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Let’s face it, sometimes the reality of a budget can be really discouraging, especially since so much that’s included in a budget, is nonnegotiable. Student debt is quite common, and generally the largest chunk of debt that someone has acquired at the time that repayment begins. Instead of freaking out over how you can possibly ever repay it, and what you will have to sacrifice to do so, get proactive and use the tools at your disposal to ballpark what your monthly payments might look like, and then how you can save money without even noticing that can be put towards your payments each month.
Research and Plan
The internet is littered with tips and tricks to help people get comfortable with their debt, and to create a successful relationship with repayment. You need to use a student loan repayment calculator to estimate what your monthly payments may be with a private student loan. Understand that this might fluctuate a bit, but this is an excellent jumping off point to plan around. Knowing in advance what you will be up against once your grace period between graduation and repayment is over can help you figure out now if you should start to think about earning money, even in small increments to stash away for future payments. A student loan repayment calculator is a free, and user-friendly tool that does you nothing but good when you are trying to be proactive.
Cut Expenses, Embrace Frugality
Feeling broke can be exhausting and can spiral out of control quick. Make saving money, and smart spending one of your hobbies, instead of one of your burdens. Once you reframe how you view your budgetary needs, you will find places to reduce monthly spending, and in some cases, pieces of your budget you can eliminate all together. Tracking even just 30 days’ worth of spending can give you a concise look at where your nickels and dimes go, and why paying attention to small level spending, and eliminating it, can really add up at the end of the month. In some cases, simple things that seem insignificant, like your daily take out coffee, could be the difference between feeling stretched thin on your bills and feeling comfortable.
Find Unconventional Sources of Income
Money is money, and do not limit your income to simply your salary. People earn extra cash in so many ways, and some do not even require you to exert a lot of effort or possesses a specific skill set. One effortless way to find yourself with bonus money at the end of the month is to save your spare change. Make paying for things with physical cash your habit, and stash away the loose change, every little bit helps and turning those collected coins into more usable money each month is only going to ‘cost’ you a trip to your bank or coin counting machine, at a frequency of your choosing.
Utilizing social media marketplace platforms to sell items can be profitable also. With a category for virtually everything you can sell something as small as a winter coat you never wear or as large as that couch in your basement you have not sat on in months. Make a promise to yourself that you are going to allocate these spare funds towards your student debt payments and allow yourself to make these payments on time and in full with some reduced stress that traditional savings methods can create.
