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Episode 233 - What We Would Have Done Differently When Paying Off Debt

Debt can be a daunting and overwhelming burden for many individuals, but it is essential to remember that there is always a way out. In a recent episode of our podcast, we discussed what we would do differently if we had to tackle debt all over again, armed with the knowledge and experience we have gained on our journey to financial freedom. The insights and reflections shared by our team shed light on valuable lessons that can help accelerate your own debt payoff journey. 

 

Key Takeaways and Recommendations for Your Debt Payoff Journey 

The reflections shared in this episode offer valuable insights and recommendations for those embarking on their debt payoff journey. Here are some key takeaways to consider: 

Simplicity and Consistency: Avoid overcomplicating financial matters and focus on consistent money management practices. 

Seek Guidance and Accountability**: Find a community, mentor, or accountability partner to support you through your debt payoff journey. 

Let Go of Shame and Embarrassment: Don't allow societal pressures to hold you back from seeking help and making progress towards financial freedom. 

Address Behaviors and Mindset: Focus on changing behaviors and attitudes towards money, not just on making payments and numbers. 

Surround Yourself with Like-Minded Individuals: Seek out and connect with people who share similar financial goals and values to stay motivated and on track. 

Embracing the Journey to Financial Freedom 

Paying off debt can be challenging, but it is a journey well worth taking. By learning from the experiences and reflections of others, you can gain valuable insights to help you navigate the path to financial freedom. Remember, it's never too late to start making positive changes and taking control of your financial future. As you move forward on your own debt payoff journey, consider the lessons shared in this episode and use them to  guide you towards a brighter financial future. 

Resources Mentioned

Get better results with your finances in 30-60 days - GUARANTEED. Watch this video to learn how! - https://www.debtfreedad.com/payoff-debt-in-60-to-90-days 

Free Tools and Downloads at www.debtfreedad.com

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Episode Transcript: 

Brad:  

So I recently got a question that really got me thinking. Someone asked me, Brad, if you had to tackle debt all over again, what would you do differently? And I got to tell you. This question sat with me for a bit, especially considering the valuable lessons our podcast team and especially I have learned on our journey to financial freedom. We're excited to share some insights on what we would do differently now, armed with the knowledge that we've gained on our journey, and we're hoping to help you accelerate your debt payoff journey by listening to this episode. Stay tuned for some valuable lessons.

Speaker 2:  

You're listening to the Debt-Free Dad Podcast with Brad Nelson. Brad and his co-hosts experienced the anxiety of living paycheck to paycheck before learning the fundamentals of financial success. They are now on a mission to empower regular people to pay off their debt for good and enjoy happier, less stressful lives. Keep listening for inspirational interviews, tips, tricks and practical advice to gain financial freedom.

Brad:  

Hey guys, welcome to today's show. I am Brad Nelson, founder of Debt-Free Dad. I paid off about $45,000 of debt, have been debt-free now for 11 plus years, outside of my mortgage. I've also been fortunate enough to help thousands of other people save and pay off tens of millions of dollars over the years with the work that we do here at Debt-Free Dad.

Amber:  

And I'm Amber Taylor. I paid off $54,000 in just 18 or 20 months since May of 2018. And I've been debt-free then, outside of my mortgage.

Chris:  

And my name is Chris Hawkins, and my wife and I started our journey in 2005. And from 2005 to 2008, we paid off just under $100,000 in debt, and since then we have been debt-free, except for our house.

Ryan:  

And my name is Ryan Nelson. My wife and I paid off $160,000 in debt over eight years and we have been debt-free for about four years now.

Brad:  

Now, after listening to today's episode, if you want to take your financial journey just a step further and you'd like to get better results with your finances in as little as 30 to 60 days, I'll be sharing some details about that later on in the show. So, guys, open discussion on this episode. If you had to start completely over and go all the way back to the drawing board, man, I don't even want to think about that. What would you do differently, knowing what you know today and having gotten out of debt? Now all of us it's taken. You know different amounts of time. I think Amber, you're the one that was the quickest. I think you did it all in about less than two years. I think the rest of us it's well over. You know three, four years. You know, Ryan, you guys were what? Seven or eight years, right, it was a while right.

