Debt Consolidation?

probably not....even with decent credit, its very hard to get any credit card company to extend a 12000 dollar limit. which is basically what you'd be doing..if you really want to consolidate loans, i'd keep trying the bank route. although i dont know what sort of interest rate they'd extend. probably not much better that what you have now. its the economy. if you cant get a personal loan, then your best bet would be to try to call your credit card company and negotiate a lower interest rate. this however rarely amounts to anything. you can also ask them about principle payments in addition to your regular payments that include the interest..the lower you get your principle the less interest you'll end up paying. i do this with my car.

NEVER go with any of those tv advertised consolidation companies..they are a rip off..and demand a lot of money up front..and if you had that much money, you could use it to just pay off the loans.

other than that..just keep paying them down..try to pay more than the minimal and make principle payments. i am not an expert, as i do not have any credit cards or student loans..if i cant pay cash for something (except car or house) then i dont need it. but thats just me.

I once looked into debt consolidation, but they wouldn't give me the amount I needed and what I could get was still at nearly 15%, I was going to lose either way. If you are trying to lower your payments you're going to end up paying more in the end. Just throw whatever you can at the debt you have and pay it off as quickly as possible.

I once looked into debt consolidation, but they wouldn't give me the amount I needed and what I could get was still at nearly 15%, I was going to lose either way. If you are trying to lower your payments you're going to end up paying more in the end. Just throw whatever you can at the debt you have and pay it off as quickly as possible.

Exactly this. You will pay more interest in the long run because your payments are lower with interest eating more of the payment up.

I think you should look into something like Dave Ramsey and start budgeting and plowing away at student loan debt. Get rid of it the old fashioned way. Just work hard on saving and spending. It is worth it.

Missing one payment on your Credit card bill will follow you for 7 years, my Advice is as follows...

Attack your credit card debt first, pay the minimum on your student loans, you can check if you can Defer the payments for them, which some allow, also your Student loan interest are Tax deductable, credit card interest is not.

First figure out how much you make a month, then set yourself a budget, figure out what you need to "live" and what is "disposable income" ie extra.

Now for your credit cards, attack the one with the highest rate first. say your min payment is $100, instead of paying the monthly payment, send $200 each pay check, no month, but paycheck, set up a online bill pay with your bank, this will greatly reduce your interest.

I also Recommend at the same time, if you do not have a savings account, set one up, and Place money in that account every check, say $100, my theory is "pay yourself first" so I stick $200 a paycheck in my savings account for a dream vacation to Bora bora in 5 years wih my wife, $200 a month for 5 years=$10,000, So while I am paying down our family debt, I am also saving for our dream vacation.

Anyway, best course of action is to bite teh bullet and pay your credit cards off first, but the more you send, the better off you are.

Stop frivilous purchases such as eating out, buying things you do not need. For us to go out to dinner (family of five) it is easily a $100 dinner, so when we "by pass" going out to dinner and eat at home, I take that "savings" and send it to a credit card company to help reduce our debt.

Also another course of action is if you have a 401K currently you may borrow from it as a personal loan and pay YOURSELF back with Interest, usually the rate is 4-6%, I did this when I purchased our first house, it worked rather well.

Best of luck, but some advice on here I would not follow, Credit is very important and will effect your life years down the line.

Think of it as losing weight, being fisical discipline is the same thing as being Physically discipline, same course of action.

Stop paying on those two credit cards for 6 months or so, find stuff you can sell of and get your self 5-7 thousand dollars cash. Then call your credit card companies direct and say listen, I have 3,900 dollars here and we can settle this debt right now and I bet they will take it. Do the same with the other company as well. Your credit score will take a hit for a year or so but it would probably drop less that 80 points. I did this 3 years ago with 7,800 dollars in credit debt, I paid 3,300 to one and 2,000 to the other. My credit score is around 730 today. Its not the traditional way to do it, but it beats taking 5 years to pay it off with all that intrest.

Whatever you do though, do not go through a debt consolidation company.

Are you talking about the credit card company taking a charge off? If they do that, then that would show against your credit. And that follows you for 7 years. A charge off is a red flag for any loan company or bank. So I doubt that someone doing that would be better off in a couple of years.


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Yes it is basically a charge off and is considered as earned income at the end of the year, and just because it stays on your record for 7 years doesnt mean your credit cant go back up for 7 years. Its a drastic decision but it is decisive. I decided to get out of debt fast and rebuild my credit insted of taking 4-5 years making minimum payments with a 1,000 dollars worth of intrest charges.

I once looked into debt consolidation, but they wouldn't give me the amount I needed and what I could get was still at nearly 15%, I was going to lose either way. If you are trying to lower your payments you're going to end up paying more in the end. Just throw whatever you can at the debt you have and pay it off as quickly as possible.

Exactly this. You will pay more interest in the long run because your payments are lower with interest eating more of the payment up.

I think you should look into something like Dave Ramsey and start budgeting and plowing away at student loan debt. Get rid of it the old fashioned way. Just work hard on saving and spending. It is worth it.

^^ I agree with both of them. & Dave Ramsey , such a great idea! You really should look into him.

Debt Consolidation programs are meant for people who are missing payments and have trashed their credit score. They are a bad deal so don't bother unless its a last resort.

