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Are You Keeping Up with the Jones? Do you spend more than you make? Are you constantly putting it on plastic, and not able to pay off your credit card each month? Are you making just the minimum payment on your cards? If so, you are fighting a never ending battle. Join the crowd, you are one of the millions adding to their balances each month. The problem has become so bad, that Credit Counseling services are popping up all over the place and the problem seems to only get worse. The Top 10 reasons spend more money then they make are:
10. Keeping up an image
9. Avoidance
8. The money is on it's way
7. Credit doesn't feel the same
6. Immediate gratification
5. Lifestyle maintenance
4. Poor as a child
3. Sense of power
2. Prove self worth
1. Just can't say NO!
If you are drowning in debt, there is help. There is a solution. The solution lies within yourself. You must control your finances, instead of letting your wants control you. You see there is light at the end of the tunnel. If you can lay it all out, figure out how to survive on bare minimum (no more Caramel Macciatos in the morning), then you can dig yourself out of debt. Believe me, I have done it, and life is much better debt free! First steps, Sit down with your spouse if you are marries, decide once and for all that debt is not for you. Set up a bare minimum budget, write it down on paper, and put it where you see it everyday. I put mine on the refrigerator door, where I was forced to look at it many times each day, and with this I knew that my wife and I were on the same page. Before th end of the month my wife and I sat down and went over the budget. We looked at how much we really spent and then decided where we could cut even more out of the budget. We did this every month until there was nothing more to take out. As I have sat with other couples helping them to set up a budget, most couples will say well we can't cut that out, that is... Normally it comes down to the food budget. Guess what?! You can cut the food budget down. Have you ever heard of beans? Serious now, you can cut it all down, and when you start doing it and getting excited about it you will see how it becomes a game how low you can cut things and still survive just fine. Stick with it, and before long you can be debt free. Come back next week for tips on how to get more money to pour into your debt.
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