Credit card debt can be extremely easy to overlook. After all, one only has to pay the minimum, which never seems like much. That new fifty inch television is only costing you thirty bucks a month (and another thousand dollars in interest by the time it’s paid off). Knowing what you’ll pay in interest rate charges may convince you to eliminate credit card debt. However, I’m more convinced that knowing all the extra goodies that come with consolidating and/or legally eliminating credit card debt will be the ultimate persuasion.

Credit card debt is one of the easiest credit problems to fix. Why? Because you have numerous choices in order to do so. Consolidation companies can reduce the total interest paid across the board and create a single payment (however, they cannot help with mortgage or car loan debt). Credit cards have minimum payments and those go down as you pay off the balance. That means there is incentive to lowering the balance (more cash in pocket). Lastly, credit cards can be opened and closed relatively easily, giving opportunities to do balance transfers to lower interest rate cards. So while there are plenty of ways to eliminate or reduce credit card debt, what you’re asking yourself is: how did WE eliminate ours?

We did a rolling credit card debt elimination trick. We had five cards that we wished to get rid of, all of these belonging to me. Of the five cards we picked the ones with the highest interest rates and balance. This was our go-to card, meaning every extra payment we had went to this card, plus the minimum. The rest of the cards only had the minimum payments made. When that card was paid off, we took the used the amount we had been paying ($150 extra + $46 minimum) and applied that to the next card (plus the minimum). Each card was closed upon balance-in-full-payment. This is, in my opinion, the best way to eliminate credit card debt, legally and inexpensively. You could pay the extra money to a consolidation firm, they will, of course, work out better terms with your credit card companies. On the other hand that also has a negative impact on your credit report.

Rolling credit card debt payments is the cheapest, safest and most convenient way to eliminate credit card debt, in my opinion.

Firstly, consolidation companies usually combine all the debt and the borrower pays them a set amount every month. The company then disperses the cash among the lenders. Having the convenience of paying all the bills to one spot is very helpful when you’re overwhelmed with bills and due dates and minimum payments.
The second bonus of using debt consolidation companies is having them work out deals with creditors. The most important bonus, actually, is their ability to reduce interest rates and even, sometimes, the total balance due.

There are a lot of negatives to working with companies that do debt consolidation. It’s important to be aware of them before you make the decision to use them.
Once you accept the company’s terms, you’ll be cutting up your credit cards and closing the accounts as they’re paid off. I have yet to find a consolidation company that allows any credit, in any form, to be kept or applied for during the course of the consolidation.

If you have anything other than revolving credit; i.e. bad checks, mortgages, car loans etc., they aren’t included in the consolidation. This means you’ll have to make those payments separately.

Hidden into some of the terms and agreements at many consolidation companies is a provision to make a “voluntary extra payment”. Be aware this isn’t a necessary payment and you should request anything like it to be removed from the contract, or go through a different company.
Consolidation through a firm isn’t the only option for someone with credit problems. A borrower can actually arrange to lower interest rates and make deals with creditors to pay off an account. A specific company is not always necessary.

There are also ways to pay off debt quickly and efficiently without consolidation; i.e. a rolling payment plan. in this type of payment plan you make the maximum extra payment to one particular card until it’s paid off (paying the minimum on others). Once it’s paid off you take all the money (including the minimum payment) and apply that to the next card. You’ll always pay the same amount total, but each card will get a different appropriation of the funds depending on if they’re at the top of the list to pay off. Once you pay off one card, it’s exhilarating enough to usually spur higher payments to the next.

Debt consolidation services work directly with creditors and can do any number of things. They can reduce the amount owed to all merchants by working out a payment schedule. They don’t only just work out a payment plan for your debts; they work out a plan to pay off the debts. Often debt consolidation services buy the loans themselves at lower rates and pass that onto the borrower. It’s wise to shop around at different debt managing services to find one willing to pass a better interest rate onto you.

