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Inspire<br />
Lessons learned from stories in our community.<br />
Austin and Shelby Pierce<br />
Intentional Strength<br />
By Michelle Lessmann<br />
When Austin and Shelby Pierce became husband<br />
and wife, their combined debt exceeded<br />
$100,000. The bulk of this number came from student<br />
loans from when they attended private colleges, Austin<br />
at Morningside College, and Shelby at Colorado<br />
Christian University in Lakewood, Colorado. Before they<br />
wed, Shelby requested they develop a personalized<br />
premarital counseling program to address various issues<br />
that plague most marriages, including money. That is<br />
when they were introduced to Dave Ramsey’s Financial<br />
Peace University Program. They took the program twice,<br />
once before they married and again to ensure they had<br />
laser focus to tackle their debt.<br />
Like many couples, Austin and Shelby took the Program<br />
because they wanted to start their marriage off right<br />
and take control of their money. In 2015, they made the<br />
decision to follow the program to eliminate their debt.<br />
Within five years, they made their final payment and<br />
became debt-free in December 2020. According to<br />
Austin, they “told their money where to go, instead of<br />
figuring out where it went.”<br />
The couple intently followed four main Ramsey<br />
principles in their quest to become debt-free. First,<br />
they developed a monthly budget and dictated where<br />
they would spend every single dollar they earned that<br />
month. They established categories including the typical<br />
food, rent, and utilities, then added items specific to<br />
them, including weekly date nights. They set the monthly<br />
budget, then followed it religiously. At the beginning of<br />
the next month, Shelby would copy and paste the previous<br />
month’s budget, make adjustments if needed, then repeat<br />
the process, month after month.<br />
Next, Austin and Shelby used Ramsey’s infamous<br />
“envelope system” converting from using credit cards to<br />
an all-cash system. They had physical envelopes for each<br />
budget item and each envelope contained the precise<br />
number of budgeted dollars. Shelby attempted to make<br />
the envelope system more palatable by decorating her<br />
envelopes. When the envelope was empty, plain or fancy,<br />
that category was done. The Pierces laughed that some<br />
months they would have 3 really nice date nights and<br />
then stay at home on the fourth date night because the<br />
envelope was empty, or do something small, like go out<br />
for Blizzards if only a few dollars remained.<br />
Another widely-known piece of Ramsey’s advice the<br />
couple implemented was the Debt Snowball effect to pay<br />
off debt. This system for attacking accumulated debt has<br />
one pay off balances from smallest to largest, regardless<br />
of the debt’s interest rate. Minimum payments are made<br />
on everything except the smallest balance, and the largest<br />
sum is paid toward that. Once that balance is reduced<br />
to zero, those funds are added to the payment on the<br />
second smallest balance until that is paid off, and so on.<br />
In this manner, debt reduction momentum builds and the