I have two credit cards and $450 total m
Ask
I have two credit cards and $450 total monthly budget to pay them down:
- Card A: $5,200 balance, 24.5% AP, minimum payment $130/month
- Card B: $1,800 balance, 16.0% AP, minimum payment $45/month
ent, utilities, survival medicine, and food are 100% covered and fully funded from our main checking account.
Can you run a comparison between the Avalanche strategy (highest AP first) and the Snowball strategy (lowest balance first), showing how many months each takes and the total interest paid?
Answer
ent, utilities, survival medicine, and food are covered from your checking account, so the $450 monthly budget is a pure repayment comparison, not a crisis decision.
| Strategy | Extra goes first | Months | Total interest |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Avalanche | Card A (24.5% AP) | 19 | $1,264.20 |
| Snowball | Card B ($1,800 balance) | 19 | $1,446.54 |
Source: this turn's `payoff.py` ok:true stdout; monthly compounding, paid as `Card A 130 + Card B 45 + $275 extra` per month until cleared.
- **Avalanche** targets the higher AP (Card A) first. Same19 months, but **$182.34 less** interest paid overall.
- **Snowball** clears Card B in 6 months, so you see one balance hit zero first. Then Card A carries the remaining 13 months alone on the full $450/month.
Both finish in 19 months because $175/month is locked in for minimums and the extra $275 is enough to push either single-card route forward at similar speed. The trade-off is purely "save interest" vs "clear one card fast for the psychological win."