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Because inflation has been surging for the past two years, credit card debt has become a part of life for a lot of people. But a Motley Fool survey reveals that people who identify as LGBTQ+ are more likely to have credit card debt than Americans overall.
If you owe money on your credit cards, that alone could be causing you to lose sleep. But there are steps you can take to break the cycle of debt and get to a better place financially.
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1. Start buckling down on spending
You won’t be able to pay off your credit card debt if you spend your entire paycheck month after month. So if that’s a pattern you’ve fallen into (perhaps due to inflation), try your best to get on a budget that allows you to track and limit your spending.
You may also need to prepare to cut some spending, like canceling streaming services, until you’re able to make headway on your debt. Order your non-essential expenses by priority so you’ll have an easier time figuring out which ones to trim and which ones to keep paying for (since you can’t reasonably eliminate every expense that brings you joy).
2. Give your income a boost
If you’re not spending very much these days on non-essentials, then cutting back on things like Netflix may only go so far in freeing up cash for debt payoff purposes. If that’s the case, then you may want to look to a side hustle to boost your income. Since that money won’t be earmarked for current bills, you should be able to take all of it, minus what you might owe in taxes, and apply it to your credit card balances.
3. Put a stop to accruing interest
One reason so many people end up stuck in a cycle of credit card is that interest can accrue on your balance as you’re trying to pay it off. So even if you’re chipping away at your principal balance, your total balance might continue to grow due to the interest you’re being charged.
If you’re eager to shed your credit card debt for good, one thing you may want to do is transfer your various balances over to a new card with a 0% introductory APR. That will give you a reprieve on the interest front for a period of time.
That period will be limited. Some 0% introductory offers only last for 12 months before interest begins to accrue on your balance. But if you find a card with a longer introductory period and manage to pay off your debt within that time frame, you might manage to get out of debt for good.
Owing money on credit cards can be extremely stressful, not to mention costly. So it’s important to do what you can to shed that debt in short order. By curbing spending and budgeting carefully, boosting your income, and transferring your balances onto the right card, you can hopefully make great progress on your debt, and ideally eliminate it for good.
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