Financial Strategy

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Why Getting Out of Debt Fast Isn’t Always the Right Choice

Occasionally, there are better uses for your money

3 min readApr 21, 2025

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Image by wayhomestudio on Freepik

If you’re in debt right now you’ve probably heard a lot of advice about how you should get out of it as fast as possible.

That way, you’ll pay less interest overall — and that just makes sense, right? You should cut expenses, stop all discretionary spending, and just throw everything at getting out of debt.

If you can make that work, that’s great — but for many of us, it’s simply unrealistic. Here are three good reasons to get out of debt slowly.

Fast isn’t always sustainable

We can all cut expenses, stop all discretionary spending, and just throw everything at getting out of debt for a short period.

It even feels quite satisfying.

We can turn a no-spend month into a game, and our brains love a bit of gamification, but a no-spend life can feel very restricting, and more like survival than living.

Putting our entire life on hold while we get out of debt is frustrating and , for many of us , not sustainable. We all need to enjoy life, which is why I recommend putting a little fun money in your budget.

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Financial Strategy
Financial Strategy

Published in Financial Strategy

From financial goals to success — follow us and learn how to develop your path

Karen Banes
Karen Banes

Written by Karen Banes

Freelance writer sharing thoughts on life, society, creativity, and productivity. https://changetheworldwithwords.substack.com

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