Holiday Credit Hangover?

Are you overwhelmed by credit card bills for overindulgent holiday shopping? Between gifts for spouses, kids, grandkids and besties, it’s easy to get caught up in the spirit and overspend. Here’s how to repair the damage from your credit card hangover.

Obviously, it’s too late to tell you not to overspend during the holidays. So, let’s focus on how to get out of that fix if you did overspend. Some sage advice from the experts:

Don’t Beat Yourself Up

“You got there the way you got there,” says Heather Philp, senior vice president at Wells Fargo.  “It doesn’t make sense to cry the blues because generosity overwhelmed you and you decided that Auntie and a cousin needed everything. Give yourself some grace and don’t beat yourself up because you overspent.” And, she adds, “it’s okay to make returns.”

Have a Plan

“Sit down and create your plan,” Philp says. “I’m old school. I believe in pen and paper, because I think that what you manage and what you measure are things that you have to be able to see. Get a pen and paper and list all the credit cards that you’ve racked up debt on over the last month or so.” She says financial apps are fine, “but just from my own experience, I find that most people will pay closer attention when there’s something that they could literally pick up day-to-day and take a look at it.”

Determine your Excess Funds

How much in “excess funds” will you have monthly to apply to credit card debt? “You should always start with ‘how much excess funds do I truly have in any given month?” says Philp. “You will know if you have an extra $100 you can use to pay down that credit card debt.”

Don’t Just Pay the Minimum

“One of the big challenges with all that credit card debt is you can have a really high interest rate. Especially in this environment where rates have gone up significantly over the last two years,” points out Usama Ashraf, president and CFO of Prosper in San Francisco. “It’s really important to pay down your principal balance. If all you’re doing is making the monthly payment, your balance will not go down significantly in the near term. You’ll be making those payments for a long period of time at a high interest rate.”

Start With the Highest Interest Rate Cards

“Start with the one that has the highest interest rate,” advises Philp. “I’m not a firm believer in starting with the one with the lowest balance because that may be the one with the 6% interest rate.” She says you should also look at the credit cards with the highest balance, and plan out how you will pay them off.

“Ultimately, look at what you can afford to pay down,” Ashraf adds. “Try to max that out and start with the highest interest cards.”

Use Your Tax Refund

Use your tax refund or year-end bonus to pay down the balance, experts agree. “To the extent you can — use a significant portion of that to pay down the balance and focus on the highest interest debt as well,” says Ashraf.

The tax refund or bonus would be included in that excess cash category, says Philp. “You’re better off using the money to pay off that 29% interest credit card, because you will get only 4% to 5% in a savings account, which is still nowhere close to what you’re going to be paying in interest.”

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Start a Plan for Next Year

“It’s important to say okay, now that you’ve gotten through this year without a plan, let’s start a plan for you for next year. When you start holiday shopping you’ve got to be very deliberate,” says Philp. ‘I go back to that pen and paper concept, but how much are you going to spend this year and be really, really deliberate about sticking with that plan?”

YOUR TURN

How do you handle holiday spending? Share your tips in the comments!

Rodney A. Brooks is the former deputy managing editor/Money at USA TODAY. His retirement columns appear in U.S. News & World Report and Senior Planet.com. He has written for National Geographic, The Washington Post and USA TODAY. The author of “Fixing the Racial Wealth Gap,” Brooks has testified before the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging. His website is www.rodneyabrooks.com.

 

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