For anyone who’s ever had a credit card, especially more than one credit card, we all know that making monthly payments can feel like a futile operation. However, it certainly isn’t, as making (at the very least) minimum on-time monthly payments is incredibly important when it comes to maintaining or improving your credit score, even if it just feels like you’re chipping away at it. Owning a credit card can be highly beneficial, as you’re able to borrow and make payments each month on what you borrow; if you to make an emergency purchase, for instance, and don’t have funds on hand when you need them, that’s where a credit card can help you best. However, the importance of making those on-time payments can’t be stressed enough.
If you’re looking to get out of any credit card hole, be it big or small, here are some tips to pay off your credit card faster without breaking the bank.
- Work on paying down the card with the highest interest rate first. If you’ve got more than one credit card open other than Polam’s VISA credit card, check their varying interest rates. Once you’ve found the card with the most interest due, start working on paying it off first. By doing this, you’re paying off the highest amount of interest that is relative to the card’s balance. This is much like making higher-than-minimum payments on a card, as you are helping stop the interest from accruing and raising that card’s balance entirely.
- Pay more than just the minimum monthly payment. This is certainly one of the most common pieces of advice given to any credit card holder. Making minimum payments ensures that your account will be healthy, but if you can afford it, move past doing just the bare minimum with your account and try doubling your monthly payments, to start. While making the minimum payments seem like the easy route, it can actually develop more interest the longer it takes to pay off your card. Take a look at your budget and adjust it by calculating how much money you’ll have at the end of the month, and then see how that extra money can be used toward those larger monthly payments.
- If you have more than one card, pay off the one with the lowest balance. Again, if you have an additional credit card on top of Polam’s VISA credit card, another way of paying off your debt faster is to find the account with the lowest balance and pay it off first. This way you can avoid gaining further interest on that account, and it can feel like a “small victory” on your way to getting out of debt.