Debt-free living is a possibility

No matter what your financial situation, there are ways to legitimately reduce your debt.

12:15 23 September 2013

If you have ever wanted to get out of debt, but haven’t known where to start, this is the place for you. It can be tricky to figure out the best way to get rid of debt. Let’s face it can be a little bit intimidating if we have a lot of debt.

Here are a few ideas that might help give you some hope and motivation to reduce your debt:

• Find free organisations and charities that can help give you advice on how to eliminate, or begin to reduce your debt load. If you receive advice from a qualified financial professional, you will know that you are getting advice that works.

 

• Whenever possible cut back on your monthly and yearly financial expenses. Do not think that just because your movie night does not cost much that it will not make a difference. It’s all about what you do with that money instead of going to the cinema. Take some time to be brutally honest with yourself about your spending habits. This can be very eye opening, but just remember that this is the first step to turning your finances around.

 

• It is important to pay more than the minimum amount due. If you don’t have a lot of extra money during the month to pay extra on all your bills, choose one of the bills with higher interest, but a lower balance. This should mean that your monthly payment on the bill is fairly high even though the balance isn’t that large. Put any extra each month into this same bill until it is paid off.

 

• Use the money—all or part of it—that you get from paying off that first bill and increase the amount you can use to pay off the next.