Debt Dumpers 2025

[ruadisneyfan2]

I just realized I'm contradicting myself somewhat. Telling others that fees are dumb while I'm paying some myself.

To me, when you need to pay off debt, ALL bank fees are funneling your snowball away from paying down debt and the sooner you can pay them off and get rid of them, the better. In those cases, you're paying the fees because that's the only way you can have a card at all, so you accept them. Once your debt is gone and your credit score gradually rises as you pay off the debt, you can be more selective about which card/s you want.
Ironically, our kids are not that into travelling and their cards are the no fee, cash back type. That's what makes them happy, so be it. I still love to travel and love it even more when several aspects are free such as flights or hotels. I'm not forced to have these cards. I could choose the Chase Freedom card with no fee but I love the rewards and feel that what we get in return for those fees, far exceeds what we pay.

I wouldn't recommend doing what we do unless you know for sure you can pay it off monthly.

 

[Tygerlilly]

You’re doing a fabulous job! Very impressive how you’re handling your mom while homeschooling and raising the kids and working. No way I could handle all of that.

It has definitely been a long few years since my dad passed. Things are finally starting to even out (I hope), so I'm optimistic 2026 will be the year I can breathe a bit and really focus on just us.

 

[pblack]

I also have 2 credit cards with annual fees. A Southwest Premier (or whatever the highest tier is) card and a Chase Sapphire Preferred card. Like @ruadisneyfan2 I find the Chase Sapphire card well worth the minimal annual fee. I'm even considering moving up to their stupidly expensive annual fee card - but i'm not quite ready to pull the trigger on it yet. Most of the time I end up transferring my Sapphire points over to Southwest for free flights, but sometimes I use them to book hotels. You may be wondering why I bother to keep my Southwest card if I use my Sapphire card for the Southwest points. Well originally I kept it around because it gave me 4 upgraded boardings in a year, plus a $75 annual credit, and points on my card anniversary, but now that they're switching up how they do things at Southwest and they've jacked up the annual fee, my plan is to keep the card for another year and see if these new "perks" will benefit me at all. With a card you do get a free checked bag per person, which is worth it to me. With the card I have you're also supposed to be able to select a better seat for free. I don't have any flights booked for next year as of right now, so we'll see if the perks end up being worth it for me and i'll re-evaluate at the end of the year. Southwest is also my "preferred" airline, mainly because they're the only airline that has non stops from my area to southern CA and Vegas.