DH = dear husband DD1 = dear first daughter DD2 = dear second daughter DD3 = dear third daughter When I first read Dave Ramsey’s The Total Money Makeover in the spring of 2012, I looked ahead to the grand finale as something impossibly remote. The last chapter of Ramsey’s book is about the step of wealth building – the final step, coming after the mortgage is gone. As I read it, I could not really visualize myself being there. It was sort of like trying to visualize myself acting in a movie or singing in a rock band. My imagination could produce something, but nothing very convincing. N ..read more

 Holding up my shoes. They’re off! DH = dear husband DFF = debt-free friend Friday September 28, 2018: Debt-Freedom! We’re officially debt-free! Friday offered one last obstacle to the final step of our journey out of debt. We bank with a no-fee subsidiary of one of Canada’s big banks. Friday, of all days, its online banking was shut down! There was no brick and mortar option, so all day, we literally COULDN’T pay off our debt!!! Both bizarre and frustrating! Finally in the evening, the online bank was up and running again. It was a matter of a few clicks of the mouse. DONE! Friday Sept ..read more

It’s hard to believe this photo was taken 25 years ago. DH = dear husband Our “PLOT TWIST” & its remarkable timing Our debt-freedom SHOULD have happened the first week of September when we paid off our mortgage. But it didn’t. This summer, we stumbled at the finish line and borrowed for the first time since we began our journey out of debt in June of 2012. So we’re left with a small line of credit to pay off. It was $3,800 at the end of August, and is now down to $2,500.  Since we won’t have to put any money aside for next month’s mortgage – because we won’t have one – we should be ab ..read more

Remarkable timing In November of 2013, I wrote a post about debt, faith, and freedom. I was surprised this past February – of 2018 – to receive an email message from the Christian magazine Activated, requesting permission to publish the article.  When told that it would be published in September, I was struck by the incredible timing involved.  “We’re still a long way from paying off our debt …” I wrote nearly 5 years ago. “Time will tell if we maintain the discipline necessary to keep things going in a positive direction once we’re out of the red. Time will tell if we use our g ..read more

DH = dear husband DD3 = dear third daughter DD2 = dear second daughter DD1 = dear first daughter “You’re worried about what you’ll write on your blog.” Last week, I wrote rather cryptically: “Ironically, with our total debt-freedom only weeks away, DH and I were off our game.” I then vaguely stated that “we faced our current mess. What would we do to deal with it? A mortifying thing, but we got it figured out.” All week I’ve had a nagging stress about this “mess” in the back of my mind. “I don’t think it’s so much that you’re worried about the state of our finances,” DH said to me when I tal ..read more

DH = dear husband It was 3:12 am one early morning last week, and I’d woken up. By 3:40, it was clear that sleep just wasn’t going to happen any time soon. I reached over in the dark to pick up the novel I had almost finished reading, and I walked out of the room as quietly as possible – not wanting to disturb DH’s sound slumber. When I turned on the lamp by the guest room bed, I realized I’d brought the wrong book. Instead of The High Mountains of Portugal by Jann Martel, I had Dave Ramsey’s The Total Money Makeover in my hands. It’s the book that gave us the wake-up call, the ..read more

DH = Dear Husband DD2 = Dear Second Daughter Producing my graph “If you had kept a spreadsheet of our debts month-by-month, you could have produced a graph in a few seconds,” DH told me earlier today. But I have not keep a spreadsheet. Instead, I’ve provided dozens of updates on our debt-reduction progress, and these are interspersed through 277 posts that I’ve written for this blog over the last 6 years and 3 months. So it took a lot longer than mere seconds to produce my graph. For several days, I’ve been digging deep into the archives of Prudence Debt-Free: One Couple’s Journey out of Deb ..read more

We’re camping where there’s no chance for me to go online. See you next week! The post Gone Fishing appeared first on Prudence Debt - Free ..read more