[Kimberly]

47 and 54 years old. $381k debt (no mortgage ) yearly income: $120000 gross. Retirement is 10k only combined. Will we make it?

Debt is state and federal taxes, student loans, medical and consumer debt, car notes.

Would like to breathe one day.

[Robert]

Will you make it? With the numbers you’ve given us; that will only be possible with both a drastic adjustment to your lifestyle; and not retiring until each of you are in your early 70s.

With the numbers you have given us; I do not perceive retirement for either one of you until you are in your early to mid 70s at the earliest I know student loans cannot be discharged in bankruptcy; but I don’t know if state or federal taxes could, or could not be discharged in bankruptcy; But in any event, I would seek out a consultation with a bankruptcy attorney.

I mean, I understand being in debt; I accumulated about 63K in student loan debt; and about a decade and a half after that I accumulated quite a bit in credit card debt; but I was able to do a cash out refinancing on the investment properties that I owned.

In your situation; if you cannot discharge anything in bankruptcy; I would advise that you hit up Dave Ramsey‘s videos that discuss how to get out of debt and how to get “ back to basics” when it comes to building a financial future for yourself.

Some of your medical debt might be negotiated downward; and I think there are agencies both profit and nonprofit that help people with that.

You can get on a payment plan for your federal taxes and I would assume you could do the same for your state taxes.

Assuming you could somehow kill all of that debt in the next six years; that gets both of you to ages 53 and 60 respectively.

That is barely enough time to build the amount of assets you will need to provide an income stream to replace the paychecks you will no longer have when you retire.

Accordingly; I do not believe that either one of you will be able to retire until you are in your early 70s at the very least.

The only silver lining to that cloud is that if you do not take Social Security until age 70; then you maximize your payout.

I could see a scenario where each of you works until 70 or so; then start drawing as Social Security; and at the same time downsizing from your current residence – and putting all that money from the sale of your primary residence (minus what you will pay for a new primary residence; ideally a condo or something like that) into retirement savings.

While your situation is dire indeed; I do not believe it is completely non-salvageable.

But you’re probably going to have to make drastic adjustments to your lifestyle. (again, you can get more on that from Dave Ramsey.)

[Mike]

You need to get on the Dave Ramsey plan and increase your incomes in order to retire with anything more than Soc security.

[Petty]

I’ll keep it short. NO. but all is not lost. Do whatever it takes to get rid of your debt first.

We went from near penniless to a $1m networth in just 10 years, and we stomached a COVID crisis (big income cut) and $50K stock losses along the way.

[Sylvia]

It’s not the easiest or quickest route you are on right now to hit FIRE however I think if you all are serious about wanting to get there and get out of debt you can.

If it were me I would start by writing out all the debts broken down by dollar value.

I personally get motivated paying things off so I would look to pay the smallest debt first and roll the payments into the next smallest once paid off etc.

Also I’m not sure where your medical debt is from but a lot of the times you can negotiate it and offer to pay a smaller one time lump sum (this can also be done with credit cards just know they may close your accounts but in my opinion if you have this much debt right not maybe not having a credit card at the moment might be best for you).

As for the cars maybe look into downgrading them you don’t need nor can you afford anything fancy right now.

Let’s be real a car’s purpose is to get you from a to b and whether it’s a beat up Nissan or a g wagon doesn’t matter what matters right now is that it gets there.

Tax and student loan debt unfortunately there’s nothing you can do about that but pay it.

In order to grow your retirement $ try either getting a second job to help be able to pay things faster or have extra dollars to put towards a retirement account or look to see where you can cut costs right now maybe streaming services or eating out too much and take that extra couple of dollars to put into your retirement account.

Best of luck to you stay positive financial freedom is there you just need to get hungry enough to chase it correctly.

[Carol]

Does no mortgage mean you own your house free and clear, or you don’t own at all? Break down all your debt. How much are the car notes?

Sell the cars and buy something cheaper.

Negotiate the medical debt. How many years left on student loans? Renegotiate those.

[Author]

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