Overwhelmed by Debt? Uncover What's Really Keeping You from Retirement
You cannot ignore retirement because you feel like you have too much debt. You really need to find what will work best for getting you to retirement and how much debt to go with you.
Feel overwhelmed by debt and unable to plan for retirement? In this episode, I explore retirement and debt, and why they don't have to be mutually exclusive. The truth about paying off debt before retirement is that you don't have to eliminate everything first. But you do need help with identifying what's really causing your debt cycle. Discover how understanding what creates your debt changes everything.
What You’ll Learn In This Episode:
✅ Why you don't need all debt paid off before retirement and the better question to ask
✅ How to decide whether retirement and debt can coexist
✅ Why feeling overwhelmed by debt often stems from a preparedness problem
✅ How the cycle of debt reveals what's really blocking your path to retirement
✅ Why getting help with retirement planning is non-negotiable at this age
Unedited Transcript For This Episode
Click HERE for Full Transcript of Episode
Welcome to the Wealthy After 40 podcast, where I help you enjoy your money now and later. I also help you find solutions of managing that money for now and later, which we are specifically talking about in today's episode. So whether you have credit cards, mortgage, heloc, student loans, whatever else I may or may not have mentioned, whatever shape of debt you have, it might. Be a hindrance to retirement. But if you are thinking, I'm too overwhelmed by debt to even think about retirement, that is your obstacle, your challenge to reaching retirement. It, we all have debt in one way, shape, or form, some of us have a lot, some of us have a little. You know, there's a whole bunch of different scenarios and circumstances that I could talk about, but you believing you can't retire because of the debt you have may or may not be true. So I wanna ask you a question to start deciphering. What debt problem you feel. What that actual challenge is and why you can't think about retirement. So the first question is, do you need to have all of your debt paid off before retirement? Now I'm gonna quickly answer this, no. And if you said yes, I want you to hang on to that for a minute. The better question you should be asking yourself, and I am going to ask you. Do you want to pay off all of your debt before retirement? This is for you to decide this is your yes or no. Do you want to pay off all of your debt before retirement? I've heard countless people have different ideas, varying ideas really, especially with a mortgage, some feel like they have to have it paid off before retirement. Some people do not, and that is okay. It is for you, for that person to decide. So to better understand if debt should go with you or not, you really need to. Like dive into what is your relationship with debt? How does that feel? So the individual I know who is like, I will never pay off my mortgage. She had different means to an end. She had a different purpose. The other individual who said, my mortgage has to be paid off before I retire, just didn't want that demand of debt and retirement. This is what you need to decide. This is what's very important. However, at this age, well into our forties, if you are there, it is important to balance the now and later. Specifically with debt. You cannot ignore retirement because you feel like you have too much debt. You really need to find what will work best for getting you to retirement and how much debt to go with you. It's a balance now and later. This is crucial. You cannot ignore retirement at this age. Now I know debt is a huge concern. It's a huge concern of many. And debt is a concern because you can't seem to stop the accumulation. You get the balance on your credit cards paid down, only finding yourself to using those credit cards to cover this, that, or the other. This, this structure, this flow down and up, down and up has you believing that you don't have the ability to retire. And so immediately you're thinking the solution is to pay off the debt first before I can plan for retirement. And I've already told you at this age, that is not an option. What I'm going to tell you in that scenario, debt isn't the problem. You do have debt, you do need to pay it off, but the debt balance fluctuating up and down is the problem, and it's actually a preparedness problem. That preparedness problem. Is your hindrance, is your challenge in reaching retirement? I can be honest with you, if you don't solve this problem now, it will follow you into retirement if you get there, so I dug into the archives. My podcast archives, episode 45, is all about financial freedom levels. Basically going from step one up to Full Financial Freedom Grants a Bader. I share all about that in that episode. So give it a listen for complete understanding, how to define what level you are and what steps to take next, but. What I'm gonna share with you and why it's relating to this episode is that if you don't reach the financial freedom level of financial stability first, you won't ever reach financial independence, okay? Financial independence is retirement, meaning you no longer have to exchange work for money, but if you don't solve the stability. Financial independence, like even if I said you enter into retirement, it's going to be a struggle. It's going to be a challenge. So I've recently shared about this client before but she was also experiencing the same thing that we're talking about with debt balance fluctuating up and down, and her specific words when she reached out. I need your help. My spending is not good and I'm creating too much debt. She's like, I've just gotta figure out the debt. As we worked together, as I helped her solve the preparedness problem, not just paying down the debt. Three months after working together, this is what she sent to me. So glad I did my workup with you. I went from paycheck to paycheck, making minimum payments on my credit cards to paying off $5,000 of debt and saving $2,500 in three months. Now she's got the ability to make at or to save at least 10,000 a year with that amount. We solved her preparedness problem. She was ignoring expenses that were coming around the corner, expenses that she had already committed to, such as her car registration, her car insurance, paying for the tax attorney, CPA, whatever you wanna call them. Once we solved that preparedness problem, these are the results she got in three months. Not even accumulating anything more debt, paying it off saving as well, because that was her goal. That was her balance of now and later we structured that for her. So what is one step you can do today? You need to understand what is creating your debt. So when you reach for that credit card or when that balance goes back up, what are the items you are using it for? It may or may not be clear because sometimes the reaching for that comes one or two after. So exploring what has created that and then start creating a saving funds for those things. And I can almost guarantee you that the debt fluctuating will stop. So instead of staying in the cycle and thinking that debt is the problem, begin understanding what is creating your debt. Once you identify those, just like I did for my client, creating a saving a savings funds for those things. And your debt fluctuating should stop. So if you're struggling with debt and you're tired of the balance going up and down, I would love to chat with you about how to solve your problem. So book a Clarity, connection, call at Elevate Finances us slash connection. Let's chat. Spend about 45 minutes together exploring how be how to best number one, find what's wrong and prepare that solution. All right, so what have we talked about in this episode? We have covered. The reluctance to think about retirement because of debt, and at this age, that cannot be the answer. We need to be tackling all problems, maybe not all at the same time, but we've gotta figure out how to balance now and later. So explore what is causing your balance to go up. You're able to get a paid down. So something is not happening all the time. And I know a lot of individuals think I just overspend. I want you to be more thoughtful, more, give yourself more grace than that because like I have said, 99% of people are not just fri frivolously overspending. So think about what is causing that balance to go back up after you have got it paid down, and then find the solution to that. And if you need support, like I've said, book alar connection, call with me at Elevate Finances US connection. I'd love to help you solve that problem and share with you what more we could do if we work together. So find 45 minutes on your schedule, schedule that I would love to chat with you, especially as we're coming to the end of the year to get yourself set up and prepared for a wonderful 2026 to get you started to support you in being able to reach retirement and not fill all of this doubt. Last episode we talked about. You know, even just believing that it's possible. And this one, we talked about ignoring it because of other issues. So let's solve those. Let's get you moving forward. I would love for you to be in the place where you're saying what next, what next? And moving yourself closer and closer to retirement. Thank you for tuning into today's episode again. Head over to Instagram. Let's connect. Leave me your thoughts, your ideas, your questions that you want covered in that workshop I've been talking about. Or just come say, Hey, just come say, Hey, I would love to hang out with you over there in those, in that DM over there. Have a wonderful chat and yeah, get to know one of the other a little bit better. Thank you for tuning in again, and we'll see you next week.
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