Down to $42 thousand

And this exercise has been interesting because it served to show me how rigid my repayment schedule has been over the last few years. What does that mean? Well, for the last six weeks or so I’ve allowed myself to change my focus from putting every extra available dime towards student loan repayment to holding back on every expense/cost ranging from saving money to repaying student loan debt to purchasing certain, necessary new items for my home, etc. And do you know what this exercise has shown me? It’s shown me that once I repay that United States Department of Education student loan, I’m going to have a good amount of money coming in. No, it’s not going to be enough for me to immediately make an impact on other areas of my financial life (i.e. super saving to bolster my retirement funds, buying a house immediately after paying off the loan, etc), but it’s going to be pretty nice.

The trick, though, is to figure out which goal is next.

Do I begin by bolstering my retirement accounts? Do I begin building a major down payment to eventually purchase a house? What about saving for a few months to be able to purchase a brand new car? Maybe I could save money in a series of liquid investments such as CD ladders, money market accounts, generic savings accounts, etc…

I know what I won’t do once this remaining student loan is paid off, though: I won’t try to achieve all of these financial goals at one time. I think that my story – up until this point and God-willing over the next 12 to 18 months – has proven that focus is the key to achieving financial success. I’ve opted to spend the last few years focusing my financial efforts on repaying my student loan debts and I’ve come a pretty long way; far enough to see the light at the end of the tunnel. When I reach the end of this tunnel, I’m not going to be the dog that caught the fire engine and wonders, “What now?” Nope. Instead, I’m going to have a plan of attack for my next big financial focus.

And the great part of this all is that I have a whole year and a half to figure out what that focus is going to be. What about all of you out there in internet land. Do you have any ideas on what my next big financial focus should be once this remaining student loan is paid off? I’d be interested in hearing your ideas!

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 $61 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 $42 thousand in principal to the United States Department of Education’s Direct Loans program – a loan which started repayment in July 2006 with a balance of $59 thousand. To date, I’ve repaid well over $30 thousand in interest to these lenders. Follow my student loan repayment story on JerseySmarts.com.

This has been a pretty happy place for the last week and a half.

About a week and a half ago, nearly a one-third of the planet’s population began celebrating the Easter Triduum. The Easter Triduum is the three day period leading up to Easter Sunday and the celebration of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Certainly something for believers like me (and some 2.1 billion other believers in Christ) to celebrate.

On the first of two personal notes in this entry, one of the young men that I advised when he was an undergraduate in Sigma Pi Fraternity became a member of the Roman Catholic Church during the Easter Vigil mass. For him – and those of us who know him – this was also a reason for celebration.

After a solemn, joyous Holy Week the world then began preparing for the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. Normally, I wouldn’t cite this as a reason for the world to celebrate. However, following the tragic, paparazzi-fueled death of his beloved mother Princess Diana, there were many people who saw this past Friday’s wedding as a sort of victory for civility. The Sun Newspaper (based out of the United Kingdom) estimated that up to 3 billion people might watch the wedding. I’ve read post-wedding viewership figures as high as 2 billion, so I don’t know the exact number of people who saw the wedding, but I’m sure that most folks out there either saw the wedding live or saw footage.

In any event, the adoring crowds in the United Kingdom reflected the joy and happiness that most people shared for the young bride and groom.

And on a personal note – this past Friday a good friend of mine got married. I was honored to be one of his groomsmen and the excitement of the wedding helped make this past weekend a really great one for me and the hundreds of people who are celebrating this wedding, too.

And then Sunday, May 1st came. For the more than 1.2 billion Roman Catholics in the world, we celebrated the beatification of Pope John Paul II – now known as Blessed John Paul II. The beatification mass was viewed around the world as a man who many knew as a world leader took the final step before being declared a saint by the Roman Catholic Church. Certainly a reason for celebration among the faithful Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church communities!

Of course the only way for such an amazing week and a half period to come to completion was with the announcement that the United States had located, stormed, and killed the most wanted terrorist in the world. And not only was I excited about the confirmation of Osama bin Laden being killed, but I was proud about the way the United States citizens celebrated the victory. I posted this message on Facebook late last night about our national celebration:

When certain countries on the other side of the world celebrate a big event, radical extremists come out in the streets and burn effigies of world leaders and flags of other nations.

When America celebrates the death of a global mass murderer, we have men, women, young, old, Republicans, Democrats, black, white, Hispanic, etc. all celebrating together chanting “USA! USA! USA!”

We win. Again.

Followers of freedom and believers in liberty have a big reason to celebrate this news. Congratulations go out to the men and women of our military and intelligence services on a job well done.

