Throwaway because I’m actually really ashamed that I’ve reached this point. I used to be very good at saving (I even paid off 20k of student debt) and somewhere along the way I effed up.
I’m in a rock and a hard place and I need advice.
I’m 32 years old and I moved to a new city without a full-time job in October. I’m currently working consistently part-time (30-40 hrs a month on average) as a freelancer for my old company. I have 24k in credit card debt and month by month it’s literally me just dumping in money to try to cover the interest. My have bills otherwise have been covered by my part-time work and I’ve been paying with cash.
The thing is I have built up 50k in my 401k from my previous job - while I know in the short term and possibly long term that this will hurt, I’m considering pulling some of my money early and nuking my credit card debt. I understand I’ll be taxed and penalized for pulling it early. But on the other hand my credit score has been garbage purely on the credit card debt alone and this has been an emotional and mental burden on me.
The other option is to try to negotiate for lower interests and a payment plan with my credit card companies but I’ve tried that in the past and have gotten nowhere with it. And I’m also afraid that it won’t help at all and the interest will just keep on compounding even more with a lower interest rate and my credit score will continue to be terrible.
I guess I’m asking which is the better scenario (other than not having gotten into this debt in the first place).
Submitted April 19, 2019 at 12:31PM by fiscalthrowaway123 http://bit.ly/2XtepqK
