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Yet Another Big Drop in My Total Student Loan Debt – Another $3 Thousand Down

November 17, 2012 by Joe Leave a Comment

You’ve all been waiting for the latest update on my outstanding student loan debt. Can you believe that the last update was way back almost three months ago when my total debt dropped from $26 thousand down to $25 thousand? Well, after three months of waiting the latest update is that my student loan debt has dropped again – this time all the way down to $22 thousand! In fact, I’m getting really close to a major milestone when my debt hits about $21 thousand – which will be a full $100 thousand repaid to my student loans.

Just $22 thousand left to go...

There’s no secret about how all of these student loan repayments are possible. In fact, the “secret” seems to be something that the unemployed masses don’t seem to want to accept in today’s economy – that if you want to make money and retire your debt, then you need to get your butt working right now. Don’t wait, don’t deliberate, don’t overthink this whole process. Instead, go out and get a job – any job – so you can start bringing in income. NOW!

If you want to call it a secret, then that’s the big “secret” to paying off debt. Productivity today equals a paycheck tomorrow and a paycheck tomorrow equals a loan payment the following day and a loan payment the following day equals getting out of debt. Period.

No big surprise here, folks. For me, the concept of getting up off my butt and doing something has taken the form of working at a popular online university as an instructor. The secondary income that I earn from this job is a nice boost to my overall monthly cash flow and it has helped to fund a great deal of my student loan payments over the last two years. And I know some idiot is probably out there reading this right now thinking, “Well, you have an advantage because you have that second job and I can’t find any job in the first place!” Bullshit! I work a 40+ hour work week with no less than a minimum of 10 hours commuting each week – and that’s just at my day job. So I don’t want to hear any crap about having any advantages because I found a good second job. If anything, my life is more strenuous than the person who is, let’s be honest, optionally-unemployed because I have several different workplace management structures that I have to perform within.

Since we’re telling secrets, I think the unemployed masses should know that one of the secrets to finding a job is getting over yourself. Sure, you shouldn’t take a job that pays below minimum wage if you’ve earned yourself a doctorate, but at the same time you shouldn’t reject an entry-level job with a modest salary either because you have a bachelor’s degree and you think that makes you worth more on the market. Newsflash: it doesn’t make you worth any more on the market in this economy! All your degree gives you is access to applying for jobs that high school graduates are not able to apply for – that’s it. And that’s not a big advantage in this economy so get over yourselves and take that entry-level job. Didn’t your professors ever teach you to “get in” at a company and then begin to find ways to climb the internal corporate ladder? It can be done, folks. You just have to get up off your butts and do it!

Stick around for more student loan news coming up in the next few weeks. Several milestones are sitting on the horizon including the aforementioned payment where I hit a remaining balance of $21 thousand. Again, this will signify an incredible $100,000 in student loan principal repayment. The next milestone after that is just a thousand bucks away when I hit $20 thousand left outstanding and then smash through that number to get into the teens.

It’s pretty amazing to think that this aggressive repayment plan really took its infancy just under three years ago in December 2009. Time flies, huh?

In May 2006, I graduated from Rutgers University with a Masters Degree and $120,720 in student loan debt. Since I started repaying my student loans in July 2006, I’ve repaid a total of $99 thousand in principal to various lenders including the federal Perkins loan program, the New Jersey Higher Education Student Assistance Authority, and CitiBank. I currently owe $22 thousand in principal to the United States Department of Education’s federal Direct Loans program. This loan is serviced by the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority. To date, I’ve repaid over $35 thousand in interest to these lenders. Follow my student loan repayment story on JerseySmarts.com.

Filed Under: Student Loans Tagged With: Debt, employment, Job, MOHELA, repayment, Student Loans, USED, Workforce

Have I Mentioned That I Hate My Commute?

August 17, 2010 by Joe 3 Comments

Even though I’ve said it on here before, I have to repeat the fact that I absolutely hate my commute to work each morning. Driving from one side of New Jersey to the other is not appealing at all. Granted, the commute itself is relatively easy since I just jump on 195 and go all the way from Tinton Falls into Trenton. However, I hate my daily commute with a passion.

I work in community development and one of the big discussions when considering how to best develop a community always revolves around the idea of smart growth. In other words, how do you arrange a community such that the people who live there also work there or very nearby. As a related side note – everyone who works in Trenton for the state has a similar discussion, yet most state workers live far outside of Trenton. Weird. Anyway, nothing would make me happier than going to work within a 5 – 10 minute commute of where I live.

