Well... yesterday I turned 27. Somehow I expected to be a lot further long on the road to financial security at my age. So I'm starting to this blog to explore my journey from deep in the red realm of debt to the financial mecca of a positive net worth. I'm taking my cue from a couple others I've "met" on the WIRR message board.
December 2006 - graduated law school with a whopping $48517.91 in student loan debt... not including the balance left on the consolidation loan for undergrad, which in December was just shy of $24000 (which ironically, represents just over my half of our consolidation debt... it was $38K from our combined undergraduate educations... but his loans only made up about 18K of that number.) So all things considered I'm facing $72000 for the privilege of being where I am today... making less than $30K as an attorney working at a small law firm.
Additionally, I've got my car loan for my 2005 Ion, that we bought in April 2007. I owe a just under 12K for it, after the first few months of payments.
There are some bright spots... we bought our house before I went to law school. So we've built some equity (althought not much.) And my darling spouse has been steadily squirreling money away in his 401K since we got married in 2000 and now has almost 50K saved (which at age 30 is a pretty nifty sum.) I have about $5K in retirement accounts myself, so I've got a lot of catching up to do. To be brutally honest with myself... we would have a positive joint net worth if the market feels like rebounding anytime soon. But most of the debt at this point is my doing. It's a good thing I love my job, or I'd wonder why I put myself in this position.
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