Brad:  

So we've learned a lot. You know going through all of this and you know kind of learned what the journey, the struggle and all of the obstacles that you're going to kind of face. What are some of the things that come to mind for you guys. There is the first time I tried to get out of debt.

Chris:  

There was the second time I tried to get out of debt. Then there was the time that I got out of debt. And now you want me to think about knowing what I know now if I found myself back in debt. First of all, I slapped the buh-jeezus out of myself for allowing myself to go back there. I would say the big thing I would do differently is to try to not overcomplicate things. That is ultimately why I stopped trying to get out of debt, because one day I didn't do something right and, oh, the world came to an end. It was like Chicken Little and that's a good excuse to just stop and this doesn't work. And the second time I tried it again overcomplicated it, and when I mean overcomplicated, it wasn't about necessarily paying off debt, but it was the whole how to manage my money, from tracking my expenses to budgeting. And when I failed at one part of it, it gave me an excuse to just well, this doesn't work.

Brad:  

So I think for me, I think the big one and I did a TikTok video on this because I did get this question I was like we're just going to create a quick video about this, but I kind of came up with four or five things that stood out to me and it's kind of like why we run this business now a big part of a lot of what I would do differently. But number one is just I think I would not let the shame and embarrassment of my situation hold me back as much as it did. I think you know, especially early on, you know, you, you there's a lot of people who deal with a lot of emotion around their finances and they're ashamed and feel like they're the only ones and and they're the only ones who have made the mistakes and and it's just not true. The reality is is a lot of us that I've coached, or a lot of people that I've coached over the years, we don't really have a lot of unique stories behind why we got into debt. A lot of us have a very similar path on why we got there. It wasn't on purpose, it was just we didn't know any better. Nobody really taught us how to manage money. We started kind of doing what everybody else did. You know your parents didn't really give you any tools Like it's a lot of the same types of repetitive stories about why a lot of us get into debt and so many of us get so stuck because of that shame and embarrassment, and sometimes it's so much that we refuse to get help because we feel like someone's going to laugh at me or think I'm stupid for this.

Brad:  

And so for me I would have let that go that I held on to for quite a while, especially because when I really got started because, Chris, I kind of had a similar experience like you did, where I tried once, tried twice, tried three times, tried four times and I kept failing. But what really kind of made me sit up straight, really focus was losing my first house or that house to foreclosure, and that was embarrassing. They put that stuff in the paper. Our friends and family knew about it. That was like a slap in the face. So for me I was like I am never going to be in this situation ever again. I'm going to learn how this stuff works situation ever again.

Ryan:  

I'm going to learn how this stuff works. The biggest thing we would have done different is we constantly focused on the payments and the numbers and we avoided focusing on the behaviors and ourselves. And so we consolidated all the time, thinking that was going to be the savior, like if we consign. You know, we borrowed from retirement, we took out credit card consolidations and home equity loans and we did all sorts of consolidations and it never worked, not until we, you know, similar to what you said, brad you know, we sold our house, we sold the big house, and we downsized and that was kind of just like the kick that we needed, because it was like, if we're doing this, like we are getting out of this, we're not coming back. But that was for us, that was the biggest thing. Just, we just constantly focused on the math of being in debt and the math of getting out of debt, and that was the big thing. Like, okay, if we consolidate, we take all this debt and we put it on this card where our payment is going to be like $600 less every month, and then we'll take that extra money and we will totally put it on that debt. We'll pay it off in 27 months. If we do that and it's like we're into month three and I'm like we got 600 bucks, we should go buy a car. Like what are we doing? Like you, just you forget.

Ryan:  

You know we've talked a lot about this where it's like you, you get rid of that pain that you're feeling and as soon as the pain's gone, within a short amount of time, it's suddenly it's like you start doing the things that caused you the pain to begin with. And that was just us, over and over and over again and even in the other big thing for us was like getting around like-minded people. The world is full of broke people and that's just hard. It's a lonely road and one of my big reasons of doing this podcast is I do feel that personal finance is still this taboo subject that you don't talk about.

