topic Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice? in General Credit Topics

INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 19:38:50 GMT

Stats:

- Age 22

- 78% utilization throughout 7 credit cards (4 which are maxed out) / $38,154 out of $48,700 available credit

- AAoA of 2 years, 4 month / No missed payments or collections

- 2 hard inquiries from Dec 2016

- Credit Karma states FICO scores of 586, 587.

Hey everyone, I never thought I would have to be making this post. I came here many years ago and that's what helped me get started on my credit journey. I had a good paying job at the time and suddenly lost that about a year and a half ago when I moved to another state due to my mother having breast cancer. Over that time, I became reckless with my money, taking expensive international vacations, unnecessary vehicle upgrades, buying high end technology; basically using my credit card like it was cash on hand. I thought to myself, "Oh screw it, I'll just keep doing balance transfers with no interest and pay it all off when I have a good job in the future. There are people with $90k in student debt my age, what's so bad about being $35k in debt myself?"

^ That was my immature mentality that I am now suffering from. Now, I found a decent job (where I live) that's giving me close to $1,600 a month. I have no other financial responsibilities other than my credit cards, which most have now kicked in at 20% APR. The payments on those are literally 80% of my monthly pay. I know if I apply for another card (sole purpose of no interest for xx months), that I would most likely be denied due to high utilization. I am in a financial bind here from irresponsibility and I am wanting to get my finances on point while I can.

So please help me here, FICO'ers. What is the best route I should take now? Debt consolidation? Personal loan? If so, which companies are best?

Thank you all kindly very much.

- Derrick

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 19:59:31 GMT

Do you live in or near a big city where you could drive Uber/lyft as a second job? My understanding is that those guys can make over $20/hr

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:09:37 GMT

My vehicle is a coupe, it wouldn't work haha. But thank you.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

redpat — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:10:58 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Do you live in or near a big city where you could drive Uber/lyft as a second job? My understanding is that those guys can make over $20/hr

You are young take on an additional job that you can squeeze in and grind it out.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:16:23 GMT

What about a debt consolidation loan? Since I'm paying close to $600 a month just in interest?

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

redpat — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:19:24 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
What about a debt consolidation loan?

Highly unlikely w/ current income level. I'd be working day and night if I were you.

Nothing is easy.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:23:05 GMT

You might want to pay the money to get your actual FICOs. Your credit might not be as bad as you think it is. I know my FAKO TU is almost 70 points lower than my actual TU score. You might have good enough credit to get a debt consolidation loan from a CU like PenFed. One of your scores might be higher than the others and you could look for lenders that pull that score. PenFed for example pulls a FICO 9 (which you can get from myFICO) from EQ. NFCU pulls TU.

If you can’t get a debt consolidation loan, there are companies that can get 0% interest on your CC debt, but I’m pretty sure going that route hurts your credit.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 20:46:58 GMT

It says on Discover: Your FICO® Score 8 based on TransUnion® data: 660

American Express says: Your FICO® Score 8 based on Experian data: 660; March 31, 2018

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 21:02:21 GMT

I'd like a debt consolidation loan where there are no origination fees and... Does PenFed require a membership with a hard inquiry, I read somewhere? That was one of the organizations I was thinking about. What are the others?

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Kforce — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 21:07:20 GMT

No need to pay money and get real scores at this time. They will look equally bad.

As others have said it is important to pay as much as you can as fast as you can.

This will save you a lot of money, and let you get back on your feet as soon as possible.

Peanut butter & jelly, no eating out, overtime, etc. It will be hard but look at what you can save if you suffer for a short time.

Some numbers to show how more now saves later.

38154 @ 20% interest

Monthly Payment Years Interest lost $

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

1420 3 12,900

1160 4 17,500

1010 5 22,500

914 6 27,600

850 7 33,000

_______________________________________________

1420/month compared to 850/month saves $20,000

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

marty56 — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 21:12:54 GMT

A Debt Managment Program (DMP) for 5 years would be about $700 a month and when you are done your score wwould recover to where they would have been prior to all the debt.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Sun, 08 Apr 2018 21:30:34 GMT

PenFed does do a hard inquiry when signing up as a member. I was able to use the same HP for membership and a CC, but I don’t know if you can do that with a loan.

