December 10, 2013

Pay off loan or build up savings

I just realized that January is a 3 paycheck month for us.  Now I'm trying to decide what to do with that extra money.

My student loan balance is $1,238.  It'll probably be a little more to fully pay it off.  I think they gave me a discount to make payments on time but if its paid early I lose that discount which is stupid.  But anyways, at 7.25% interest, it would be smart to just get rid of it.

But that was the plan in the beginning of 2013.  I made some big payments and some great progress on paying the loan off.  Then we decided to purchase the condo next door to us as a rental unit.  Then I regretted making all those big payments on the loan because it would have been nice to have that extra cushion in our savings.

So now I have to decide.  Should I pay off the student loan?  Or build up the savings?  Or a little of both?  Hmmmm. Decisions, Decisions.

Of course, with the amount of dental work we've been having to get done on the girls, all the money might just go to the dentist. :)

2 comments:

  1. How much do you currently have in savings? I would probably build up your savings.

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    1. Our emergency fund is sitting at $1000 and one of my goals next year is to bulk that up. But it's so tempting to pay off the loan. I'm thinking of splitting the money between an extra loan payment and my savings goals.

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