About Jon Hanson, author of Good Debt, Bad Debt

Self employed for 25 years I decided to stop, and "retool" for a second career. This involved writing a and publishing a book, returning to graduate school (MBA-December 2007) and beginning a research PhD (2008). Here is the bio from my website: A 25-year veteran and student of the real estate business and now an author and speaker on topics of personal finance, Jon Hanson talks from the heart — literally; he barely survived his own "near-debt experience" a few years ago and used the lessons he learned to mine a deeper joy out of the dysfunctional monetary habits and attitudes that nearly cost him his life. Stressed, demoralized, nearly $100,000 in debt to the IRS, and suffering severe chest pains, Hanson imagined his own obituary while hooked to a heart monitor at his local emergency room:

"Jon Hanson (41) of Pickerington, Ohio, died Tuesday from complications stemming from lack of discipline, inability to delay gratification, and lack of discernment in financial matters. He showed great promise early in life. Unfortunately, he expired before much could be made of it."

Fortunately, there's been no need for the obit. Jon has lived on to write Good Debt, Bad Debt which he hopes will spare others from the trauma he experienced while suffering from extreme "debtabetes, and inspire folks to rise above the financial mistakes made by virtually everybody in today's immediate-gratification consumer culture.

Prior to devoting himself to writing and speaking on the dangers of Debtabetes and other scourges of the land, Jon's full-time business was real estate. Jon has worked almost exclusively with distressed property situations since 1981. In the second half of his real estate career, most of Jon's effort was concentrated on more than 120 foreclosure work-outs, judicial foreclosure of liens, judgments, and disposition of bankruptcy claims.

Jon holds a Bachelor's degree in Sociology from the State University of New York. Completes his MBA from Franklin University in December 2007) and plans to pursue a PhD in Lifelong Learning and Economic Psychology from University of London (U.K.). He lives with his wife and two children, a very small mortgage, an even smaller dog, and zero consumer debt.