This category is dedicated to content that teaches you ways to avoid debt and strategies in paying off credit card and loan debt including your mortgage. My favorite way to pay off debt fast is to use velocity banking. If you want to learn more about velocity banking, the 7 baby steps, or other strategies, this is the page for you.
The worst thing you can do is to blindly follow financial advice without doing your own research. I am not a financial advisor, but I can share some common mistakes in personal finance. Investing Without Research: Blindly investing in stocks or other financial instruments without understanding them or conducting thorough research can be risky. High-Risk Strategies: Pursuing high-risk investment strategies without considering one's risk tolerance or financial goals can lead to significant losses. Ignoring Emergency Fund: Some people suggest skipping…
The New Year's is a time when people define their resolutions going forward. Many of you will have New Year's resolutions that focus on getting new material things, going after your dreams, confessing your love, or growing your careers. I believe it is important to invest $20 in a Vision Board. A vision board is just your basic cork board where you can pin down your goals in picture or word format. This Vision board should be hung up somewhere…
Intuit's popular personal finance app Mint is shutting down by the end of 2023. One of the few free budgeting apps available, Intuit is transitioning Mint users to Credit Karma where you can still track your credit score and net worth, but you can no longer create custom budgets. Let's talk alternatives! 1. Credit Karma As the parent company of Turbo Tax, Mint, Credit Karma, Mail Chimp, and Quickbooks, Intuit recognized that Mint and Credit Karma were similar enough to…
The idea behind Velocity Banking is to use the HELOC (Home Equity Line of Credit) to pay off high-interest debt, such as credit card balances, and then pay off the HELOC more quickly than you would be able to pay off the original debt. By doing this, you can potentially save money on interest charges and pay off your debt more quickly than you would have otherwise. Here's how it works in practice: Take out a HELOC on your home,…
When it comes to tracking the health of your personal finance, the net worth statement is the best way to measure your financial situation. This easy calculation can help you determine if you are on track with your financial goals, or if you are in trouble and need to tackle your debt. Download the Finance Throttle Net Worth Tracker or consider spending the time to create your own. WHAT IS A GOOD NET WORTH? Every person is different. Your net…
If you are new to the blog, Velocity Banking is the strategy I am using to pay off my home in 7 years or less. I started off with a new house and a mortgage of $282,000 due January 1st, 2019. Using Velocity Banking, I paid off over $115,000 and saved over $60,000 in interest payments in just 3 years. Now I owe $165,000. You can follow my velocity banking journey on this page. Increasing Costs With the rising costs…
Normally, I would post one to two times a week on Finance Throttle. However my wife and I recently discovered that my wife's identify was stolen by someone who made over $1700 in Xbox related purchases back in 2021. Let's just say it has been a busy and stressful two weeks where I couldn't find the time to blog. Here is what happened. We were contacted by a Debt Collector We received mail from a debt collector saying we owed…
With inflation, interest rates have jumped up along with home prices. Historically, home prices go down when interest rates go up. When you hear the term housing bubble, that means home prices are inflated and the bubble may soon pop. This will send home prices crashing back down. If you really need to buy a home in current market conditions, consider an ARM. An ARM, or Adjustable-Rate Mortgage is a loan with a variable interest rate that fluctuates throughout the…
Let's say that you have $500 left over each month after expenses and savings. In most cases, investing your $500 in the total stock market or S&P 500 will grow your net worth faster than paying off your home early with an extra $500 per month in principal payments. However the stock market is now projected to earn smaller returns of 4% per year and 30 year conventional mortgage rates shot up to 5.14% on April 13th, 2022. Whats more,…
Velocity Banking is a strategy used to pay off debt really really fast, hence the name velocity. In essence, it is the strategy of paying off your debt in large principal chunks every "x" number of months. For example, you put $5,000 extra towards principal now, then don't pay any extra principal until you save up $5,000 again. That is the simple explanation of Velocity Banking, but it involves more than just that. Debt Snowball is the process of paying…
