I paid off a little over $10,000 worth of consumer debt yesterday. This was made possible by breaking that old 403(b) account I had from a previous job. So three Chase cards are paid off, and I will be canceling one of them soon. The other two I will keep around because the Amazon one I only use on Amazon orders, and it earns gift certificates from Amazon, and the Disney card we will use when we go on the Disney cruise later this year, as it too earns bonus money. The Bank of America and First National cards will be canceled as well; Lowe’s and my medical bill are gone as well. I figured this is around $322 a month in minimum payments that will no longer be going out. Close to $350 when you figure in the additional snowball amount I was paying.

This leaves only the car, home equity loan, and one consumer loan for appliances (which at 0% and a low monthly payment I was not concerned with paying this off). The wedding and cruise are now paid in full with no interest charged. That is a big bonus.

Some people have said I lost about $200,000 by breaking this account now, but I counter that with as soon as I can, I am going to increase my 403(b) contributions to 10% to match my employer’s input, so I think I can actually make this money back.

I am also going to split that monthly savings between paying additional on the Toyota loan and putting the rest back in savings.

This is a big relief, and it comes at a good time. My fiancée’s car is having problems, and we will have to save about $500 to fix it. She is also getting laid off March 1st. Money will be tight, but at least the over-all outlook is much better than it was just a month ago.