Why You Should Get Serious About Your High Interest Credit Cards

If you talk to any financial planner, they’ll tell you that credit cards are the most toxic kind of personal debt to have in America. The problem is two-fold: consumers buy things they cannot afford, and then they only make the minimum payments, under the false supposition that they are somehow saving money in the short term by doing so. In reality, with high interest rates, your credit cards will take years and years to pay off when you only pay the minimum due – and in the meantime, your card supplier is raking in your interest fees.

The first solution to start paying off this kind of debt is to call the credit card companies and ask for a discount of at least three percent off your current rate. While the phone call is free, if you have a great deal of debt then that three percent could ultimately save thousands of dollars added up over the course of several years. This is a must-do to get those credit cards paid off faster.

Next-up, this is one of the oldest and best tricks to keep your credit card bills from mounting up: simply keep your credit cards at home. By not using them, you won’t add to your debt total. Some people have just one credit card that they keep locked up in their safety deposit box at the bank for true emergencies.  Others freeze their credit card in a pan of water and keep it in the fridge – that way, you can’t grab it and slip it into your purse ‘just in case’ when you leave the house for that ‘quick’ drug-store or supermarket run.  The physical act of having to break your card free of the ice with a hammer will inspire you to only do this when you really, really need it.

Look at where you can get extra money. Do you have premium cable? It’s time to say bye-bye to expanded cable and hello to either basic service or no service. Most people find they only really watch the same on or two channels anyway. Other people opt to get real medieval by using – gulp – dial-up service instead of broadband Internet.  If you work at the office and spend all day on the computer with full internet access, how vital is it to you to come home and do the same thing all evening?  If you know you’re having to pay per minute for internet use, you’ll soon find you can reshuffle your time to do all your internet ‘checking’ at the office, on your lunch break.  

To really attack your credit cards in the case of extreme debt, you may want to at least consider taking a second job. Even if you’re a mother, you’ll find that there are plenty of ‘work at home’ jobs which can offer a realistic alternative to earning a second salary. Even if you just earn $20 a night filling in online surveys, that’s an extra $400 a month – think how handy that would be.

By really attacking your credit cards, you’ll be living without toxic debt in no time.  So put the scissors on standby – and good luck!