Pay off your student loans in 6 steps

Here’s how I did it

When I graduated in 1988, I had $40,000 in student loan debt. That is equivalent to over $86,000 in today’s dollars. I paid it off in 5 years. For me this was important because I hate being in debt — to me, it’s about freedom. In this article, I will share how I did it. You might decide to try some of these things, or you might decide your priorities are different.

When I graduated in 1988, I got an engineering job making $34,000 a year. That was a good salary back then, but I had $40,000 in student loan debt plus another $10,000 because I had bought a new car. So how did I pay off a total of $50,000 in 5 years?

Make sure you do the following simple things.

You have to budget. Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t know how. I didn’t when I graduated. I had to learn. Back then, I read books and asked friends for advice. Now, there are apps and other great resources.

I used a legal pad and broke things down into progressively smaller units. So I crunched the numbers for my annual, monthly and weekly budget.

The most important thing — you have to spend less than you make. Then, you use the extra cash to pay down your loans.

You might say, “easier said than done. You were an engineer. I’m a barista.”

Hopefully that means that you don’t have as much debt as I did. I hope so. But even if you do, attitude is key.

I knew a teacher who paid off her mortgage by the time she was 35, and a river guide in Colorado who made…

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