Ryan:  

You just bring it up and people like almost like hey, you want to talk about Jesus? No, like the same thing. Like do you want to talk about money and your finances? No, get away from me, it shouldn't be that way. You know the whole country like if you take a survey, I mean a large percentage of people think it should be taught in high school. We need to be okay with saying we're bad with money and we want to get better. It's okay. It shouldn't be embarrassing Like most people are bad with money and need to get better.

Amber:  

See, I struggle with this question only because I feel like we did it so well and I wouldn't have changed anything. But I landed show off. Well, I would have started earlier. I I landed in a place where I was guided. You know like I landed? I I found Brad, I found his course. I I was guided, I was given the tools, we followed the process, we did the things and I just don't think I would do anything different because it worked so well. We did it in 18 months. It just worked so well for us that find somebody you can relate to. That is offering something like a course or good advice. Do do your research, but like that you can relate to, that you can, that can help you do this, because having that community and that guidance made all the difference.

Brad:  

I, in my opinion, well, and I think the other one for me is getting away from and this is hard is this was hard is separating yourself from broke friends and family and coworkers. You know, and it's hard, it's hard. You know I've lost friendships, I've probably have drifted away from different relationships because of it, and but the reality is, you know uh, you know Chris I think you said this in the last episode that we recorded is, you know, you are the average of the five people that you surround yourself with, and I don't want to say that in a snobby way, stuck up way. I don't want to hang out with anybody, that's not it. I just think we need to be very selective about who we let influence us.

Brad:  

And I think, if you look at the statistics of money, the majority of people unfortunately aren't doing well with it. So the majority of people that you hang around with aren't handling their money properly and a lot of the stuff that they say, a lot of the stuff that they do, a lot of the ways that they live their life is going to lead to financial stress and not handling your money right. I mean, that's just the reality of things. So I think for me is being okay separating yourself from. That is. But that's hard because there's a human side of it, right. There's that relationship that you have with these people. You don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, you know.

Brad:  

But at the same time you also want to stand up for your financial life and say, hey, I want to, I want better, I want to do better. But, man guys, I can remember getting made fun of because I didn't want to go out or do things and go to a movie or go out to the bar or go out, because I just didn't have the money and they would just pick on me for it. But I had to do it if I wanted to start getting better results. But I would say I would do that much sooner because I drug my feet. That's why I say $45,000. I paid off in about four or five years. I say four or five years because of all of these reasons. It just slowed everything down and the reality is is like the right people will stay in your life. The wrong people. They're going to go anyway, so it doesn't matter. So do what's right for your financial life and start and do away with other people's opinions of what you're doing.

Chris:  

So if you're out there listening to this podcast and we always talk about, 70% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck don't have $400 for an emergency fund, and you're one of those which, statistically speaking, you probably are there's nothing wrong with you.

Chris:  

We are a function of our culture. Okay, you're just going along with what everybody else does, and until we as a culture decide to look at money differently like Ryan talked about, we haven't always been this way. Now, fortunately, we're sort of blessed by the excess and the. You know the blessings of being in this country that sometimes we've got it too good almost, and I know it seems like hard for some of you to believe. But until we as a culture change how we collectively look, you're going to have to do it on your own and you're going to have to search for, like we've talked about, mentors and other people, listen to podcasts like this, self start actions and just don't care what other people think about you and focus on your future, because, at the end of the day, you are the only person that you can control. And until society and our culture catches up with this way of thinking if they ever do then you're going to have to be brave and bold and forge your own path.

Ryan:  

Yeah, and I would say that kind of leads, you know, to me like. The other thing that I wish I would have done is I wish I would have educated myself more on just debt and money. When it comes to like we are a product like of marketing and terrible advice from the debt industry parents, friends, relatives, I mean we talk about how new cars are not a great idea, it's a paycheck killer.

Ryan:  

The amount of people that will come out of the woodwork to just say that we're crazy and stupid and idiots, for that it's not it, it's not their fault. That's what we have been led to believe, and I wish I would have spent more time understanding that. Because when you kind of take a step back from it and you realize, like you know, as credit cards became more acceptable I think there was a commercial about how the credit cards were just being accepted at a fast food restaurant in the nineties and people thought it was just like this is just ridiculous. How would I mean that is, how could you dare do that, you know, and so it's. It's just.