As I posted on Twitter last night – I feel like this week and a half period of happiness and celebration is the beginning of something great for this world. Let’s hope that the good times keep on coming and that we continue to receive good news (or the Good News, as it were) in the coming days, weeks, and months! Enjoy!

On Friday, (after a quick swim in the pool) I did some shopping with my Mom and then headed back to the hotel to get ready for the wedding rehearsal. After a few more dips in the pool, I went to the rehearsal at the Meadow Wood Manor in Randolph, Morris County, New Jersey (which is a beautiful facility, by the way). The rehearsal dinner was at La Strada (in the same town) and the food was outstanding. At the rehearsal dinner, the bride and groom-to-be gave the bridal party and the groomsmen some presents. I got some funny gag gifts – How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must) by Ann Coulter, an Obama for President deck of cards, a Snuggie, and Go Dog Go (my favorite children’s book). I also was given a really nice pen, which is great because it’s really something that I needed.

On Saturday, I slept in a little bit before spending some time in the pool with the groom and his brothers (the other groomsmen). To the bride and grooms’ great credit, the entire day of the wedding was planned down to the minute so after I cleaned up after the pool and got lunch, the guys were transported to the Meadow Wood Manor and sent down to the game room. As the guests filed in upstairs and the bride arrived, the guys played some Wii and had a toast to the groom.

The there was the wedding, which I don’t think I need to get into too much detail on. It was a spectacular wedding – definitely the best wedding I’ve ever attended (and that’s not just because I was the best man – it really was that good). I can’t say enough good things about the Meadow Wood Manor and how amazing their service was, how delicious the food was, how elegant the decor was – it was just perfect. On top of that, the owner of the facility was on hand and personally attending to each of the tables to be sure that everyone was satisfied. You honestly don’t get that type of service any more. Very impressive facility and very impressive service.

To let you know how good the wedding was, I thought I’d share this picture of me and one of the guys that I advised in college:

Yeah. A little alcohol, a little Bon Jovi, and a lot of good people and that’s what you get! No complaints from this end, though.

Both the bride and the groom have amazing families and I was honored to meet and become friends with them. I was also honored to stand up and say a few words after the bridesmaid (the bride’s sister) gave a speech. It was a great wedding.

The next day I suffered from some pretty severe heartburn (pounding Yuenglings will do that to you), which I actually was battling through this morning. But, today was back to work and – as such – back to putting new content on this blog!

On Friday I have the rehearsal dinner and then on Saturday it’s the main event. On Sunday, I plan on sleeping in a little bit (if possible) before heading back to Tinton Falls and relaxing the day away through Monday.

Have no fear, though. I have entries prepared to be automatically uploaded each day through Monday. In the mean time, enjoy the weekend!

From the BBQ I went directly to my Mom’s house up in Morris County. Soon after arriving at my Mom’s place we headed over to my aunt and uncle’s house for a pre-wedding party for my older cousin, David, who was getting married the next day. This was also a lot of fun as my Grandmother and Aunt were at the party – both of whom I haven’t seen in a few years (probably since my Dad’s funeral almost two years ago).

Like most families, we tend to have an extremely fun time once the drinks start going down and the music gets turned on (and raucously “sung” at high volumes late into the night). And since he’s a dedicated reader of JerseySmarts.com, I’d like to give a shout out to Mike R. Happy?

The next day was my cousin’s wedding and reception, which was some of the most fun that I’ve had in a long, long time. Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook have probably already browsed through the pictures from the wedding, but I also created a Google photo album for those of you who aren’t on Facebook (yet).

I thought the ceremony was very well done. There were about 30 witnesses and I was sitting in the back row with my brothers. The wedding was emotional for my family since David is the first among the cousins to get married – which explained why my Mom, her sisters (including the groom’s Mom), and my Grandmother were in tears for a portion of the ceremony. It was a very nice wedding ceremony and I think that the pictures from the church show how it was very well put together.

The reception was also a good time. It’s always fun hanging out with family and friends for a celebration like a wedding. One funny occurrence – as I was walking outside for some fresh air, a kid came up to me and asked me if we knew each other from somewhere. I had no idea (and the memory wasn’t being assisted by the few beers that I had put away). To make a long story short, it turns out that the kid – who was one of the bride’s cousins – had just graduated from The College of New Jersey and is a member of my fraternity. He remembered me from all of the visits that I made to his chapter and the workshops that I put on while I was in charge of New Jersey for the fraternity. Small world, huh?

All in all, it was a great weekend. I hope for the best for my cousin and his wife and I hope that our family can get together more often to hang out and have some fun! Next on the agenda is a BBQ that my older brother’s girlfriend is throwing in a few weeks. I’m looking forward to that!

And I’ll see the rest of you back here tomorrow with some more Jersey Smarts!