Snowflaking and a Few Debt Management Tips
Snowflaking is a derivative of the Debt Snowball. I’m not a formal snowflaker. Silly names don’t mean much to me. But I did pull a classic snowflake maneuver this week.
I put away $200 more into savings. And I looked at my money for the rest of the month and decided that I could put $100 towards my credit card debt, bringing my total payment to $1100. Sure, I could have put the saved $200 total towards my debt for a total of $1300, but I’m still edgy that my Save-O-Meter is low.
At any rate, I think I’ll end up doing more snowflaking till the end of the year.
What strategies do you use to save money on interest and pay down your credit cards faster?
1. Closing Date - I pay as close to the closing date as I can. That way I have the lowest balance I can all month and pay less in interest.
2. Extra Payments - I try to send in extra payments when I can. Budgeting lately has been helpful in finding more money to send. (I use the term ‘budgeting’ loosely. It’s more like being mindful of what I spend.)
3. Use Balance Transfers judiciously - Not all offers are created equal. Watch out for one-time transaction fees and expiring low rates. The best offer you can find is a balance transfer offer with no transaction fee and a low rate that lasts until the transferred amount is paid off. I never see these anymore, but I don’t shop for them either. Lately I’ve pushed all my balances onto two cards incurring a low rate till January 2008. That puts my rate around 6.5% and 7.2%. I now pay off the balance on the other three cards I have. Those include some recurring subscription fees and the occasional big ticket item.
4. Don’t charge any more - Cut up your cards if you have to. Learn to pay off your balances each month. (see above)
What else do you do to save money on credit card interest and snowflake/snowball your debt?
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