For starters, I don’t like this part of the state. I’m not sure what it is about Trenton or this part of Mercer County, but I’m not a big fan of the area. I couldn’t see myself ever living over here. I could live in Morris County because I have family up there and I could live in Monmouth County because it’s where I’ve been for ten years and I like it down there. But Mercer County? No thanks. So moving closer to my office isn’t an option to eliminate the commute.

Also, there is a strong possibility that my office is going to move to New Brunswick in the next few months. I couldn’t live in New Brunswick, either. It’s too congested and the places where a guy like me could afford to live aren’t nearly as safe and secure as where I live now. At almost 30 years old and having rented in a variety of arrangements over the past 10 years, I can’t see myself downgrading my living quarters just to be closer to my 9-to-5. That would be completely ridiculous and a sure way to increase the misery level.

I like my job. My only issue with my job is that they unknowingly hold down young talent so I (nor anyone else my age or younger) have not been able to advance professionally at this place. However, the pay is good and the benefits aren’t bad. Plus, the flexibility at this place is phenomenal. It’s just the miserable commute that gets me – and it’s “getting” me in an increasing frequency it seems.

I’ll figure something out. I’m not sure what I’m going to do at this point, but with less than 6 months left to my 30th birthday and having just “celebrated” 4 years working for this company, I’m not sure how much longer I’m going to keep this silly commute up each day…

Filed Under: Money, Jobs, & Finances, The State of New Jersey Tagged With: commuting, Job, Mercer County, Monmouth County, Morris County, New Jersey, Tinton Falls, Trenton

Too Busy For An Update Today

July 16, 2009 by Joe Leave a Comment

Sorry, folks. I was too busy to put an update on the blog today. Between a packed post-vacation schedule at the office and a plethora of website requests building up for my website company, I’ve been running around like a crazy person lately. Since I’m working from my home office tomorrow, I’m going to try to be as productive as possible. I’ll be doing work for my day job until 2pm (which is the end of the work week during the summer at my office) and then it’s straight into creating websites for my clients.

Should be a busy day followed by a busy night. I am, however, looking forward to a relaxing weekend – I need to rest a bit!

Filed Under: Random Entries Tagged With: Blog, home office, Job, productive, too busy, Working From Home

Working From Home Today…

June 10, 2009 by Joe Leave a Comment

One of the best parts of my job is that I can choose to opt out of my daily commute and work from home on occasion. As it stands, I get one day a week where I work from home (usually Fridays) and once every 6 to 8 weeks I take an additional day one week. It’s a sweet deal.

I opted to work from home today so I could work on a major project that my company is participating in. It’s a huge, multi-million dollar deal that kept my brain to the grindstone for most of the day. I tell you this because I have nothing interesting to put up on the blog today and the reason why is because I’m exhausted from working from home.

Hmmm… A little bit of irony there, right? The fact that I’m exhausted from working, but working from the comfort of my home office? Weird.

More fun and games tomorrow – see you then!

Filed Under: Random Entries Tagged With: Blog, Brain, Dollar Deal, Fridays, Fun And Games, Grindstone, Home Today, Irony, Job, Occasion, Reason, Sweet Deal, Weird, Working From Home

A Clod Hopper Appears at the Gym!

May 14, 2009 by Joe 1 Comment

Finally! I found one! Earlier today I was at the gym (eleven days in a row, by the way) and while I was on the treadmill I began to take inventory of my fellow gym-goers on the treadmills around me. Isn’t people-watching the best thing going today?

Anyway, the woman two treadmills down from me was the epitome of a clod hopper! Every step she took on the machine you would have thought that she was going to go through the floor. I’ll never understand why some people don’t pick up their feet when they get on the treadmills, but you know what? This woman was going at a pretty good pace and she was burning calories like it was her job. Impressive…

But still funny!

The other funny observation that I had at the gym today was the guy on the treadmill next to me. For those of you that go on these treadmills you know that you can increase the incline on the machine to simulate the going up hill effect. It’s actually a great way to burn more calories over the course of a week. Anyway, this guy get on the treadmill next to me and sets the incline at such a ridiculous level that he’s practically falling off of the machine! It was pretty funny – he couldn’t even swing his arms as he was walking because he had to hold on to the top of the machine to stay on it.

Clod hoppers and mountain climbers…hilarious!

Filed Under: Health Ideas & Gym Stories Tagged With: Burning Calories, Clod Hopper, Clod Hoppers, Eleven Days, Epitome, Funny, Health, Job, Mountain Climbers, Observation, Ridiculous Level, Treadmill, Treadmills, Woman

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