Staying Out of Debt Once You Get Out of Debt

Paying off a major debt produces a sense of relief. You can celebrate a financial milestone; 

you can “pay yourself first” to greater degree and direct more money toward your dreams and 

your financial future rather than your creditors.

Once you get out of excessive consumer debt, the last thing you want to do is fall right back 

in. What steps can you take to reduce that possibility, and what missteps should you avoid 

making?

Step one: save money. So often, an unexpected event can put you in debt: an auto 

breakdown, a job loss, a trip to the emergency room or a hospital stay. If you earmark $50 or 

$100 a month (or even $20 a month) for an emergency fund, you can create a pool of money 

that may help you deal with the financial impact of such crises. Every dollar you save for these 

events is a dollar you do not have to borrow through a credit card or a personal loan at 

burdensome interest rates.

Step two: budget. Think about a 50/30/20 household budget: you assign half of your income 

for essentials like housing payments and food, 30% to discretionary purchases like shopping, 

eating out, and entertainment, and 20% to savings and/or paying down whatever minor debts 

you must incur from month to month.

Step three: buy things with an eye on value. Do you really need a new car that will require 

financing, one that will rapidly depreciate as soon as you drive it off the lot? A late-model used 

car might be a much better purchase. Similarly, could you save money by eating in more often 

or bringing a lunch to work? You could find some very nice goods at very cheap prices by 

shopping at thrift stores or online used marketplaces. These are all smart consumer steps, net 

positives for your financial picture.

You should also be aware of some potential missteps that could lead you right back into 

significant debt, or negatively impact your credit rating. Some of them may be taken 

consciously, others unconsciously.

Misstep one: spending freely once you are free of debt. If you get rid of consumer debt, but 

retain the spending mentality that drove you into it, your financial progress may be short-lived. 

If the experience of getting into (and getting out of) debt does not change that mindset, then 

you risk racking up serious debt again.

Misstep two: living without adequate health, auto, or disability insurance. Sometimes 

people  are forced to assume large debts as a direct consequence of being uninsured. 

Hopefully, you have not been one of them. If you must pay for your own insurance and the 

premiums seem high, remember that they will likely be lower than the bills you could be forced 

to pay out of pocket without such coverage.

Misstep three: getting rid of the credit cards you used to go into debt. You may think this 

is a great way to quickly improve your credit rating. It may not be. Closing out credit cards 

reduces the amount of credit you can potentially draw on per month, which hurts your credit 

utilization ratio. Having more accounts open (rather than less) improves that ratio.1

The key is how you use the accounts in the future. When you use about 10% of your available

credit each month, that is a positive for your credit score. When you use more than 30%, you

potentially harm your score. For the record, the length of your credit history accounts for 

about 15% of your FICO score, so if a card has more good payment history than bad, getting 

rid of it could be a slight negative.1

Instead of closing these accounts, keep them open, and use the cards once a month or less.

Should a card charge you an annual fee, see if you can downgrade to a card from the same

issuer that does not.

If you can keep debt reined in, you will have an opportunity to make financial strides. Not

everyone has such a chance due to the weight of their liabilities. Earlier this year, total U.S.

credit card debt alone surpassed $815 billion.2

This material was prepared by MarketingPro, Inc., and does not necessarily represent the views of the presenting party, nor their affiliates. This

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Citations.

1 - cnbc.com/2018/01/19/why-you-should-keep-old-credit-card-accounts-open.html [1/19/18]

2 - usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2018/08/15/simple-things-anyone-can-do-stay-out-debt/989168002/ [8/15/18]