Dave Ramsey encourages people to get out of debt with gazelle intensity. I understand his point—eliminate the debt so you can move forward with an improved financial situation. Quickly paying off debt means you’ll pay less interest. However, if you have a large amount of debt that will take years to eradicate, no matter how gazelle intense you are, I recommend paying off debt slowly.
Our Debt Story
My husband and I have been married for over twenty years, and we’ve been in significant debt twice in our lives. The first time was when I quit my job to stay home with our kids. (Daycare was expensive in the large city we lived in. Almost my entire paycheck would have gone to paying for daycare.) My husband was a graduate student, and we wracked up debt while he finished.
The second time we were in significant debt was eight years later when one of our children had major medical expenses that our insurance did not cover.
We got out of debt the first time using gazelle intensity. The second time, we slowly worked our way out of debt. I recommend families with more than $20,000 debt get out of debt slowly.
Why We Prefer Paying Off Debt Slowly
There are two reasons we prefer paying off debt slowly:
- We had more family time, and
- We learned how to avoid debt in the future
Our Gazelle Intensity Journey
When we were gazelle intense, our children were young, approximately one, two-and-a-half, and seven. My husband went to school and worked part-time. I worked part-time from home. Because I cared for the kids during the day, most of my work time was early morning and late at night. We never got to spend time together as a family on the weekend because my husband and I took turns working. We were exhausted, and if I’m honest, we were grumpy and frustrated. Lack of sleep and overwork will do that to you.
Family Relationships Suffered
Our family relationships suffered. Even now, I regret that I couldn’t more fully enjoy spending time with my kids. During the day, I was so exhausted I was just trying to make it through the day. At night it was time for more work.
We Kept Taking Financial Steps Backwards
Because we were gazelle intense, we only had a one-thousand-dollar emergency fund. Every extra penny went on the debt, so we were ill-prepared for any emergency. Our only vehicle required a $2,500 repair. Boom, in one swoop, we had to empty our emergency fund and pay the remaining $1,500 on the credit card because we had no extra money. Working so hard to pay down debt only to add to the deficit when emergencies cropped us was depressing and demotivating. Yet, this happened repeatedly because we were living so close to the financial edge in our attempt to be gazelle intense.
My Health Suffered
Also, my health suffered. I ended up having health issues because we were working so hard. I had to see a specialist and spend money restoring my health. Getting back to baseline took several years.
The worst part of this all? We were so far in debt with so little income that it took us years to claw our way out, even with gazelle intensity.
How We Finally Got Out of Debt
We had been gazelle intense for a few years when we decided to take money from my retirement and pay off the remainder—about half of the original debt. What a relief to be debt free! However, we hadn’t learned how to manage our money effectively.
Our Paying Off Debt Slowly Journey
Three years later, one of our children suffered from a mental health issue. We had to pay for many treatments and therapies out of pocket. Soon, we were in serious debt again.
While I regret that we went back into debt, I don’t regret that we had to spend money on our child. Eventually, we did receive coverage to pay for many of the issues we had been paying out of pocket, so we started to work to pay off the debt again. This time, my husband and I were firm that we did NOT want to be gazelle intense. That had affected our lives too much.
We Set Up a Realistic Budget First
The first step was to set up a realistic budget. We used You Need a Budget (YNAB) and followed those principles. Our priority was to create a $5,000 emergency fund. Then we set up a realistic budget with sinking funds. Every month we set aside money for irregular expenses like home maintenance and repairs, car repairs, property taxes, etc. We wanted to avoid the seesaw of quickly paying down debt only to have to add to the debt when an unexpected expense cropped up.
Pay the Same Amount on Debt Every Month
We determined how much we had to pay on our debt and paid that same amount every month. As the balances decreased, more money went on principal instead of interest. When we paid off a debt, we rolled the money for that debt payment into our next one. Slow but steady, we paid down our debts.
Why This Worked Better
Gazelle intensity affected our family relationships and my health. I knew the second time around that I wanted to have time to enjoy my kids (they’re only young once!), and I wanted to maintain my health. I’m happy to say we were able to do both.
Most importantly, paying down debt slowly allowed my husband and I to learn a better way to manage money. We became debt free five years after initially going into debt due to medical expenses.
We learned how to save for things. Recently, we had to replace my 18.5-year-old minivan. Because we were better money managers, we saved money for a new car. We bought a model we could afford and paid 60 percent down. We have a car payment now, but we have already made extra payments and plan to have the car paid off in 2.5 years rather than five years. Then, we’ll start saving for my husband’s replacement car. Hopefully, we can pay more than 60% down for that one.
Final Thoughts
Gazelle intensity was like crash dieting for us. We improved our finances, but didn’t learn the skills that helped us budget effectively. The benefits of paying off debt slowly were that we didn’t have family or health repercussions and learned how to manage money effectively. Even though we paid more interest over time, paying off debt slowly was more effective for us.
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Melissa is a freelance writer and virtual assistant. She earned her Master’s from Southern Illinois University, and her Bachelor’s in English from the University of Michigan. When she’s not working, you can find her homeschooling her kids, reading a good book, or cooking.
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