Friday, December 18, 2009

Don't Let A Debt Consolidation Turn Into Your Next Catastrophic Decision

By Frank Froggatt

The process of debt consolidation allows you to put all of your higher interest charging cards and bills into a single payment that not only has a lower rate of interest, but a lower payment to boot. It has been used by many debtors to plan for a bill relief. A bill consolidation is most often accompanied with a debt consolidation loan. The bill consolidation loan will be used to payoff all your high interest debts and you just need to concentrate on single monthly payment to clear the debt consolidation loan. This loan will be effective in helping you get a handle on your debt so that you can move toward you financial debt relief goals.

When your debt are paid off with the loan, your credit card balances will then be placed to a zero balance again giving you the maximum limit to use once again. This could be a really bad thing if you don't learn to either not use the cards at all or pay off the full amount each month. If you don't change the previous habits that led you into the situation that you re in, it can get exponentially worse in a short period of time.

If you are in the process of getting a debt consolidation loan right now you understand that it is not an easy process. Don't make things worse on yourself by doing the same things that got you into this hot water in the first place. Things that you can do to avoid it from happening are:

1. Change Your Spending Behavior

If you tend to buy items spontaneously, you are an impulse buyer. This type of irresponsible behavior can easily cause you to spend way more money then you have allotted in your budget. Hence, you much change your spending behavior to avoid new debts added to you, else you effort to consolidation your debts and plan for a debt free will be a waste because new debts will snowballing to a serious debt issue if you not control it and you soon will again trap into another financial crisis. In order to not make any impulse purchases, you need to make sure that you make yourself a list before going shopping and commit yourself to not deviating from it.

2. Make A Budget Plan

Having a budget plan is critical if you wish to get control of your money spending habits as it will allow you to see how much you have coming in as well as going out.It is vital that if you are on a bill consolidation loan payment plan that you incorporate that payment into your budget plan so there will always be money in place to cover it. In the end you need to have an income that is greater or equal to the amount of cash that you have going out. If you don't then you need to make some changes in your spending habits in order to make the numbers coincide. Some things you could opt for implementing would be cutting coupons, or looking for good deals on clothing at St Vincent DePaul instead of Maier and Frank. It is an absolute must for you to live within your means.

3. Avoid Swiping Your Charge Card

It is far to easy to simply swipe your charge card to pay for something instead of writing a check or paying in cash. Because of this ease of use, it may cause you to over spend and not pay notice to it until you receive the credit card statement. Hence, avoid using your charge card again. A really smart move would be to cut up all of your cards but one that you might need for an emergency. Do not tell the companies to close your accounts as this will have a bad reflection on your credit score, simply get rid of the cards so you cannot use them.

4. Produce Full Payment On charge card Balance

If there is some odd reason that you cannot stop using credit cards, then it has to be one of you main priorities to make sure that the entire balance gets paid at the end of each billing cycle. I strenuously advise against this type of thing though as with the fact that LIFE happen and misfortune of some sort always rears it's head which results in the credit card bill being put on the bottom of the list. This will lead to another complete disaster.

To Sum It Up

Working through a debt consolidation is a fantastic way to get yourself out of bill as it is a solution that works when implemented correctly. On the other hand if you continue with your spending habits you will end up in a situation even worse than when you began. Because of this fact you need to take the consolidation companies up on their offers for credit counseling and get help in learning how to properly handle credit and cash in general.

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