Credit Card Diet

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Week 2 Bonus #1: Credit Card Diet



Loren Schandler Slocum is a distinguished international personal development seminar leader, speaker, coach, author, wife and mother.

Thank you for joining us in the 52 Week Tuneup Challenge™! This week’s Featured Tuneup™ is “Clean Up and Clean Out Your Wallet”. Throughout the week we will be posting special Bonus Tuneups to help you implement this week’s Tuneup Challenge™!

Week 2 - Bonus Tuneup #2: CREDIT CARD DIET

Welcome back to our “Clean Out Your Wallet” challenge. Our focus today is credit cards. Unfortunately, in today’s stressed economy, many people have become more reliant upon credit cards to make their purchases. Besides adding to your debt, they are taking up valuable real estate in your handbag. As you were going through your Handbag Detox, did you notice how much plastic you were carrying, whether it be credit cards, video store cards, or a grocery store loyalty card? This makeover is a project in itself, so let’s get started.

According to Kevin Trudeau in his book, Debt Cures:

“Credit card companies are in business to make money. They are not offering a service out of the kindness of their hearts.”

Trudeau sat in a meeting once with some high-level bankers and was told:

“We love consumer lending. We want them to be late; we want them to make their minimum monthly payments. We are virtually in their wallets for the rest of their lives.”

Let’s interrupt that pattern and eliminate those credit cards in your wallet that you don’t need so they aren’t there for the rest of your life.

1. Decide which credit cards you use on a regular basis. Put cards that you never or rarely use in a place of safekeeping. Better yet, pay them off and cut them up. Do not cancel them as this can lower your credit score (which is calculated based on the amount of credit you have available to you – when you cancel a credit card you lower the amount of credit available to you, and thus your credit score. On the flip side, don’t open new credit cards to raise your score either!)

2. Apply any extra cash to the debt with the higher rate of interest. As you pay off cards, redirect the money and make larger payments on cards with balances.

3. Remove department or retail store cards that you only use occasionally and put them in a place of safekeeping until you need them. This will also help you resist impulse purchases as you will have to go home to get that store’s specific credit card.

4. Before you decide to throw down your credit card and buy something, ask yourself if it is something that you really need, or is it a potential space monger that you may never use? Stop adding to the problem.

5. Use cash whenever possible. People tend to spend more when using a credit card versus cash for purchases. It will make you think twice about impulse spending. If you must use credit, use the card with the lowest APR.

6. Keep a daily log of your expenditures. You will be surprised after a latte or two, lunch out, shopping at the grocery store, buying gas for your vehicle, picking up a gift or two…it all adds up! Keep receipts, AND do your Handbag Detox at the end of each day and do an audit of your spending.

According to Trudeau, “The federal government is allowing the credit card companies and big banks to enslave people, but we don’t have to live in bondage.”

So take control of your debt and you will take control of your life. This wisdom will create space in your wallet for prosperity to flow in.

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