pay off my credit card debt

Got rid of the balances on two accounts. One big one and two smaller ones to go, plus the loan I took out from my 401k. It’s not going to be quick, but it’s doable.

When I zero my balances out I’ll take a look at what I could have for a downpayment on a new car and what I could get for my vehicle, then I’ll decide how much longer I’ll have to wait to replace it. I want to make sure that I don’t wind up in a situation where I’m charging up my credit cards again just to get by.

Once I buy a new car I will get rid of at least two accounts permanently. I want to make sure I get a good interest rate on the car loan so I don’t want to do anything that would lower my credit score, like get rid of long-standing accounts or reduce my available credit. I can take a little bit of a hit that way after I’ve secured the car loan because I ought not to be applying for any new credit after that.

I got there. A few months ago every single card was paid off. Then I thought I could gradually start furnishing my house. Not go out and buy all new furniture, mind you. Just start picking up things here and there to furnish my nearly empty house. I did used, I did IKEA, I did eBay…I only bought a few things and still have a largely empty house. And now I am in debt. Again.

Well, I guess I did pay IKEA off, and did so within 90 days so there wasn’t any interest. But now I have charged up the others because I busted my @$$ to get IKEA paid off before the no-interest thing went away, leaving little money left over to pay routine expenses.

Geez. I need a fairy godmother.

I was kind of bummed at the time of my last entry because I’d paid off everything I could with my tax refund and still owed AMEX a lot. I didn’t think about the fact that I also paid most of my bills with that refund, freeing up the majority of my next paycheck to give to AMEX.

I actually paid off the entire balance, meaning I was completely free of credit card debt. But since I left myself no money for any other expenses I knew that I would have to use the card again for anything that came up over the next two weeks. My entire paycheck for the first half of the month goes to the mortgage so I won’t have any free cash until the latter half.

So far I have charged groceries, one $6 lunch and the hair salon. Hair salon is the biggie. I would love to not have to pay so much to have decent hair, but so far my experiments in that area have been a disaster and for now I’m not going to risk it. I know I’ll have to buy a few groceries and put gas in my car a couple of times, and all that will have to go on the card. I’ll also need to charge a $90 tool, which I didn’t really want to do but when I added up what I’m paying by not getting this tool I figured out that it would pay for itself in a little over six weeks.

I guess what I was worried about overall was if I would be able to live without turning to my credit cards every single pay period and without feeling like a pauper from here on out. I don’t mind being frugal…I like the challenge. But I also don’t want to be on so tight a budget I can’t go out with friends for the occasional dinner or buy a new outfit or something nice for the house every few months. I think I will be okay, but I’ll have to go through a few more pay periods to get a realistic picture of how my finances will shake out. For now I am living like a pauper in order to avoid actually being one as a slave to my credit cards.

I paid off one MasterCard, the card with the worst rates and terms, when I got a bonus. I got my tax refund on Friday and promptly paid off the other MasterCard. I then went to the AMEX site and thought I was going to pay it off as well until I saw the balance.

That’s been my go-to card of late – the one I use to tide me over between paydays. Well, I’ve been charging more than I’ve been getting paid. I was able to pay off the statement balance of over $600, but that pretty much took care of the remaining tax refund money. And since that statement I have charged about $800 worth of stuff, mostly house related. But still…

This AMEX card is the only credit card I owe anything on now. Other than that my debts are a loan I took out to repay an ex’s parents and an insurmountable student loan. The student loan might be something I can try working down in a few years but right now I need a new car and furniture and the balance is so high it seems impossible. The other loan is something I plan to start knocking out as soon as I get the AMEX paid off.

I have got to cut back everywhere I can because there are always going to be those things I can’t control, and if I don’t have the money in my checking account to handle them then I have to put it on a credit card, thus perpetuating the whole cycle.

It would have helped if I hadn’t gotten so crazy with my year-end bonus and paid off my biggest balance (it had the highest interest rate). I then realized a couple of days later that I had big utility bills about to come out of my checking account. Yikes!

I had to go to the bank and get a cash advance on my MasterCard. I’ve never done that in my life. Sigh.

I’ll get there.