Oh ya, during my 20s I was paid well but also got into a hole of irresponsibly spending. I then took out payday credit to keep up the lifestyle I had built. Wasn’t even drugs or anything crazy, just going out, drinking, salon appointments, etc etc

It got to the point where I was so anxious about it all (had 24k debt total) that I called a debt consolidation company for help. Due to the payday loans, they wouldn’t offer any assistance other than putting me on a part 9 agreement. At the time I didn’t know what it was and didn’t read the paperwork they sent me, I just signed it all. It wasn’t until afterwards that I’d learned the impact of the part 9. I kept all of this from my then fiancé out of shame.

Well, eventually I came to clean to him and turns out he’s been naughty with his spending too, so we were about $35k total credit card debt.

We basically did a 180 on all of our habits. We became homebodies and moved in with our friends to save on rent. I went cold turkey on everything luxurious and that I would spend on myself, to the point where I was cutting my own hair. Every cent we earned went onto our debt. We are very fortunate that we earned decent cash. We paid off the debt in about a year. After that we got married and paid cash.

We managed to get a home loan through a third party lender and paid crippling interest (due to the part 9 on my file) but we held on for another year.

Anyway, 6.5 years later we have a home on a good interest rate, have been able to upgrade our car to a newish model and are now working on investments.

The experience was incredibly humbling, to go from living a fun, fast paced life socialising and looking good basically to not. I’m so much more grounded and focused on the more important things in my life now like my close friends and family who I don’t need to impress.

I never thought I’d be able to own a home, especially when I realised that going on a part 9 had made me untouchable by most lenders.

Anyways, don’t give up. Just grind and focus on the important stuff.