I don’t think you’ll have a lot of luck not paying origination fees. You could check out what rate you would get with a SP on TU with Lending Club. They charge 1-5% for the loan. If you end up getting a loan with them, they do a HP on TU.

Don’t know what kind of origination fees PenFed charges.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 00:38:25 GMT

I'm debating on if paying origination fees are worth it. Another thing that's got me second guessing is the whole income thing. All I know something has got to be done about this interest because it eats me alive I am paying $600/month just on that. I mean that could go to something else, like my savings.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 00:55:17 GMT

Good news! I was on PenFed transfering some money around and it says right on the home page that PenFed doesn't have any origination fees on personal loans.

Edit: Looks like the max you can borrow is $25,000.

Further edit: So, PenFed pulls EQ and uses FICO 9 scores according to posters in this forum. Discover also does personal loans with no origination fee. Discover pulled my EX and EQ reports, and I believe also uses FICO 9 because my approval score I got from Discover for EX matches my EX FICO 9 score I get from Wells Fargo.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 01:00:32 GMT

Another player in the loan consolidation market without originations fees, Marcus, pulls TU but it's unclear to me whether that's a FICO 8 or FICO 9 score. They will loan up to $40,000.

Discover will loan up to $35,000, and will let you check your rate on their website with a SP.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 01:06:23 GMT

What do you guys recommend I go for? PenFed, Discover, Lending Tree or Prosper?

I mean I am going to try to borrow at least $20,000. My salary I will put $25,000 (with bonuses), because I am pretty sure they will ask for paystubs and proof of income, but I have no expenses (rent, food, phone payment, etc). One of my CC's I have had from 2014 is a Discover It with a $15,300/$15,700 balance. But what about the others? How high of an APR am I looking at with my file? Would I even get approved if all?

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 01:33:53 GMT

You should be able to find out the APR from LC without taking the HP from them, I think you don't get the HP unless you go through with the loan. Not sure if any of the others work that way.

Other people have gotten out of more debt so don't give up. Target the highest interest first and aim to pay it off then with your way down the list. If you have some cards with smaller balances maybe aim to get them paid off completely as it'll make you feel good to see that balance go to zero.

You may get balance chased by some of the issuers where as your pay they lower your limit. Don't let that discourage you, they will love you again when you get your debt paid off.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

BronzeTrader — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 02:31:24 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
What do you guys recommend I go for? PenFed, Discover, Lending Tree or Prosper?

I mean I am going to try to borrow at least $20,000. My salary I will put $25,000 (with bonuses), because I am pretty sure they will ask for paystubs and proof of income, but I have no expenses (rent, food, phone payment, etc). One of my CC's I have had from 2014 is a Discover It with a $15,300/$15,700 balance. But what about the others? How high of an APR am I looking at with my file? Would I even get approved if all?

If I were you, I'd stop reading this site and run out, work hard to earn anything you can. If you can't drive Uber, can you go to work in Wendy's?

Or get some help from your family. A lot of parents step up when their children get in touble like this.

Not sure how the debt management stuff helps much. Rember there is no easy way out.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 01:57:45 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
You should be able to find out the APR from LC without taking the HP from them, I think you don't get the HP unless you go through with the loan. Not sure if any of the others work that way.

Other people have gotten out of more debt so don't give up. Target the highest interest first and aim to pay it off then with your way down the list. If you have some cards with smaller balances maybe aim to get them paid off completely as it'll make you feel good to see that balance go to zero.

You may get balance chased by some of the issuers where as your pay they lower your limit. Don't let that discourage you, they will love you again when you get your debt paid off.

You can check your rate with Prosper with a soft pull as well. Prosper pulls EX with a Scorex PLUSSM score (whatever that is). You can check your rate with Best Egg online, not clear if it's a SP, they pull EX too.

Edit: Did a little checking on Best Egg's website, to check your rate it's a SP.

Re: INSANE Credit Card Debt = Need Advice?

Anonymous — Mon, 09 Apr 2018 02:06:19 GMT

One more to check out that's popular on this forum: Sofi let's you check rate online with SP, pulls EX.