“Dear Steve,
The credit cards that I have are only in my name. I married over two years ago. I owe alot on my credit cards. I have thought about not paying my two highest credit cards to pay my other ones and then pay them at a later date. I wonder if that would hurt my husbands credit considering we have houses and cars in both names. My credit score now is 6533
Would that be smart to do?
Heather”
Dear Heather,
I’m going to assume that your credit score is 653 and that’s not such a great score. Could be a lot better. I’d like to see it above 720.
Do You Have a Question You'd Like Help With? Contact Debt Coach Damon Day. Click here to reach Damon.
I’m concerned that your approach to your current issues is a strategy and not a solution. If you don’t pay the two biggest credit cards, and pay them at a latter date, that is going to result in bad credit.
As far as your husband goes, since these are not joint debts with him it would not directly impact him.
But I’m wondering, is there more to this situation? Does your husband know about these cards and know how much you owe on them?
Oh, one other question, what has happened that makes these cards hard to pay? Is it an increase in the balances or a decrease in your income?
Yes, my husband knows about my cards and how much. We bought a house in Nov. of last year. One reason is I put half the downpayment on one of my cards. I bought some new stuff with my cards but I didnt over do it. I had a surgery and that is on my care credit card. I actually started a part time job last year to help pay off my cards. I have a loan from the bank where i paid all my cards and then used them again. I’m working a paying my lowest amount off right now and then go to the next lowest. I have found that is the easiest for me. It’s hard to pay extra on them because i don’t have alot of extra money to put on them. What should I do?
Heather,
The debt snowball approach is a very successful approach for many. It’s the way I’d want to dig myself out of debt if I was in the same situation.
Ultimately I think the Law of Holes applies here. The Law of Holes says that if you want to get yourself out of a hole, stop digging. Meaning, once you dig yourself out of this mess, you really need to avoid repeating the same mistake again. Learn from it. As I always say, there is no sense wasting a perfectly good mistake.
Steve