30 Day Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Challenge

“Never spend your money before you have it.” —Thomas Jefferson

“Unless you change how you are, you will always have what you’ve got.” - Jim Rohn

“A goal without a plan is just a wish.” -  Antoine De Saint Exupery

What could you get done with your current money situation in 30 days? I mean really, have you ever stopped to ask yourself that question? What if you had a (free) resource that spoon-fed you every little micro-step you needed to start the process? Do you think you could make some significant progress in 30 days?

Do you think you  could maybe save $500-$1000 to keep on hand for emergencies? Do you think you could get your finances a little more organized than they are right now and maybe start chipping away at that “b-word”, (budget)? Do you think you could organize your debts into a solid “order of payoff’?

Well, I’m here to tell you that you can AND I want to give you a FREE resource to help you get started.

This “30 Day Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Challenge” is a step-by step video series designed to help you get started with 1) organizing your finances, 2) writing your first (or latest) budget 3) beginning to address your debt and 4) getting some “quick wins” in the process. 

It’s meant to be an easy, “no-overwhelm” resource that you can use as a reference, no matter where you are in the process. This post is going to go into: 1) why we produced this series, 2) who it’s specifically for, 3) What you’ll be learning and 4) The “how to” behind doing it all. Best of all, it’s completely FREE!

Before we get started, I wanted to invite you to download our free PDF guide that goes along with this series: “Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Guide”. This free resource will have ALL the tools, forms and printables you’ll need while moving through this 30 day challenge.

Next, head over to the beginning of the series:

Again, this “30 Day Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Challenge” is a step-by step video series designed to help you get started with 1) organizing your finances, 2) writing your first (or latest) budget 3) beginning to address your debt and 4) getting some “quick wins” in the process. 

Why A 30-Day Challenge?

We (my wife and I) produced this 30-day quick-start series because we found that a lot of our financial coaching students (and audience in general) were having a hard time just “getting started” on their debt-elimination journey. OR, if they had started and fallen away, they were having a hard time getting re-started.

The questions of “what do I do first?”, or “what do I do next” are often top of mind. And if you’re arriving at this material in a high state of stress, that overwhelm can be a big inhibitor in you taking whatever the next step should be (assuming that you even know what that next step should be).

This series is designed 1) take the guesswork out of “what to do” but also 2) takes the guesswork out of “how to” do it. Each day of the 30-day challenge addresses its given topic in extensively granular detail. And it’s meant to be a resource that you can keep coming back to as you move up the staircase of your own personal finance journey.

Do you "get down" with Pinterest? Would you consider pinning this to your favorite board?

Another “why” for producing this series is something you’ll hear us talk about a lot around here and that is, “reducing overwhelm”. We’re actually pretty fanatical about that.

The overwhelm that typically comes with getting your arms around your personal finances is understandable because the process usually involves visiting some highly emotional topics around your money and the problems you’re having with it. And to be sure,, there are TONS of “tips and tricks” you can find on YouTube, Google and Pinterest, but you really need a step by step, “do this, then do that” system to follow.

We aim for this to be so granular, that you’ll literally almost never feel overwhelmed and will therefore be able to get results much faster and with much more regularity.

Who Is This Series For?

This is a series for people who have a strong sense that they want/need to get more control over their money and need some help/resources to get them from “point A to point B. To illustrate, here are some of the situations that might describe you right now:

1. Financially disorganized (i.e. no budget or budgeting-”ish”, no expense tracking, vague sense of cash flows, overwhelmed at the thought of getting started).
2. In a financial crisis (paycheck to paycheck, job loss, can’t pay all the bills, creditors calling, possibly even considering bankruptcy).
3. Swimming in debt and desperate to escape.
4. Financially dissatisfied (make good money, just don’t feel like you’ve got much to show for it).
5. Or, maybe financially healthy and just ready to take your personal finance game to a whole new level and reach your financial independence goals.

What’s In It? 

Generally, the contents of this series fall into the following 1) addressing your “why” and other mindset considerations, 2) getting organized, 3) getting on a budget, 3) tracking expenses, 4) saving money 5) debt elimination and 6) specific relational, vocational and societal situations you’ll likely run into and how to deal with them.

Each of the 30 days addresses a part of the personal financial literacy and debt-elimination process in great detail so that, if you find yourself stuck at a certain stage, OR if you’ve “left the building” for a while and you need to pick up where you left off, you’ve got a faithful 30 days of topics that can serve as focus points to engage or reengage in your journey.

