A Tale From The Debt Side

Something I have never mentioned on this blog that I might as well write about is the $25000 loan I took out of my 401k almost two years ago.

I consider it one of my dumbest moves ever!  Maybe I did need the money at the time, but it didn’t do me any good, because:

• I can’t even remember exactly what debts I paid off with the money.
• I didn’t learn my lesson because I ran up my debt again.

• My 401k requires I pay myself back with interest, so $150 of my paycheck goes to pay that money back every week.  That’s $600 a month!  I could be making some serious payments on my debt snowball if I had that extra money every week!

If there’s any silver lining to this it is the fact that I have gotten accustomed to my check not having that $150 in it.  By the time I have the 401k loan paid off, I hope to be debt-free (or very close), so I should be able to continue contributing that much or more into the 401k each week.  If the stock market rebounds one of these days, maybe my retirement account can make up for lost time and I’ll be able to retire with a decent nest egg.

Do you have a tale about your debt that you’d like to share with the readers of this blog?  You can email it to: thedebtside@gmail.com.  You can remain anonymous as I won’t include your email address or your whole name (you can choose an alias if you’d like)  in the blog.