Discover lowered my limit——UPDATE

[NRB525]

Thanks for listing out the details. As you know, not a lot of room to work with those.

I would not close the Discover. If it is on a 0% APR til next year, that's already a good indicator they had a nice view of you earlier. The 0% APR will help get it paid down, and Discover should be a long term keeper for several reasons. After you get past this, the CLI will come again some day.

I've been in the situation where one has high balances, and lots of minimum payments. Lenders balance chasing, CLD, closing accounts on me. Best to keep chipping away at the minimums for now, and very important not to get too wrapped up in utilization concerns, FICO scores, or interest rates. You cannot control those now. For the time being, you just need to make those minimum payments on time, keep the balances from growing, and pay no attention to the finer points of FICO scoring or interest rates. FICO is simply not your highest priority for now.

Don't close any accounts. It is possible some CCC will close an account. It is possible they will CLD and/or balance chase you. Nothing you can do about that, it's their decision to make. As long as you are making your minimum payments on time, though, you are within terms and all they can do is stomp around. They loaned you the money, now you just have to pay it back, along the minimum terms.

Switch your focus to ensuring your job activities are going well, changing jobs if that is the best, to keep your income coming in.

[austinguy907]

---

@icyhot wrote:
My income is very unsteady at the moment and I couldn't possibly give an exact number, the problem is for the past few months I haven't been able to bring enough cash in to make my bills, I charge most of them an just pay the minimums.
My recurring expenses:
Rent: $849
Car note: $430
Car insurance: $93
Phone: $170
Wifi: $45

Balances are as follows
BofA: $10,535/0- minimum payment $163....the promo BT rates are expiring and the interest is skyrocketing
Quiksilver: $18,130/21500 minimum payment $181, same with BofA, BT rates will expire soon
Spark: $5,390/6,000 minimum payment $50, 0% until next year
Disco: $2685/$2900 minimum $54, 0% until next year
Citi AA: $2837/6400 miminum $25, standard APR
Citi forward $1534/2900, minimum $25, standard APR
Citi double cash $5330/6000, minimum $80, standard APR
Chase Marriott $873/7000 minimum $25, standard APR
Chase Freedom $1121/5000, minimum $25, standard APR
CU: $4423/$5000, minimum $135, 8.25% APR
PayPal credit: $400 balance, minimum $25

As you can see, my minimum payments take up a large chunk of cash every month and if I can make those along with my car note, it's a good month. Everything else gets charged, including rent

---

Simple math says this isn't going to work when you're charging $849/mo for rent and then only paying $788/mo on your CC's.  Not only are you spending more than you're paying but, you're also compounding interest each month which just doesn't let the balances come down at all.

Why are you paying $170/mo for a phone?  This shouldn't be the case when you can't even pay rent.

$45 for internet?  Keep this and ditch the high cost phone data plan.

I'm sure while charging your rent to a CC each month also includes an additional 2-3% on top of the $849 thus putting you $100/mo behind the 8 ball.

I would make some plans to move home or get out of the lease somehow because even with a FT + PT job unless you have a significant change in income that $850/mo is going to be needed to dig out of this hole and not take 15 years to do it.  I wouldn't even consider BK on this either until you have a way to not put your rent on a CC. 

Hopefully you get to a place where you can make some headway and get above the water line again.  

[icyhot]

Getting out my lease or even trying to change my living situation simply isn't an option right now, especially not with a newborn. The phone bill is high because of the device payments, it's really the cheapest I can get it at this point. My brother is on my plan and he gives me money for his portion.  I'm starting another job this month and hopefully will be able to pay my rent, car, an minimums comfortably while also trying to save

[Anonymous]

Not to sound judgemental but I see no mention of baby's other parent paying or helping.  Could they do more?  Kids and new ones especially  are very expensive .     

[icyhot]

I receive $65 every two weeks for child support which goes exclusively to the baby, the other parent can't help much despite my constant asking

[Anonymous]

$65 every two weeks?  I would ask for 25% of other parents income.     Either friendly or by court. $65 every two weeks won't pay for formula.   

[icyhot]

He makes even less than I do.....thankfully I breastfeed exclusively and have a friend who watches her while I'm at work. I also get public assistance

[Skymogul]

---

@icyhot wrote:
My income is very unsteady at the moment and I couldn't possibly give an exact number, the problem is for the past few months I haven't been able to bring enough cash in to make my bills, I charge most of them an just pay the minimums.
My recurring expenses:
Rent: $849
Car note: $430
Car insurance: $93
Phone: $170
Wifi: $45

Balances are as follows
BofA: $10,535/0- minimum payment $163....the promo BT rates are expiring and the interest is skyrocketing
Quiksilver: $18,130/21500 minimum payment $181, same with BofA, BT rates will expire soon
Spark: $5,390/6,000 minimum payment $50, 0% until next year
Disco: $2685/$2900 minimum $54, 0% until next year
Citi AA: $2837/6400 miminum $25, standard APR
Citi forward $1534/2900, minimum $25, standard APR
Citi double cash $5330/6000, minimum $80, standard APR
Chase Marriott $873/7000 minimum $25, standard APR
Chase Freedom $1121/5000, minimum $25, standard APR
CU: $4423/$5000, minimum $135, 8.25% APR
PayPal credit: $400 balance, minimum $25

As you can see, my minimum payments take up a large chunk of cash every month and if I can make those along with my car note, it's a good month. Everything else gets charged, including rent

---

That adds up to $53,258 in revolving balances and $788/month in minimum payments on those. You haven't said what your income actually is, but if you're charging your rent, I think it's safe to assume it's below your  $2,375 in total monthly bills.

You are extremely under water and I don't see a lot of options for you. Once those intro periods fall off and you start paying interest on your large balances, your minimums are going to increase and you'll be even further under water.  You're renting so you don't have home equity. Since you're so under water, it seems safe to assume you don't have retirement or other market assets to work with. 

Unless you can radically increase your income, you are hitting the wall - indicated by the fact that you are charging your monthly bills, including rent.  A personal loan is not a good option even if you could get one, because you are alread under water with a large portion of your balances sitting at 0% APR.

My advice: you need to talk to a reputable non-profit credit counseling service like https://www.nfcc.org/.  Credit counselors can have the interest suspended on your accounts and work out payment terms. This will absolutely destroy your credit for the next several years, but to be blunt, the truth is you have already done that.

[icyhot]

Why would it destroy my credit? Are payments not being made while I work with them? I do plan on increasing my income significantly in the next few months with a new full time job, and I was considering a personal loan to pay off at least the two largest balances and using a part time job to pay off the sub-$10,000 balances one at a time.

[Anonymous]

I would expect him to tripple at the least.   40 hours at $10/minium wage times 25% equals $100 per week. In most states its a percentage of income with a floor and ceiling.

I would suspect he makes more than $10/hour.  If he does not want to pay more,  talk to family and children services and find out what you have to do get more.  You owe this to the baby.  The baby is depending on you.