How To Pay Off Your Holiday Debts
Posted on January 12, 2009
Filed Under Family Finances, Money Merge Account program, Personal Finances |
I found the first 5 suggestions on my bank’s website, www.USAA.com. The 6th suggestion is mine.
“If you overspent during the holidays, use these ideas to help you lower your debt quickly and potentially avoid repeating the same mistakes this year.
1. Tighten the Reins
Start tracking your expenses, line by line, to see exactly where your money’s going each month. Chances are you’ll find places to cut back. The more you save, the more money you can put toward paying off those credit card bills.
2. Set Realistic Goals
Dropping debt is similar to shedding pounds. You’re more likely to get results if you set a specific goal and give yourself a timeframe for reaching it.
3. Plan Strategically
If you have more than one credit card , focus your biggest payments on the card with the highest interest rate. This will help minimize the amount of money you’re wasting on interest charges. Or try paying off the card with the smallest balance first, which will help you to see progress quickly and give you one fewer bill to pay each month.
4. Card-hop with Care
Consider transferring your balance to a new card with a lower annual percentage rate. It can make sense under the right circumstances, but be careful. Many cards offer extremely low rates for an introductory period, but make it up through extraneous fees and a sky-high rate after several months. Read the fine print carefully to make sure you’re getting a good deal.
5. Start Saving for Next Time
Once you’ve successfully banished that monstrous debt, make sure it stays away for good. As soon as possible, establish a holiday fund and begin putting away a small amount from each paycheck.
Once gift-buying season rolls around, you may be able to make most of your purchases with the money you’ve saved. Better yet, you might want to consider charging those gifts to get your rewards points and then tap your stash to pay your bill in one fell swoop, avoiding interest and finance charges.”
6. Start using the Money Merge Account program from United First Financial
It will automate all of the above processes for you - 1) tracking where your money goes, 2) helping you set and achieve financial goals, 3) designing a strategic payoff plan for all of your debts and tell you specifically which ones to pay off first, 4) guiding you to “merging” your accounts based on saving you the greatest amount of interest and getting to zero debt in the mathematically quickest way possible, 5) helping you to utilize interest float and rewards programs, and getting you to a strong financial position so you don’t repeat your past mistakes next holiday season. You can accomplish all of this in less than 30 minutes per month using the Money Merge Account program along with our unlimited coaching and client support services versus hours trying to do it manually on your own.
Comments
2 Responses to “How To Pay Off Your Holiday Debts”
Leave a Reply
Bad Credit Payday Loans…
I usually run into a bunch of junk when it comes to this niche, but this is some good useful information I found here. I can’t tell you how much rubbish there is out there, but again I like this site and just wanted to say keep it going…
http://www.ucblogs.com...
Wow, this is some good useful stuff. It’s hard to find some good info about this industry but I do like this particular site. Informative and totally related to niche. Just wanted to say good job and I like the site….