Ready to put your credit card balance behind you? Money is one of those things that can turn into a major roadblock in your life plan if you let it. It should be a tool you use for building the life you always wanted to live, but when you owe more of it than you own, it turns into a weight around your neck.
Carrying a high credit card balance can be extremely dangerous for your financial health. Every month, you wind up spending a lot of money on interest payments alone. Those are funds that could be going into your savings account, toward a down payment, or paying off a student loan.
When you’re ready to leave debt behind and build the rest of your life, you need a plan that will help you pay off debt quickly and smartly. Here are some ways you can save money and spend less time struggling with your credit card balance.
Get Credit Counselling
With the help of credit debt counselling, you can create a plan for debt freedom. An accredited Credit Counsellor with a non-profit credit counselling agency can sit down with you to assess your finances, create a budget, and work with you through a Debt Consolidation Program.
With a Debt Consolidation Program, you can simplify the repayment process and even secure reduced or eliminated interest rates from your creditors. The process can speed up your repayment plan and save you money overall. Get credit card debt relief through credit counselling.
How to Pay Off Credit Card Debt
You need a smart method for repaying your debts. One great method is to pay them off fully one by one using one of two methods.
- The Snowball Method, where you list all of your debts and make minimum payments on all of them except the smallest. Instead, you pay as much extra money as you can to eliminate the smallest account and move up your list.
- The Avalanche Method, where you list your debts according to the interest rates. Pay extra toward the account with the highest rate and work your way down.
If you’ve gone with credit card debt consolidation, stick to your repayment plan. If you find you have extra cash at the end of the month, you can speed up the process or put it toward low-interest loans that you didn’t or couldn’t include.
Maximize Extra Income
If you want to know how to pay off credit card debt fast, the first step is having extra income in the first place. You need to be able to make more than minimum payments to speed up the process.
That may mean you need to either earn extra income or find more savings in your budget. Working a second job can help you make rapid progress on debt while you keep up with your basic living expenses. But if that’s not an option, you may want to make some lifestyle changes so that you have more money each month that can help you reach your goal.
