I am in general a very frugal person. I am very careful about where I spend my money and I use things until they wear out. Frankly, I am as tight as the bark on a tree.

I always find it amusing when magazine articles or talk shows say they can tell you how to save money. The advice is usually the same–cut out the lattes and you can save $15 a week! They have all sorts of cost-saving tips, but it doesn’t help a bit if you are a frugal person who already does all that. Where’s the advice for people who already have cut spending to the bone? Yippee! I saved over a million dollars last year, just by not buying that Porsche and the property on the lake.

The only debt I currently have is my student loan and the mortgage on our house/farm (which is in the 5-digit range.) But I have hated every minute of having student loan debt hanging over me. I graduated twelve years ago, and I hope to get it finally paid off next year.

I got into the student debt before I fully realized what it meant. I was a naive 18-year old who fell for the old “you need to have a college education” bit. I also had a touch of Monopoly-itis–money didn’t seem quite real to me yet. When I graduated with loans totalling more than 200% of my annual salary I felt smothered and a bit helpless. Now I feel like I can breathe again.

Like everyone else, I receive regular requests for donations from my alma mater. I’m sorry, but I refuse to donate money to them until I have at least paid for my own education.

I also am extremely hesitant to lay out any more cash for education while I still owe on the last.

I would sort of like to get a library degree, just so I can be a professional at what I do, but I don’t want to take the gamble of laying out a ton of money and ending up in more debt. So I’ve put off the MLS, at least while I’m still paying for the BA (the cost of the MA is negligible since I had an assistantship that paid for that.) Now with the end of the student loans visible on the horizon, I’m starting to think about it, but that decision rests largely on what scholarships are available.