We made progress on our debt snowball in January 2008, but not as much as I had hoped, and it was our lowest month of debt repayment since starting our get out of debt plan in August 2007.

That being said, the news isn’t all bad because we did carry over about $1,000 in cash from January that could have been used for debt payment, but due to payday timing and payment due dates I would have been left with very little cash on hand had I tried to use all of the money within the calendar month.

Current total debt = $255,848.23
Principal paid in January 2008 = $396.21
Principal paid since August 2007 = $9,770.53

While it’s not critically important, I was disappointed that we are still stuck below the $10,000 total paid number since we have been in striking distance of that for two months now. $10,000 is a significant milestone, but I also know that it is a small step in the big picture so I need to just continue to be patient and wait for it to happen, which should be in February.

Current credit card debt = $18,034.11
Principal paid in January 2008 = $470.67
Principal paid since August 2007 = $7,525.71

You may notice that we paid more on credit card principal than our total debt principal went down. That is because we had some accrued interest pile up on our student loans in January. I’m a little unclear on the details, something I am looking into further, but to save a long story I will just say that our student loan balances went up for now (I’m not sure if there was a mistake made or not).

Six months into this project, we have averaged $1,628.42 of principal paid per month. At that pace, we are looking at more than 13 years to be out of debt. Ouch! So far our monthly debt payments have varied a lot, so I don’t have confidence in the average or the projected time (could trend higher or lower at this point), but I like to have a trend-line to follow even if it is a volatile one.

Nothing left to do now but try to find more money to pay toward debt in February. Wish us luck!

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