Ryan:  

It is kind of mind blowing to think like this wasn't always a way of life. We've made it a way of life. Learn these things because I think you'll start to understand that. I know none of us want to admit that we've been brainwashed, but I will tell you a lot of us have been brainwashed by this credit industry. We are walking billboards and commercials for them. They've done a masterful job over the decades of training people to think that way, and you got to take yourself out of that.

Brad:  

So the last one, guys, that I want to share is just overall accountability. You know we talk about it often on the podcast is that the it's not. It's not what to do. I mean, it's easy to learn what to do. It's doing it consistently, long term and long enough to get those big results Right. And that's the part that we all struggled with, I think, and that's one of the reasons why we do this podcast. It's one of the reasons why we have Roots. It's one of the reasons why Debt-Free Dad exists.

Brad:  

It's not that this information isn't widely available for you to learn financial education. There's plenty of information out there. What we strive for is to offer the consistency, the accountability, to remain consistent, to teach you how to be more disciplined. That is what really separates people who are only looking for quick fixes. It's the long-term plan. It's a long journey that you've got to be committed to. So for me, if I had to go back, I would have gotten an accountability partner, I would have gotten a system. I would have found other people sooner that were doing this, so that way I could have something to kind of rely on that I knew I wasn't in this alone.

Amber:  

Well and I think that's what I kind of said it right was, that was what really helped us just get to where we were going is we had guidance and we had that accountability to help us through. So it does make a huge difference and that's why we were able to do it so quickly.

Brad:  

All right. So if you want to learn from us and you want to get started now, get started right now. And you want to pay off more debt, save more money and take control of your finances and you want to start seeing some pretty amazing results within just the next 30 or 60 days, all you have to do is head over to debtfreedad. com, click on the green button at the top of the page and we'll show you how you can get started right now, after this episode your money.

Amber:  

And that sound means it's time for the celebrations of the show. Today we have some money and savings tips from our Roots members, and first we have Christina going through my pantry freezer to use up as much as I can before buying more.

Brad:  

Yeah, there you go, Christina. We call that pantry creations, by the way, a member. I'm going to share this Now. I have not used this, but I'm just going to throw this out on this podcast because I want to go check this out. It's called Super Cook. You guys, we need to do this. So it's an app where you can just, with your microphone on your phone, say exactly all the ingredients that you have in your house and it will create recipes for you based on the stuff that you have.

Brad:  

How cool is that it's called Super Cook. Again, they're not an affiliate. We don't make any money off that. I haven't even used them yet, but I thought it was just a cool idea. Rachel says shop sales and clearance, but only buy what you would have either way. Just because something is on sale or clearance doesn't mean you are saving money. If something is regularly $10 and on sale for $7, you're not saving $3, you're still spending $7. That mindset has changed, or that mindset change helps me to resist the impulsive sale purchases. Awesome, Rachel.

Chris:  

Hope says write every expense down, Be honest with yourself, whether it was a planned or an unplanned expense, and this not only tracks your spending but gives you insight into your behaviors.

Brad:  

Yeah, that's awesome.

Ryan:  

And Claudian, I think twice about buying things.

Brad:  

Yeah, just taking that extra second. Right, we actually say just give it a little bit of time, give it 24 hours, give your purchases 24 hours and 95% of the stuff that you think that you need. You never go back and buy. So I love that one. So, as always, congratulations to all of you guys who are taking a stand for your financial life and are wanting better. We get that. Getting out of debt isn't easy, but with our help and with your consistency and discipline, we promise you that this will be some of the best work that you guys do in your entire life.

Amber:  

Thanks for hanging out with us here today.

Brad:  

And we will see you guys on the next episode.

Speaker 2:  

Thanks for listening to the Debt-Free Dad podcast. Connect with us on Facebook, tiktok, youtube and Instagram. Just search Debt-Free Dad. If you found value in today's episode, please leave us a rating and review. We so appreciate it For resources, show notes and links mentioned in today's show. Visit DebtFreeDad. com. Catch you next week.

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