Debt is a topic I bring up fairly often, in my newsletters.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because it is something most people need assistance with.\u00a0 It’s an interesting topic, as everyone sees debt differently.\u00a0 Some people avoid it at all costs, some see it as a necessary evil, some people don’t have a choice but to incur some, and others rack it up because they don’t care.\u00a0 But what exactly is debt?<\/p>\n
According to Merriam-Webster, debt is, “a state of being under obligation to pay or repay someone or something in return for something received:\u00a0 a state of owing.”<\/em>\u00a0 Being in debt means you received goods or services without paying for it and as such are liable for that amount.\u00a0 You incur debt because you received goods that you could not afford (or chose not) to pay up front. Now some people will tell you that there are good and bad debts.\u00a0 That is because some types of debt give you tax advantages, or will end up being worth more than you spent.\u00a0 Regardless, all debt has a cost.\u00a0 This cost is the interest rate.<\/p>\n Most people don’t realize how much that interest rate actually affects them and what their debt is really costing them.\u00a0 Let’s do the math real quick.\u00a0 Let’s focus on credit cards.\u00a0 Credit cards usually have interest rates anywhere from 0% on an introductory period to 29.99% annually.\u00a0 Now what does this mean to you?\u00a0 According to Bankrate.com the average interest rate on credit cards in the US is 16.67% (for easy math let’s assume it is 16%).\u00a0\u00a0 According to NerdWallet, the average family has $16,061 in credit card debt (let’s assume $16,000 for easy math).\u00a0 So if you have 16,000 in debt and you are paying 16% interest then, each year<\/strong>, you are paying $2,560 in INTEREST<\/strong>.\u00a0 That’s almost $215 a month just going to you having that debt!<\/p>\n How much better off would you be if you didn’t have that debt and were able to put it into savings?\u00a0 Well assuming you are getting a net 5% return…in 5 years you would have accumulated $14,568…in 10 Years $33,265…in 30 years $178,288.\u00a0 How much better off does that put you?\u00a0 How much easier are your retirement or other financial goals now?\u00a0 This is the true cost of your debt!\u00a0 How does that sit on your stomach?\u00a0 Does that change your perspective?<\/p>\n Don’t be discouraged though!\u00a0 There are many strategies we can use to help you get out of the debt trap!\u00a0 If you would like help creating a plan to tackle your debt.\u00a0 Contact my office today!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Debt is a topic I bring up fairly often, in my newsletters.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because it is something most people need assistance with.\u00a0 It’s an interesting topic, as everyone sees debt differently.\u00a0 Some people avoid it at all costs, some see it as a necessary evil, some people don’t have a choice but to incur some, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":412,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":413,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411\/revisions\/413"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foundmoneyconsultants.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}