Kyle Littleton, 26, wanted to get rid of nearly $4,500 in credit card debt.
The amount weighed on him; he was always tempted to keep using the card; and he was annoyed the monthly payments didn’t get reported to any of the three credit bureaus, which would help burnish his credit history.
But instead of increasing his monthly payments to pay down the debt, Littleton, a HR specialist from Washington, D.C., took out a personal loan in August to wipe out the outstanding balance all at once.
“I paid it back and now I can’t add any more to it,” he said. “That’s the good thing about a loan over a credit card,” he said. “Otherwise, you think ‘what’s another $40’ and soon that turns into another $70 and so on.”