Unsecured debt, like credit cards, is usually at a high rate of interest and the most commonly consolidated debt. Unfortunately, many people choose equity loans to secure a loan with a lower interest rate. While the interest rate seems very low, the debt is spread out over such a long period of time that the loan actually ends up costing more than non-consolidation. If you decide to use an equity loan to consolidate debt, be sure to have a pay off date. The longer a loan stands on an account, the more interest accrues. If left to accrue long enough, it can double the amount of the original loan. Debt consolidation is a great idea if you can pay the loan off before the interest piles up to ridiculous heights or if you’re in trouble financially.

Those who have financial trouble can benefit from debt consolidation services. Working directly with your debtors, they will create a time line to pay off your debt. The great thing about these services is that they reduce most debt to one payment. It makes it a lot simpler to pay off the bad debt.

You can work out your own payment arrangements which might be better, however. There is a term called rolling debt and it’s very effective in reducing debt without consolidation. Basically you make the minimum payments on all debt except the highest interest and balance loan. On the highest loan make the highest payment you can until it’s paid off. Once that debt is paid, pay the minimum plus what you were paying on the other card. Here is an example: if you have 6 loan payments, pay the minimum on all of them and then add $100 to the highest debt. Once that debt is paid off, take the entire payment you made on that card and put it towards the second highest, paying the minimum on that as well.

Online high yield savings accounts are usually able to pay better interest rates because they do not have the overhead of the traditional bank.  Yes, they still have an office somewhere but instead of a bunch of branch buildings and employees they are able to use programmers in one building to take care of most of it.  They also look at only a few business lines instead of everything and the kitchen sink.

The best high yield savings accounts are found in FDIC insured banks.  You don’t want to use a non FDIC bank or account as it makes your money subject to tons of different risks.  The only risk with an FDIC account is that the government falls which makes the insurance worthless.  That is a risk I am willing to take.

So should you always go for the highest yield savings account?  Well it depends as you first want to make sure it is an FDIC insured account.  After that you will want to make sure that it is not filled with a bunch of fees to withdraw your money or anything else.  While most online banks do a good job with customer service, some do not and do all they can to nickel and dime you into oblivion.  You don’t want to give up all of your added savings in order to pay fees.  By the way banks claim they need to charge fees to pay the bills and this is a lie.  Banks want you deposits in order to loan it out.  The larger their deposit base is the more that they can loan out and make the real money.

So make sure that you are looking at several different banks both online an in person and then make sure they are FDIC inured.  After that compare high yield savings accounts for not only the yield but also the fees and convenience.  Some banks are really bad at sending you money while others are a gem to deal with.  Customer service is definitely something that you will want to look at as an unresponsive bank is not very helpful.

That being said thanks to technology you can get relatively, if not absolutely, high returns.  By getting a high yield online savings account you can get more interest, or juice as I like to call it, then you are likely to get via your regular bank.

So how do you find the highest yield savings account?  There is an awesome thing called Google and it is your friend.  In all seriousness the primary things you want to look for are to make sure that the bank is real and not some online scam and that you are putting your money in an FDIC insured account.  If you do anything else you open yourself up to non-savings account type risk.

One of the best high yield savings account banks has historically been Ing Direct.  Ing with their orange savings accounts were one of the pioneers in online banking and give a higher than average yield to their customers.  Of course just because they have been one of the best does not mean you can’t do better with some extra homework.

Go to Ing and look at their rates.  Then go land find a bank that is offering even higher high yield savings account rates.  If you shop hard you will find some really good deals.  A few major caveats are that some banks kind of mislead and make you think that their account, which is really a CD, is a savings account.  Yes, it is a savings vehicle but a savings account it is not.

Another thing that you will want to do when looking for high yield online savings account is to look for any added bonuses.  Over time they can really add up.  We have seen free concert tickets, $100 dollar bonuses, Amazon gift certificates, and basically everything but the proverbial bank toaster.

By looking around and doing some good research you can make more money over time in a guaranteed manner then you would otherwise make.  Of course you will also want to ensure that you are using other methods of growing you money.  Online high yield savings accounts are great for your emergency money and other liquid needs but to build real wealth you will need to invest in stocks, bonds, and other similar things in order to reach your financial goals.  But maximizing your savings is a great first start.