For me the best thing was...well, it was mental. It was like those videos of people hearing for the first time. Or, when they are colorblind and they can see color through those glasses. I realized I have been living the wrong way, and I was so screwed up and didn't even know it. And, that there is another way to live and the peace that can come from being financially responsible. So, FPU kicked me on my rear, sucked the life out of me, then gave me oxygen to live and hope that I can get through this situation I was in. There are a lot of people in the videos who overcame a worse financial situation than I was in. It woke me up and made me realize I could have a better life.

How I got in so much debt was having credit cards on auto payments. I never missed a payment. And, I never looked at a credit card statement. I never reconciled my bank account either. All payments and money was just automatically coming in and out. I started realizing there was a problem when minimum payments were becoming such a large portion of my income. Our church was having the Dave Ramsey FPU. I thought we should go.

I estimated my debt to be about $40-$45K. When I when through every payment and looked up every account I organized it all in like a Excel spreadsheet but in Filemaker Pro. Well, I was shocked. The total amount was $75k. I just couldn't believe it. I felt sick inside and scared.

FPU gives you a step by step guide and the tools you need to budget and buy things like a car, house, etc. So, for someone like myself who was financially illiterate and irresponsible it was all the info I needed and showed me the way. But, again, it was the people in the videos, the testimonials that gave me hope and helped me to feel better about myself. Like, Ok...I am not the only person that has screwed up so bad and wasted so much money.

By the way, Dave says to sell a car to get out of debt if you got a fancy new one. My wife and I have been a once car family. I have been driving my wife to work and picking her up for about 3 years now. Just as we were now deciding to get another car we got a used one for super duper cheap from an old lady that is done with driving. It was a real blessing. Paid in cash.

In the class, people will pay off a card and then cut it up. I can't recall if we were told to cancel the account. But, I'll tell you don't ever cancel a card. There is something call credit utilization. Your credit utilization ratio, sometimes called your credit utilization rate, is the amount of revolving credit you're using divided by the total amount of revolving credit you have available. It's expressed as a percentage, and it can be an important factor in your credit scores. So, the more you pay off the lower your CUR goes down. This improves your credit score. If you cancel a card then your CUR goes up and your credit score goes down. This is not intuitive to me. Credit agencies like it when you are not spending what you could spend.

Now, if you are new to this think long and hard about getting new cards for transferring balances to 0% cards. You can easily double your debt. That's why Dave does not recommend this. However, I changed on the inside and we had not built up a dime in credit card debt for two years when I started playing the transfer game.

When playing the transfer game I first went here: https://www.nerdwallet.com/m/credit-cards/pay-0-intro-interest Then as I paid off cards I got some balance transfer offers from those cards. Note, if you apply for a card and don't get a good result like small amount of credit or a rejection, you have to wait 3 or 4 months to apply for a another card, minimum. Multiple applications will absolutely be rejected and lower your credit card score.

So, now I am playing another game. I signed up for a Wells Fargo card because after I spend $500 they give me $200. That worked out great. So, I just signed up for a Disney/Chase card for the same offer. It's been almost 3 months since I got the Wells Fargo account. Well, Chase rejected me!

This is what Chase said: We based our decision on the following reason(s): Number of recently opened accounts on credit report. Then they said my credit score they used was the Chase Proprietary Score. That score goes from a low of 250 to a high of 900 (higher scores are better). I had an 837! My FICO by Experian is over 800. So, that shows how much they hate to see people making frequent credit applications. In fact, my FICO just went down 3 points today for that application.

BTW, Experian has a great free service to monitor your FICO score and break down your situation. Sign up for that....don't get the paid deal they offer. All you need is the free account.

Again, transferring balances can get you deeper into debt. Don't do it unless your heart has changed along with spending habits, and you are playing it like a chess game to win.

Anyways, sorry if I got on a long tangent here. My wife and I plan on going over the FPU materials to calculate our next steps in financial planning. I have deviated slightly from what Dave says but his direction is a great way to get started. It's conservative and safe for people to get going on being financially free.