When I first started to host group workshops or talks on personal finance, I was surprised to see the most positive and detailed feedback was on the sessions that addressed debt.
Perhaps predictably, the debt sessions tended to be the least interactive. But the feedback I received from participants was on how (surprisingly) interesting they found the topic.
Participants wrote to tell me that they had found a way forward that makes sense to them and they now feel secure and motivated.
So maybe there is more to managing debt than blindly throwing as much money at the problem as possible until it goes away.
What piques people's interest are the four best approaches to clear debt. Namely, the Avalanche, Snowball, Kiyosaki and Emotional methods.
What are they and what is the difference between them?
The Snowball method is when you focus on the smallest debt first. This way, you can obtain a sense of achievement faster by clearing at least one debt quickly.
The Avalanche method is when you target the debt with the highest interest rate first. This may not be the fastest method but it’s the cheapest way to pay off your debt. If finding the cheapest way possible is a motivation for you, this is the one to consider.
The Kiyosaki method was created by Rich Dad, Poor Dad author Robert Kiyosaki. Pay the debt with the highest monthly repayment first. Once that is paid, you have the largest amount of cash available to you to use to pay off the rest of your debt.
The least considered approach is the Emotional method. This is when you target the debt that causes you the most stress.
It could be a debt for something you no longer own or regret. It’s often related to lifestyle debt.
It could also be the result of a poor relationship with the lender. I recently worked with an individual who was the victim of a smaller scale Tinder Swindler-type scam.
She took out loans to help her boyfriend, only for him to promptly disappear. She was left with three loans and no money. These loans caused her a lot of stress.
Sometimes there are motivations from more than one approach.
I worked with a couple who are reconsidering their mortgage arrangements.
They have four motivations for doing this.
Their agreement carried a higher interest rate than the current market rates. Their house is worth significantly more than their current mortgage amount and they would like to release equity to consolidate other expensive loans.
The Snowball method is when you focus on the smallest debt first. This way, you can obtain a sense of achievement faster by clearing at least one debt quickly
Carol Glynn,
founder of Conscious Finance Coaching
They also need cash to carry out some essential maintenance work on their home. And lastly, they strongly disliked the frustrating, poor, insulting and often confusing customer service at their current bank.
Switching mortgage providers in these circumstances makes sense both financially and emotionally.
But they hesitated and got stuck when their bank offered them a very low interest rate to remain.
Taking this offer had many benefits. They would pay a lower interest rate (Avalanche), they would reduce their monthly debt obligations (Kiyosaki) but they would not rid themselves of the toxic relationship with their bank (Emotional).
This had confused them and they were unclear as to what they “should” do.
How do you approach a situation like this? The first step is to rank your motivations in terms of importance.
Traditional advice would be to choose the cheapest option as that will save you the most money.
But while saving money is always a major consideration, it does not always improve people's lives. What was going to reduce their stress levels more, give them a sense of accomplishment and help them sleep better at night?
Despite the couple's considerable frustrations with their current bank, the financial benefits of a lower interest rate outweighed their feelings. They chose to take their bank's offer and are planning to reassess the situation in a year.
All is not lost from an emotional front; they are confident and content with their decision as they feel they have considered it thoroughly and made the right decision.
Another couple may have made a different decision and that would be right, too.
What’s important is ensuring you look at the situation from all angles to help you make an informed decision after considering both the financial and emotional impact. How can you then be wrong?
Carol Glynn is the founder of Conscious Finance Coaching
Who has been sanctioned?
Daniella Weiss and Nachala
Described as 'the grandmother of the settler movement', she has encouraged the expansion of settlements for decades. The 79 year old leads radical settler movement Nachala, whose aim is for Israel to annex Gaza and the occupied West Bank, where it helps settlers built outposts.
Harel Libi & Libi Construction and Infrastructure
Libi has been involved in threatening and perpetuating acts of aggression and violence against Palestinians. His firm has provided logistical and financial support for the establishment of illegal outposts.
Zohar Sabah
Runs a settler outpost named Zohar’s Farm and has previously faced charges of violence against Palestinians. He was indicted by Israel’s State Attorney’s Office in September for allegedly participating in a violent attack against Palestinians and activists in the West Bank village of Muarrajat.
Coco’s Farm and Neria’s Farm
These are illegal outposts in the West Bank, which are at the vanguard of the settler movement. According to the UK, they are associated with people who have been involved in enabling, inciting, promoting or providing support for activities that amount to “serious abuse”.
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
Six large-scale objects on show
- Concrete wall and windows from the now demolished Robin Hood Gardens housing estate in Poplar
- The 17th Century Agra Colonnade, from the bathhouse of the fort of Agra in India
- A stagecloth for The Ballet Russes that is 10m high – the largest Picasso in the world
- Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1930s Kaufmann Office
- A full-scale Frankfurt Kitchen designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky, which transformed kitchen design in the 20th century
- Torrijos Palace dome
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
LILO & STITCH
Starring: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Maia Kealoha, Chris Sanders
Director: Dean Fleischer Camp
Rating: 4.5/5
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TOUCH RULES
Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.
Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.
Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.
A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.
After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.
At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.
A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.
