Switching from Snowball to Avalanche Debt Payoff Method.
The plan to pay off debt was to use the snowball method which has been working but as I watched our large debts barely decrease I have decided to switch things up. It is going to be a combination of sorts of both snowball and avalanche methods. A tool I used to come to the decision was a Google Sheet for debt snowball/avalanche created by Personal Finance with Leila. With this Sheet you can see your debt payoff date depending on the order you put your debt into the sheet.
Order of debt payoff for snowball method
Order of debt for avalanche method
New plan of attack- Order of debt payoff
Dental- my ex-husband is also responsible for this debt so he also makes small payments. Because the debt is so small, I just want to get paid off so we both can put our payments to a much larger debt with a high interest. Tentative payoff date is July 2024 for both the snowball and avalanche methods because there is no interest on this debt.
Snowball
Avalanche
ZuntaFi-This has an interest rate of 8.80% but it is a lower amount than other higher interest rates debts so I decided to pay that next so my $40 snowball payment from paying off dental can go principal only payment. Tentative payoff date of November 2025 compared to December 2026 for snowball. With avalanche I will be saving $68.
Avalanche
Snowball
Collections Pro Mine- this is another debt my ex-husband is partially responsible for. We both make small payments to it. The interest rate is 10% so it is going down at a disable turtle pace. This debt tentative payoff date is over 15 years. The Google sheet only calculates up to 15 years. This debt is a collection of 12 other debts. Ranging from $137 to $5,536.71. The extra payments I make will pay off lower amounts first. Making a snowball method within an avalanche method. Giving me the small wins while attacking such large debt. I am going to do a blog post about collections debt soon. With the avalanche method I will pay off this debt 5 years sooner saving me $8,267 in interest.
Snowball
Avalanche
Collections Pro His- Another 10% interest debt and an over 15 years payoff date. This one will take us a long time to pay off. With avalanche saving $35,960 (at least for the 15 years the sheet shows). Watch for updates on this debt because on the months that my husband has 3 paychecks an extra $175 goes to this debt so it will go down a little bit faster.
Snowball
Avalanche
Collection Bureau- 10% interest tentative payoff date August 2027 which is 9 month faster than snowball. Once this is paid off the $75 a month that goes to this will go to Collection Pro Mine. This one will actually go down much faster because all the debt at this collection agency is from health care bills so my husbands HSA can go to that. In January his company contributes $1,000 to the account. Watch for those updates in future posts. However where I stand right now the avalanche method will save me $35.
Snowball
Avalanche
Crook County- 7% interest and another 15 years payoff date. With avalanche I will save $1,225 and pay it off before 15 years.
Snowball
Avalanche
Family- No interest and an extremely patient person. Right now we do not make a regular monthly payment. However the sheet need a minimum payment for the formulas to work so I put one cents. If that changes when this is paid off it will snowball into the debt we are focusing on. We try to send money when we have extra money however with how much debt we have it does not happen often enough.
Snowball
Avalanche
Hand Therapy- No interest tentative payoff date September 2025. Once this is paid off the $100 payment will snowball into Collection Pro Mine.
Snowball
Avalanche
Thunder-No interest and tentative payoff date of November 2027. Once paid off the $200 payment will snowball into Collection Pro Mine. This is the surgery that saved my arm after a car accident in 2020. I was told I have the option to make them payoff offer when I have large chunk of money. They already knocked of $7,000 of original amount because I was an uninsured patient and would be self paying. So unsure how I feel about it. Of all my medical debt that is the one I am most grateful for.
Snowball
Avalanche
As far as my federal student loan debt that will also be avalanche method however it will not be included in this avalanche method. I will go into more detail on how I plan to attack the student loans soon.
Is anyone else overwhelmed with all of this??
Overall with doing the avalanche method will save me about $45,555. So obviously mathematically it makes more sense however using the snowball method gives small wins right away and you do not get as discouraged. However I have accepted this is a race where the turtle is disabled and it will be a slow one. But I am going to make it into as much of a game as I can. I want to beat as many as the tentative payoff dates as I can.
