Not sure which board to put this on...Discover "Debt Eraser" Loan

[Tony275]

And personal loan department is now closed, will have to call tomorrow to ask for reconsideration

[Anonymous]

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I like your Avatar, BTW, I'm watching The Office as I type this haha

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Excellent!!!  Probably the best show out there.

[jamie123]

Tony275 you need to STOP RIGHT NOW!

You are being denied because your credit behavior screams HIGH CREDIT RISK when the lenders look over your reports.

If like you stated briefly in your original post, your credit balances are climbing by $200 per month, you are using credit wrong. You need to get a handle on this right now and quit using credit at all. The road you are headed down has bankruptcy at the end and it seems to be only a year or two away. You just can't see it yet.

You need to create a plan of action and get your wife on board with it or it won't work.

This is what you need to do:

1. Take all your credit cards including your wife's cards and seal them in an envelope. Put it away to be only opened in case of emergency. And no, that awesome power tool on sale at Home Depot or those cute shoes at the mall do not count as an emergency.

2. Open a savings account. Do you have one? This is where you will put some money away from each paycheck to build an emergency fund. Yes Tony, you will find as you go through life that bad things happen to good people all the time. You need to have an emergency fund because you WILL have emergencies. I would suggest that you put at least $30 a week in this account.

3. Start paying off the credit cards. This will hurt! A lot! Pay the minimums on all the cards except the one with the smallest balance. Put as much extra cash as you can on the one that has the smallest balance until it is paid off. Rinse and repeat.

4. You need to live on a cash only basis. This will be an enlightening experience. You will find out exactly where you are spending or wasting too much money. You will have to change your lifestyle and it won't be easy.

Tony, you should only carry credit card balances month to month in cases of extreme emergencies! None of us make enough money to pay 20%+ interest rates on borrowed money. You need to be able to pay off your credit cards in full each and every month. That is the proper use of credit.

The house has to wait for updates/upgrades until you can pay for them in cash. Once you have the cash, use the credit cards to buy the materials and earn point/rewards but make sure to pay them off in full each month.

Sorry about the rant but I see a good person headed down a bad road. Believe me, I've been down this road and I went there in a similar fashion as you. It's time for you to turn around.

[Anonymous]

Amen. Be careful Tony; nobody wants to see you get burned later on.

[Tony275]

I understand how credit works and that I'm not using it as I should, that's why I'm trying to consolidate debt into one payment?

Called Discover back and asked to be reconsidered, to which he said they don't tend to reconsider once denied? Then he told me my balance to limit ratios were high, which I understand, but figured as a debt consolidation loan, that would be understood initially, I guess I was wrong.

When I say my balance is increasing $200/mo, it's one card only, none of the other cards have been touched in months, and I'm paying them down as quickly as I can. I would just prefer to have them all in one payment rather than spread out throughout the month, I get paid weekly and it's very easy to budget and plan payments this way. But having them all consolidated would enable me to pay them down quicker.

I've turned around on the road, I promise, now it's getting out of the debt I've racked up, obviously. I do have a savings and we do contribute money to it from each check, to the tune of about $150/mo. I've been picking up as much overtime at work as I can manage and put the expensive hobbies on hold, obviously. I also have a 401(K) that Target has a great match policy on, and if worse comes to worse, I'm 24, I can cash that out and pay off about 60% of my debts, that's absolute worst case.

I don't struggle month by month, by any means and I've been paying down the cards that have the highest interest first, and then working my way to the next card and so on.

This was simply an option for me to consolidate and be able to manage/pay down the number quicker and at my own pace.

[Tony275]

And I do appreciate the tips and advice, I'm doing my best to get to that point where the credit cards are benefits only. I'm just getting frustrated and I know it shows in how I talk sometimes, so I apologize!