With American's now owing over 1 trillion dollars in credit cards, local financial professional Brad Allen from WealthWisconsin.com gave tips on how to pay off credit card debt.
"The average household has 8,600 dollars in debt, and that can be tough to pay off," Allen said.
Allen's first tip was to take inventory.
"You need to know where your debt is first," he said.
His second tip is to look at your interest rate.
"The average APR right now is 16 percent," he said. Some solutions he mentioned where transferring debt and taking advantage of some companies offering zero interest rate for 12 month periods, or simply asking your credit card company to lower your rate.
"You'd be surprised how many [companies will lower interest rate]," he said. "They want you to pay that debt off as fast as possible. Sometimes they're willing to lower the rates a little bit."
His final tip is to simply spend less than what's coming in.
"That really comes down to a budget," he said. "Putting a budget worksheet together and knowing what's going out every month, where you can make cuts, so you can use that money to pay that debt off fast."
