The essence of any debt help program is that it is realistic. The debt program needs to be tailored to the individual’s situation in order for it to be of any help. There are many template debt programs out there that will apply standard rules to any given situation. Cut back spending pay off credit card debt first etc. In my mind this is like trying to fit a square plug into a round hole. The standard debt programs have things in them that will not apply to everyone and there are things missing in them that some people may need. For example a retired person in debt is going to have different priorities than a twenty five year old in debt.
What’s the alternative to using the standard debt programs? The ideal situation is where a debt help program is tailored to the individual, their resources and to their needs. In most cases you are going to have to pay for someone to tailor a debt program to your specific needs. The only other alternative is if you create your own debt help program to your own specific needs.
But I don’t know anything about debt management.
Ok – but what you should be saying is ‘Where can I learn more about debt help programs?’
The point is that if you really want to tackle your debt problems then you need to take charge of where you get your information from and how you apply that information.
With standard debt help programs the individual is told exactly what to do. Now most people don’t like being told what to do – it reminds them too much of school. Telling people what to do does not solve the problem. In the short term there may be relief as the people begin to follow the program but long term the problems with debt tend to persist.
Give a man a fish or teach a man how to fish
The old saying of ‘Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime’ holds particularly true in relation to debt programs. The saying could be rewritten along the lines of ‘Give a person a debt relief program and you give them debt relief for a day, teach a person how to build a debt relief program and you give them debt relief for a lifetime’.
By simply trying to research and build your own debt program you will gain an insight into how money really works. You will discover ways of managing the money that you have and paying off your debt in a manner that is suited to your situation. You’ll gain valuable skills in how to create and manage budgets. You’ll learn how to be creative with the limited resources you have.
Debt help program that suits you
The reason why a self made debt help program has a much higher chance of success is because you have tailored it to your situation, your needs, your income, your expectations, and your self knowledge.
If you are honest with yourself and try to be as objective as possible with your situation it is possible that you can create a very effective program.
The problem with self made debt programs
Ok I’m not doubting that you are intelligent, not one bit. I know you can research the information on this website and on the internet and combine what you learn into an effective debt program. The problem is that it was you who got you into this debt situation in the first place. You are effectively going to be creating a debt program with a bias towards your existing debt behaviour. You are either going to be too hard on yourself trying to purge the guilt from past overspending or you are going to be too soft on yourself telling yourself that you’ll start this great new debt program next month.
If you can balance the urge to quickly get rid of debt against the urge to go easy on yourself then you have the foundation upon which you can build a good debt program. That foundation needs to be solid. There is no point building the debt program on a foundation of sand. If you are not prepared to go that extra mile and acknowledge the issues that you have with debt then you may as well pay some finance company to manage your debt for you.
In Summary
1. Self made debt programs can be more effective than standard template programs. This is because they are tailored to an individual’s needs.
2. By building the program yourself you gain useful skills that will last you a lifetime and help keep you debt free for life.
3. Be careful to allow for your existing feelings on debt when building the debt program.
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