Moving Right Along – Another Thousand Bucks Melts Off My Student Loan Debt

We’re all used to this routine by now, right? It’s been about two weeks since my last student loan announcement, so that must mean that it’s time to announce another thousand dollar drop in my student loan debt. That’s right – my student loan debt is now down to $78 thousand. More importantly, however, the New Jersey Higher Education Student Assistance Authority (NJHESAA) portion of my student loan debt is now down in the $23 thousand range.

The drop in my NJHESAA student loan debt is important to note because this particular debt is the one that I’ve focused on in this repayment plan. I think that once I get rid of this particular portion of the student loan debt, I’ll be in a much better position, overall. These days, I’m sending about $2,500 in to the NJHESAA folks each month. I would rather, of course, have that money remaining in my bank account each month!

Actually, I’ll probably just direct some of those funds towards repaying my United States Department of Education (USDOE) student loan. But I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it…

According to the spreadsheet that I prepared to monitor, track, and project my NJHESAA student loan repayment, it looks like I’ll have this loan paid off in less than a year. My original goal was to have it repaid by April 1, 2011 and I think that goal is still attainable if a few things go in my direction financially. However, I take an ultraconservative stance when I update my spreadsheet so at this point, it looks like I’ll have this loan repaid slightly after April 1, 2011.

And I never factor into my projections the fact that I’ve made some money in the stock market. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about selling out of some stocks (like Ford and Bank of America). If I decide to sell out of those stocks any time soon, I’ll more than likely direct my earnings on those sales directly to repaying this student loan debt. Trust me, if I decide to do that there will be a celebration on this blog since it’ll chop the remaining balance of this particular loan down to a very easily manageable size!

In May 2006, I graduated from Rutgers University with a Masters Degree and $120,720 in student loan debt. I currently owe $78 thousand, which breaks down to $23 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.