Breaking the debt cycle - let's pay down that debt

The first part of building a solid financial foundation is to get our personal lifestyle debt under control and paid off. Once you've done that, build up an emergency fund and have appropriate insurance in place, you will be in a position to start focusing on other financial goals.

Getting into debt can be a bit like stepping onto quicksand: before you know what’s happened, you’re up to your eyeballs and feel helpless. But it doesn’t have to be that way. We've outlined some strategies you can use to climb out of the debt cycle, and precautions you can take to make sure you don’t get into a similar situation again.

 

Get rid of those cards

Firstly, let’s stow away those cards somewhere hard to reach at home, so you’re not tempted to put any new charges onto them. If you think you’ll still be tempted, go get the scissors!

Survey all that you owe

This can be a bit daunting, but you need to look at everything you owe and work out which debts are costing you the most money.

Let's look at some ways you can pay it off quickly and wisely.