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All of those friends with whom you want to travel will be otherwise involved when you're 30. You're likely to date someone your own age, should you only start dating at 30, take 2 years to find a mate, you'll be looking at advanced maternal age before you have kids. That can mean complications and poor health of your kid or expensive fertility treatments.
Whoa... you have a whole lot of assumptions there!
The OP did not say her friends are traveling... but that they are relocating and working overseas.
The OP does not mention putting dating on hold at all! And then you throw in advanced age, medical complications, and fertility problems? Quite a tale your spinning there....
The OP mentions the "immense anchor of student loan debt". Clearly this is weighing heavily and should be addressed. And 4.5 years to be free sounds like a good plan for this poster.
I would pay off the student loans ASAP. If TSHTF, you can bankrupt out most other debt, but not student loans, and those will hang around forever. Having a student loan is playing financial Russian roulette with no recourse.
His interest on the debt is probably 2%-4%. Doing that is... well... going to cost him in the long run.
Dave Ramsey's advice is about psychological stuff, it isn't the most effective road.
The math may say otherwise, but human nature usually dictates that trying to do too many things at once, results in nothing getting done well or quickly.
It's not the interest that's the issue, it's the total monthly payment. I'm guessing at that amount, the OP is paying something like $500.00/mo. That puts a big crimp on most people's monthly budget.
Thanks everyone for all the advice, helps to see peoples’ different thought processes.
To address some of the points …
1) My job does not permit me to have another job at the same time.
2) My interest rates are actually between 5.4-6.75%, with the majority of the balance ($39K) being 6.75%. Quite high.
3) My monthly payments, calculated as an average due to some months being higher due to me including annual bonus payments and such, will actually be around $1,000.
4) I would be moving overseas as well as taking advantage of the proximity to other places to travel (it’s cheaper to visit Italy from England than it is from the U.S.!)
5) Yes, the salary overseas would be decent; however, I’ll need to adjust my living expenses to living somewhere where it’s more expensive.
6) Yes, we can travel after 30, and I plan to! But the truth is I don’t know at what stage in life I’ll be at that age, if I’m ready to have a family, etc. (or if I’m even alive). Hence my nagging feeling that I need to have adventures while I still can.
7) To the person who so snidely asked me what I was doing the last 3 years – well, as I stated, as a fresh college grad graduating with a lot of debt ($65KJ at graduation) and not feeling any support from anyone (parents not helpful and most of my friends had their families support them for school, or had a lot of scholarships, so they did not understand), it can be terrifying knowing you have so much crippling debt. Cue in: avoidance. Your animosity is not helpful, so please leave if you’re going to be insulting.
8) Completely agree that it does not make sense to avoid retirement savings. Can’t ignore how powerful the compounding effect can be.
9) Re: visa. I would not move overseas without a job secured first, and if I do get a job where I’m trying to go, the employer will take care of that matter.
Thanks everyone! Please do feel free to chime in with any more thoughts!
Learn to bartend and work on the weekends. It's fun, you won't miss out and you'll have money. No sense in being a hermit until you're 30. Paying the loans off a few years earlier isn't going to enrich your life.
Depends on interest rate. No point in throwing money away on unneeded interest payments if the rate is much above inflation.
I would pay off the student loans ASAP. If TSHTF, you can bankrupt out most other debt, but not student loans, and those will hang around forever. Having a student loan is playing financial Russian roulette with no recourse.
Especially private loans with no income-based repayment option...
His interest on the debt is probably 2%-4%. Doing that is... well... going to cost him in the long run.
Dave Ramsey's advice is about psychological stuff, it isn't the most effective road.
Interest for a student loan at 2% to 4%? No way! I am the same age as the OP and I had very good federal loans that were minimum 5.5%. My highest was 6.5%. If the OP has private loans which I am willing to be they do then its likely to be more around 8%.
IMO, the interest earnings that the OP could receive from any investing isn't worth the guaranteed 6% return offered by paying down debt that cannot be forgiven in bankruptcy. You can't put a price on that freedom.
My advice to the OP. Try to pay off the loans ASAP. As mentioned above you cannot be forgiven of student loans, despite what Obama and the federal government are saying may happen. I paid off my student loans at the age of 25 and haven't looked back. Don't miss them one bit!
Question to the forum: What would you do? Would you focus on liberating yourself from this immense anchor of student loan debt ASAP, or pay off only the minimum and work abroad and travel while you still can (currently no husband, children, pets, etc.) Life is short, right?
I'd get it paid off. 5.4-6.75% interest rates? Good ghod.
And save.
Get out of the mindset of "I want it all and I want it now."
His interest on the debt is probably 2%-4%. Doing that is... well... going to cost him in the long run.
Dave Ramsey's advice is about psychological stuff, it isn't the most effective road.
Pff, I've had student loans as high as 8%. What a joke! I do agree partially on the Dave Ramsey comment. Once I got ahead of my debt and a big savings built up, I signed up for a credit card I get major benefits from. I pay it off every month, and have an $80 annual fee. On the flip side I probably get $1200+ every year in free travel. I have bought 3 plane tickets, and many many hotel nights for free with it, since I started it barely over a year ago. Dave is TERRIBLY against that, but if you're smart about it, it's stupid not to in my opinion.
To the OP, buckle down and pay off your loans, I was the same as you. Finished a tech school and a ton of college I didn't graduate from at 21 with over 40k in student loans, about 3k in credit card debt, and around 7-8k I owed to my parents. I drug my feet for a while, but also only made about 50k when I started, so it is hard to get too much ahead. Took a couple years to pay off my parents, and a couple more to get ahead on my credit cards. I'd get ahead, then something like a surgery or something else would come up and set me back. I got a major bump in income, blew a bunch of money on bad decisions, then really started to buckle down. In the last 18 months I've paid off over 25k in student loans, my credit cards have a zero balance, and I have 22k saved and only owe 10k more on my student loans which I'll knock out before Christmas and before I turn 27 next spring.
I did the math, and over half of my $550/mo student loans was going towards interest. That's over $275/mo going nowhere.
I finally got to the point that I was fed up of never truly being ahead. At the rate I was going, I could never buy a house, which is my next goal after paying off my truck. The only good thing about all the debt is I always made my payments and it brought my FICO score up to 815, so when I'm ready to buy a house, my credit will already be in line.
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