING OUT!!!

Why did I agree to transfer that much?! Why didn’t I give myself breathing room and put $2,500 on the card? That $500 makes a difference.

According to my plan, I can pay off the transfer by February 2016. That’s just a month ahead of the introductory fee and the month of my 29th birthday.

So my 27-year-old self is making a pledge to my 29-year-old self that I will not burden her with high-interest credit card debt. She will most likely have student loan debt. We’ll continue the snowball to get rid of that eventually.

But in 14 months, I want to be out of this hole.

It takes a lot of will, discipline, courage and help to slay the debt monster. But it can be done. – Dave Ramsey

I will continue to freelance and use half of that money for debt. That will expedite the process.

I just received my first payment of 2015 for a freelance piece and was unsure of what to do with it. Perhaps, I’d try the three savings buckets system and split it equally for:

1. emergency savings
2. save to spend
3. retirement

But, no. I’ve got to use part of this freelance income to hit this balance transfer. Every little bit counts. It’s not cute to continue to be the slave to the lender.

The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender. – Proverbs 22:7

I’ve scared myself straight. I must make sacrifices to achieve this goal. My 29-year-old self deserves to be free of credit card debt.