Bartering My Way Out of Debt... Is it Possible?

My husband and I are drowning in debt. Like so many other people in our situation, we are basically living from paycheck to paycheck. We can't afford health insurance and make too much money to be covered or subsidized, by a government program.

Yes, our debts are our fault. We have no problem admitting to that. We have only been married for 11 months, so the vast majority of our debt is technically 'his' and 'hers'. Together we owe approximately $107,000. It is my hope to have it paid off, in five years or less.

We are currently renting our home. It is a nice house, in a not so nice neighborhood. When we moved in 16 months ago, we signed a one year rent-to own contract. We agreed to try for a mortgage, when the contract was up. Needless to say, we signed a second one year contract. Our low credit scores and high credit card utilization make it impossible for us to obtain a mortgage, right now.

I currently work at home, 35 hours per week, as an AAA Renewal Specialist. I also write, part-time. Due to a psychical disability (I walk on crutches) working at home is ideal for me. Obviously jobs like waitressing, cashiering and anything that requires long periods of standing are a no-go for me.

I love to write. I'll never be another J.K. Rowling or Dean Koontz, but I have been published in several print, regional-type, parenting magazines.

I've also written tons of content articles, over the past couple of years. My biggest problem with that type of article is I don't charge enough. My husband is forever telling me I need to raise my fees. But, I like to think I'm helping website owners who are trying to promote their site, on a small budget. Kind of a 'pay it forward' way of thinking, I guess.

At 2 a.m. this morning, while TRYING to fall asleep, I got the wild idea to try to barter away my debt. I know it's probably a very long shot, but I've seen stranger things happen.

This is my plan. I started a blog on Saturday, titled 'On Becoming Debt Free'. (I haven't included the URL, because I not sure if that's allowed. But, let me just say with very little effort, you can probably figure it out... all on your own.) Besides sharing the ups and downs of my journey toward the road of debt free living, I'll be including resources on saving money, credit repair and working from home.

I've noticed that many in-debt bloggers have included at donation button, on their blog. From what I can tell, some have had success with this, while others have not.

So I thought "Why not barter away my debt?" I'll put up a donation button and offer my services, in exchange. I'm willing to write articles and short ebooks, create headers and banners, manually submit articles to directories, perform Internet research, do cold calling, post on forums, etc.

I will also be creating a 'thank you' page where I will gladly link to everyone who makes a donation.

Just think, if everyone donated as little as 10 bucks, my debt would be paid off after only 10,700 donations. It could happen......