Another part of the reason for producing this series is that many of our students have taken other personal finance courses and programs (i.e. Dave Ramsey’s “Financial Peace University” or other) and just didn’t get the granularity around a certain sub-topic like say, “budgeting” or the “how to” of the debt-snowball. We find that they need more detail than what’s available in the more mainstream personal finance courses like that one, so you can consider this your “next level” guide.

The “How To” Part

As I mentioned earlier, this (free) series will give you all the tools you need to: 

1. Organize your finances.
2. Get on a solid, consistent, written budget.
3. Address your debt authoritatively (and likely even pay it all off).
4. Get you some “quick wins” so that you can stay on track.
5. Build the skills and insights you’ll need to move on to Financial Independence within 10 years or less.

We’ll do all of this generally by following our “8 Steps To Erase Debt” framework:

1. Stop All Retirement Investing (Until Step 4)
2. Build A Budget
3. Starter Emergency Fund of $1000
4. Eliminate Debts Smallest To Largest (a.k.a The Debt Snowball)
5. Full Emergency Fund of 3-6+ Months' Expenses
6. Invest A Minimum of 15% Income Into Retirement Accounts (and increase savings rate to 50%+ if possible)
7. College Funding (if applicable)
8. Pay Off The Home Mortgage
9. Build Wealth, Serve and Be Ridiculously Generous

My Own Journey Out Of $43k In Consumer Debt

If you would have told me 10 years ago that I would be able to eliminate all my debt and be within an inch of “early retirement”, I would have totally laughed in your face. But here we are just over a decade in and I’ve eliminated $43,000 and my wife and I have accumulated just under $600k in savings and investments (and that’s just in the past 5 years, actually)! 

I know, crazy right!?

The best part for you is that we’ve achieved all of this by doing the exact same things I’m teaching you in this 30 day challenge. So, if you follow these steps, turn them into habits and reach out for help, encouragement and accountability, you will be absolutely amazed at what you can accomplish in just a few short years.

Once You’ve Made Up Your Mind

Let’s face it, the decision to get out of debt is easy (we’ll, sort of). The hard part is execution. And execution is all about knowing what to do, when to do it and then being accountable to some external source for validation and course correction.

I don’t want to be too harsh here, but I want you to understand that, especially when you’re in debt and living paycheck to paycheck, dealing with finances is straight up warfare. 

There are now and always will be entities that are trying to “get in your pockets”. Now, I’m not recommending you go all “monk” and never buy anything ever again, but I am gingerly smacking you upside the head to challenge you to start looking at every dollar you spend under a microscope. 

In order to break this cycle you’re in, it’s going to require two things:

1. Head knowledge AND
2. Behavior modification (requiring skill building, encouragement and accountability)

Can you guess which one is harder?

I can’t count the number of times new students come to us with their budgeting spreadsheet. They beam with pride at how detailed it is. But can you take a wild guess as to why they’re talking to us? If you said, “because they don’t actually follow the budget”, you’d be right. 

In short their spreadsheet is really just a “wishful intentions” document that they set once but don’t actually follow. It’s a theory and not a practice.  

This series will get you out of theory and into practice, fast…

Conclusion And Call To Action:

So in review, this “30 Day Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Challenge” is a step-by step video series designed to help you get started with: 

1) organizing your finances, 

2) writing your first (or latest) budget 

3) beginning to address your debt and 

4) getting some “quick wins” in the process. 

It’s meant to be an easy, “no-overwhelm” resource that you can use as a reference, no matter where you are in your own personal finance discovery process. 

In this post, we also addressed: 1) why we produced this series, 2) who it’s specifically for, 3) What you’ll be learning and 4) The “how to” behind doing it all. And again, this comprehensive resource is completely FREE!

Call To Action:

Two very easy next steps:

1. Download our free PDF guide that goes along with this series: “Debt-Elimination Quick-Start Guide”. 

2. Head over to YouTube and start with the “Day 0” video (also embedded at the top of this post). You can totally binge-watch the whole series if you want. That “first pass” will give you an idea of where you are and what it’s going to take for you to get to the next level with your own personal situation.

I want for you to capitalize on any and all emotional momentum you’ve gotten from this piece of content by committing two just getting started by completing those two actions I mentioned above. If you’ve done that, congratulations, you’ve started! Now just follow the breadcrumbs and please let me know what’s helpful and what you might need more detail around.

What do you need help with the most right now?

Along those lines, I want to encourage you and challenge you again to get started in this process. Just download the guide and start consuming the YouTube series. Easy.

And again, I’d LOVE to hear from you. The biggest compliment you can give me as your coach is to share your progress and your takeaways in the comments below.

I wish you nothing but great success in your personal finance endeavors and please let me know how I can help you accomplish your goals.

To your freedom,

Brad

Your Virtual Money Coach

[email protected]

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