Tell All Tuesday: Setting October Goals
Welcome to another edition of Tell All Tuesday, where I go over my current debt numbers and what actions I took to reduce my debt this past week, and also what plans I may have going on now or in the future towards debt reduction. This week was a week of snow flurries with many little snowflakes going out to my credit cards. After which, happily, I can now go back to using the singular credit *card*. Whew.
First, the current updated numbers:
Current amount owed:
- Credit Card (Citibank): $5,049.61
- Student loan: $12,038.71
- Spouse student loan: $12,308.71
- Car loan: $4,001.78
Summary:
- Debt at start of blog (6/19/07) : $36,451.71
- Current total as of 10/02/07: $33,398.48
- Principal paid to date $3,053.23
- % debt paid (from NCN Network Chart): 8.38% (up from 8.29% last week)
So, a little bit of progress this week. The student loans and car loan all stayed the same, and will for a little while yet. I was able to make some small snowflakes that had a big effect overall. First, the above numbers do not reflect that my Capital One statement posted, and I was able to use my snowflake money saved up from surveys and craigslist sales to pay off all the interest accrued before my balance transfer ($28.13) so that card is now done. I had $8.87 remaining to snowflake, and I combined that with $9.65 profit from the ebay sale to snowflake $18.52 on 9/27/07 to the Citibank card. I then made another craigslist sale for $12.50 which I snowflaked on 9/28/07 also to the Citibank card. All future snowflakes will be going to Citibank until it is paid off.
Therefore my NCN Network chart % did go up slightly, but not much. But knowing that if I stay focused and keep chipping away at it, I can get this credit card debt paid off before any interest accrues is a great feeling.
I again have a $100 goal for alternative income received in October. I am not sure how I’ll reach that, though. We are going on vacation for a week in the middle of October, so I don’t want to post any more craigslist ads until we return. I did relist the pair of shoes that did not sell on Ebay, and, well… they are still not selling. I do have a potential craigslist sale this weekend, and two pending survey checks totalling $15. I am also applying any money I get from survey site referrals directly to debt, but I don’t think I will see any of that until at least November. So, we’ll see. I haven’t come up with a better plan yet. I’m still thinking about it. Maybe listing things on craigslist on the 22nd will be enough time to sell a bunch of it before the 31st. As long as I list things!
So, I’m looking forward to Friday when I can snowflake last month’s little surplus and I am also looking forward to… vacation. 
~J
October 2nd, 2007 at 12:47 pm
Congratulation. I think you are doing well with your debt, so keep up the good work.
October 2nd, 2007 at 1:21 pm
Slowly but surely! You can do it. When I was paying down my cards, every month I would call the company and ask for a lower interest rate. Sometimes they could lower it, sometimes they’d say try again in the future.
Either way, it doesn’t hurt to try.
October 3rd, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Thanks!
@Kacie – thanks for the great tip! My credit card interest is now at 0% until September 2008 but I will remember that if I can’t get it all paid off before that!