Try to get a new card with 0% intro rate and do a transfer if possible as others have stated. Otherwise just hang in there and put all your extra money towards paying down the credit card. Sell any assets that might help you out there as well.

Oh, and I highly recommend against intentionally doing charge-offs. That's pretty much legal theft IMO. You spent the money. You bought the items. Charging it off means you keep the items and everyone else gets to pay for it with higher interest rates and fees.

I did a debt consolidation loan through Citi Financial several years back. Maybe google them and apply online? And debt consolidation is not for people who have "trashed" their credit. Debt consolidation means just that, consolidating your debt into one lump sum so you can make one payment with one interest rate. I was able to pay off everything I owed at a much cheaper interest rate. Saved hundreds.

There we go - screw personal responsibility! Let all of the paying people in the land make up for you lack of self-control. Do the right thing, work a second job, get more hours, stop spending - and PAY YOUR DEBT THAT YOU INCURRED. Funny this comes up on a weight loss sight. Similar issue pours into so many people's bellies - eat all we want, but don't want to pay the price to get skinny. Everyone wants it fast and easy.

And I know life is tough...suck it up. I've run 2 failed businesses, and started two more since. I was broke after the market fell apart. Guess what, I did whatever it took and I'm still paying back those debts. Why? Because it's money I owe. Have some pride and set an example. And we wonder why the country's in decline.

Stop paying on those two credit cards for 6 months or so, find stuff you can sell of and get your self 5-7 thousand dollars cash. Then call your credit card companies direct and say listen, I have 3,900 dollars here and we can settle this debt right now and I bet they will take it. Do the same with the other company as well. Your credit score will take a hit for a year or so but it would probably drop less that 80 points. I did this 3 years ago with 7,800 dollars in credit debt, I paid 3,300 to one and 2,000 to the other. My credit score is around 730 today. Its not the traditional way to do it, but it beats taking 5 years to pay it off with all that intrest.

Whatever you do though, do not go through a debt consolidation company.

As far as consolidating, I can't offer much. But you can get these paid off. 13% isn't too bad (I would love to get my APRs anywhere near that! ...)

Anyway, pick the account with either the highest interest or the lowest owed. Pay minimum payment + $10 on everything else, and pay as much as you can on this one each month. If you double the payment, it will take less than half the time to pay it off, since everything extra goes to principal. As soon as it is paid off, everything you were paying on it goes to the next lowest balance (or highest interest) and so on. It can feel like a slow start, but if you can be disciplined, it will snowball and you'll be paying off the last few quickly! It also helps if you can put the majority of any large, one-time incomes (like bonuses or tax returns) to paying them off.

The key, of course, is to be smart and not charge up again. We made that mistake -- refinanced our house and put all our credit card debt into it, then stupidly charged credit cards back up. Lesson learned now, but it was painful for a few years.

For the student loan part, you can apply for a consolidation loan directly through the dept of edu. Their website is here: http://www.loanconsolidation.ed.gov/ (click on borrower services to apply... it's pretty simple and painless... took a month or two to get everything moved into one payment for me). You may be able to get a lower interest rate or lower payments based on your income or by stretching the payments over a longer period of time. I had about 6 different student loans that they consolidated into one tht totals about 20k. I pay roughly $80 a month.

i don't know how much you pay monthly to either, but sometimes a smaller payment on one means you can apply a larger payment to the other and get one paid off sooner. Otherwise, I wouldn't recommend consolidating anything and I doubt that you will be able to consolidate the two (credit card and student loan) together.

Good luck.

I lived in New Hampshire for years and had over $10K in credit card debt. I worked with a non-profit called the Consumer Credit Counseling Service of NH and VT. It was extremely helpful--they spoke with my credit card companies and negotiated a lower interest rate, and I paid them directly. My debt was gone in 2 years. I never would have been able to do it alone.

Care One Credit is who I went through. I was so far behind after being out of work for 6 months. Even after finding a new job I knew I would never get out of this hole on my own. I was skeptical at first about debt consolidation but decided to give it a try. I was getting calls at all hrs of the day from bill collectors. I finally called Care One and it was the best thing I ever did. Within a week I wasen't being harrassed by my creditors anymore. What they do it ask you all the bills you pay out monthly and what you owe on each one. They come up with a monthy amount for you to pay, but where you can still afford to live. Then they contact the ones you owe and tell them what you can pay a month. Most creditors will accept their proposals but there are a few who do not. I lucked out and all of mine did. I have been on it since Aug of 2010 and am scheduled to be debt free in august 2013. It's a long process but my credit score has jumped over 100 pts since starting this program.

Don't borrow money to pay off debt. You're just creating more debt. Here is a very oversimplified idea:

1. Stop spending money on anything you don't absolutely need.
2. Create an Excel spread sheet with all your debt and monthly payments on it.
3. Sort by monies owed. Least to most.
4. Apply all your monies to the "least amount owed" amd make minimum payments on the rest.
5. When one bill is paid off, start applying the extra monies to the next least amount owed, until it's paid off.
6. Take the monies from the two paid off bills and add to number 3, and on and on.....

As you pay off each debt, destroy that credit card or eliminate that account. Start paying cash for everything.

The hard part is sticking to it and identifying what is a neccessity and what is a luxury. Just because a great pair of red heels is half off and you really want them doesn't make them a neccessity.