Hey,

I came across a post on this forum from a year ago about a guy who had student debt and credit card debt. The poster said he had played all the "balance transfer games" and got "ALL of his debt down to 4.8% for life." Is anyone aware of how he did this?

I have approximately 45k in Student debt in multiple loans that range from 4% to 8% and I have an auto loan for 12k at ~10%. I am a recent grad with a decent paying job so I can afford my payments. I tried to refinance my auto loan but was rejected due to an insufficient history (even though I've had credit for 6 years now and it is rated between the good & excellent tier). I was not able to get a co-signer for any of my loans. Consolidating my student loans seems to be of no benefit to me because it will raise my interest rate and extend the length of the terms, which I do not need.

In the coming years I plan to have built some equity in a home...perhaps a home equity loan to pay off my debt? I get 0% balance transfer offers all the time, but I do not carry any credit card debt. Is it possible to pay some of these loans with a credit card and transfer the balance? Anyone have some creative ideas that work?

Hi,
A very good advice for this year is to save money and try to pay off loans but first find a good job or even jobs one in the morning and one in the evening and you will pay off your loan in no time.
Thank You and Feel Free To Ask Questions

Here is a topic I just posted that might help you.

Some ideas to help make/save money

How about working out a repayment plan and a budget? If you contact your creditors for a lower interest rate or lower monthly payments, you are almost sure to get at least some reduction. Besides, if you create a budget and stick to it - you will probably find some additional extra money to pay off your debts. Taking out a loan in order to pay out other debts doesn't seem a good idea, because statistics says this is the way to get deeper in debt.

I am not familiar with the post, but saying all his debt is down to 4.8% for life, kind of sounds like he's going to be paying an enormous loan for a long time. Almost every time to do a balance transfer, juggle debt, move loans, you'll add money to your principle is the form of fees. To get to 4.8%, you normally have to put something on the line, like your house. However, moving any debt that is unsecured, into one of your assets, is turning your worst case scenario from broke, to broke and homeless.

0% balance transfer means they don't charge you extra for switching over your debt...and sometimes they require you to pay it off in a certain amount of time or you incur fees. Also, after your introductory period, you are subject to the APR on the card, which will almost definitely jump to above 10%, you would wind up paying more. To add to that, some credit cards will back date finance charges that aren't paid off in a certain period, meaning if you owe $10 on what was originally $1,000, you're now whacked with another $100 (10% * 1000).

So yeah, start paying off your highest interest loans first and work your way down. Since your student loans aren't consolidated, try to pay off one or two a year depending on what you can afford. You'd be surprised how fast your debt drops once you start freeing up those additional payments and using them towards other debt.

There was a good site listed on the forums for you to put in all your loans and develop a payoff strategy, and it is really helpful, so I'm going to look around real quick and edit it in if I find it. DueMinder dot com (found it like 10 threads down, give it a try)

I would not use a HELOC to pay off your debt. Why put your house at risk. Also, interest rates on HELOCs may be low now but will be going up. The student loan interest is tax deductible, at pretty low interest rates, and generally seen as good debt, so I would focus on paying off your car loan first. I also would not try playing the balance transfer game with CC companies right now. Most CC are cutting limits, raising interest rates to crazy terms, and you don't want to get caught up in that. You may have the intention of paying it off prior to the introductory 0% ends but what if something major came up and you could not pay it off. Then your 4.8% that you transferred into a short term 0%, could end up at 32%. Also, most creditors see student loan debt as good debt since it's an investment in your future, transferring installment student loan debt to unsecured revolving credit would make creditors raise an eyebrow and boost your credit utilization way up and would probably hurt your FICO score pretty bad. Again, start paying the car loan off first, then move on to the highest interest loan. You also may not be saving much from refi your auto loan. Not sure what the length of your auto loan is but for example if was 60 months and you have 50 months left, with a 12K loan at 10% would put you around $255.00 a month. Even if you were able to refi at say 5.99% that would only put you at $232.00 a month saving a mer, $23.00 a month or $1,150 over 50 months plus the cost of refi. But, if you just paid an extra $150.00 a month on your auto loan, you would have it paid off about a year early and save $1009.00. Be sure to check with your loan company to be sure there is not an early payoff fee.

Check out Financial Calculators from Dinkytown.net and use the payment calculators to figure out what your accelerated payments could save you.