The “Next Big Goal” Has Been Accomplished – Time to Define a New Goal

You may remember way back to the beginning of March when I defined what the “next big goal” of my student loan repayment plan would be. For those of you that might have forgotten or who don’t want to take the moment to click back on the link above, the goal was to break the $30 thousand barrier with my New Jersey Higher Education Student Assistance Authority (NJHESAA) student loan.

Today, I can happily announce that this goal has been achieved! 🙂 But let’s not spend too much time celebrating and being happy. No, in fact I want to take this chance to define what my next goal will be with this repayment (some of you might be able to guess this goal). With today’s announcement that my NJHESAA student loan debt is down to $30 thousand, that leaves a total of $85 thousand of total student loan debt that I have left outstanding to repay. The next goal is to break the $80 thousand barrier in terms of total outstanding student loan debt.

But wait! I’m going to add a twist to this goal. According to my projections, I should reach this goal by August 1, 2010. Well, I want to accelerate that a little bit. I’m going to create an even stricter time limit on reaching the next goal – I want to reach it by July 15, 2010. In the world of paychecks and balancing personal budgets, reducing a projection by two weeks is a monster goal to achieve.

Let’s see if I can get it done.

In the mean time, everyone out there in JerseySmarts.com land should feel free to raise a glass to fighting for one’s financial freedom from student loan debt. It can be done and I intend to do it!

In May 2006, I graduated from Rutgers University with a Masters Degree and $120,720 in student loan debt. I currently owe $85 thousand, which breaks down to $30 thousand owed to the New Jersey Higher Education Student Assistance Authority and $55 thousand owed to the United States Department of Education. Follow my student loan repayment story on JerseySmarts.com.