How to get out of credit card debt

Step 1: stop the balance growing

Nothing below works while new spending is landing on the same card. Take the cards out of your wallet and out of your saved payment methods, and switch day-to-day spending to a debit card for the duration.

This is not a moral point. Interest is charged on the average daily balance, so new purchases raise the base every subsequent day's interest is calculated on. Adding $200 a month to a card you are trying to clear cancels out most of a $250 payment.

Step 2: write down the real numbers

For each card: balance, APR, minimum payment, statement date. Most people have not seen these on one page, and the exercise usually reveals that one card is doing far more damage than its balance suggests.

Then find one more number: what you can pay in total, every month, without fail. Not the best month you have had — the number you can hold through a bad month. That figure is the input everything else depends on.

Step 3: see what the current path costs

Before choosing a strategy, look at where you are heading. Put a balance, its APR and your current payment into the credit card interest calculator, with the payment set to "the minimum".

The result — often more than a decade, and more interest than the original debt — is not a scare tactic. It is what the minimum payment is designed to do, and seeing it is what makes the next step feel worth it.

Step 4: fix the payment and pick an order

Set your total monthly payment at the sustainable figure from step 2 and do not let it fall as balances fall.

This is the largest single lever available, and it costs nothing. Minimum payments shrink as the debt shrinks; if your payment shrinks with them, the tail of the payoff stretches for years. Holding it flat means every cleared debt frees its payment for the next one.

Then choose which card gets everything above the minimums. The debt payoff calculator runs both orderings on your figures — see snowball vs avalanche for how to choose between them.

Step 5: check whether cheaper credit is available

If your credit is in reasonable shape, moving the debt may cut the rate substantially:

Balance transfer card. A promotional 0% period on transferred balances. Check the transfer fee (typically 3–5%, charged upfront), how long the promotion lasts, and the go-to rate afterwards. Divide the balance by the number of promotional months — if that monthly figure is unaffordable, you will still be carrying a balance when the rate jumps.

Personal loan consolidation. A fixed-rate installment loan replacing several card balances. Advantages: one payment, a fixed end date, and usually a lower rate. Watch for origination fees, which the APR calculator will fold into a comparable figure.

Credit union options. Often lower rates than commercial lenders, particularly for members with modest credit.

If the minimums are already unaffordable

This is a different situation and it needs different action.

Call your creditors first, before missing a payment. Hardship programs — reduced payments, suspended interest, structured plans — are widely available and far easier to access in advance than after default.

Nonprofit credit counseling. A free budget review, and if appropriate a debt management plan where the agency negotiates reduced rates and you make one payment to them. Look for accreditation and check what it costs before agreeing to anything.

Be cautious with debt settlement. For-profit settlement companies typically ask you to stop paying creditors and save into an account they control while they negotiate. That damages your credit, may result in collections or legal action, and does not always work. Charging fees before a debt is actually settled is generally prohibited.

Afterwards

Keep the cards open. Closing them removes their limits from your total available credit, which raises your credit utilization on any remaining balance and can drop your score at the moment you have just finished repairing it.

Then redirect the payment you were making into a starter emergency fund. The reason most people end up back in card debt is that the next unexpected expense had nowhere else to go.