Most Expensive Habits, Bill Hart, a financial planner in Jacksonville, is calling for a "lockdown" on discretionary spending by the Mayberrys for at least a year.

"What's hard about this is that you guys have developed habits, and you have to break those habits," such as eating out regularly, says Hart, co-founder of Retirement Strategies.

A limit on spending means not installing that pool. And no new hardwood floors — at least for now, the planner advises. The couple must focus on paying off debt and boosting savings to increase their chances of being able to retire within 15 years, he adds.

The need for a vast financial transformation floored the Mayberrys. But their shock has turned into acceptance, and a sense of empowerment.

"First, it was like, 'Oh, my God.' Then it was like, 'We have to do this. We can do this,' " says Caren Mayberry.

Adds her husband: "It's more of a, 'It's not as bad as I thought' reaction. We can be debt-free."

When the Mayberrys sat down with Hart more than a month ago, the couple's goal was to be free of all liabilities, except mortgage debt, in four years. But after seeing their debt and savings figures splashed across the pages of a financial plan, they've decided to act more quickly. They hope to get rid of all their debt, except their mortgage, as soon as possible so they can focus on saving.

"If we really work hard on this, we can do it in 12 months or by the end of next summer, maybe 15 months," Caren Mayberry says.

Hart gives the couple an "A+ for motivation" but reminds them that, "This is a marathon, not a sprint."

The Mayberrys have made a leap off the starting line. They've cut out most impulse spending, such as eating lunch and dinner out up to three times a week. Instead, on weekends, Caren Mayberry maps out a dinner menu for the coming week and buys everything they need at the supermarket. During the week, they try to bring leftovers for lunch.

"We spend $100 on groceries (for the week), instead of spending $100 on dinner for one night," she says. Both of them are good cooks and love to prepare meals, Tim Mayberry adds, so they don't feel as though they're sacrificing much by staying home.

They've also resigned themselves to putting off home improvements. "If we can get our credit cards paid off by the end of next summer, then we can think about" the hardwood floor and pool, Caren Mayberry says.

What else the Mayberrys are doing, on the planner's advice:

• They tried to negotiate a lower rate on a credit card that charged 16% interest. Their card issuer turned them down. So they transferred the balance to a card with a 1.9% rate.

Instead of each of them paying off his or her own debt, as they were doing before meeting with Hart, the couple are, for the most part, taking his advice to tackle the most expensive debt first. (The exception: They decided to pay off a small low-rate credit card balance first, to get that card quickly out of the way.)

Once they wipe out debt on their credit card, car, boat and motorcycle, Hart advises the couple to accumulate $30,000 — about four months' worth of expenses — as an emergency fund in case either of them is unable to work for a time. Hart suggests the couple save $500 a month, after paying off all debt except the mortgage, for emergencies. At this rate, it would take them about five years to build up a $30,000 reserve.

They think the emergency fund is a good idea. "We're absolutely going to do that," Tim Mayberry says. "My only thought is it's not enough. We want to have nine months' of funds just in case."

• Hart says Tim Mayberry's life-insurance policy is probably adequate, but the planner recommends a $200,000, 10-year term life insurance policy for Caren Mayberry that would pay off most of the couple's debt if she passed away.

Tim Mayberry's income would likely be enough for him to handle the mortgage and support his stepson, Edson, on his own if Caren died, the planner says.

They plan to hold off, though, on disability insurance, a policy Hart had recommended, because they can't find a policy they want for less than $300 a month.

"It's so expensive," Caren Mayberry says. "And being in (the physical therapy) profession, I know I have to be so severely disabled to file. I don't think it'll happen."

• Originally, the couple had thought they'd need about $100,000 a year during retirement to maintain their standard of living. But do they really need that much, Hart asks, given that they likely won't have as much debt to pay off, won't have commuting expenses and plan to live on a boat? "The answer is probably not," Tim Mayberry says.

Hart says that if the couple can reduce their spending target in retirement to $65,000 a year from $100,000, they may both be able to stop working in 2021, when he'll be 65 and she 57. But this assumes they pay off debt by the end of next year and then save at least an additional $500 each month for the next 15 years.

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