Post wedding advice from credit councelors

The wedding is past, the honeymoon has come and gone, now it's time to take a thorough accounting of the your finances. Credit counselors advise that if you want to help ensure a healthy relationship, you're going to have to attack your own debt problem.

To do that, you have to have a plan, and, unfortunately, make some sacrifices. Most experts advise that one member of each couple must be designated a "financial housekeeper." It's not terribly important whether husband or wife balances the checkbook, pays the bills, keeps the financial records and handles other routine chores. But it is important that one person is responsible for getting it all done.

If you do find yourself in debt, the first step in any debt-elimination plan is to stop borrowing. While this may seem obvious, it's a difficult concept for some to master. It may be necessary to cut up your credit cards or freeze them in a block of ice.

Next, some experts advise, make a big one-time payment. If you have money set aside for a house down payment, you might consider using it to pay down your other debts instead. It doesn't make a lot of sense to have investments earning eight per cent, when you're paying 18 per cent on your debts.

Alternatively, you might opt to sell investments and apply the proceeds to your debt, or consolidate your debts into the lowest-cost loan, usually a mortgage. But this only works if you're disciplined, and don't run up your debt again.

The next step includes cutting down your expenses. If your in debt, often it is because you are living beyond your means. You can save as much as $3-4 a day by eliminating trips to coffee shops for specialty coffees and bagels.

The final step to a debt elimination plan is to prioritize your debts. Arrange them in descending order, with the highest interest debt at the top of the list. Typically, this would show something like credit card/car loan/line of credit/ mortgage. Every month, you make the minimum payments for everything but the first one, and then slam every cent you can find on the highest-interest debt. When it's paid off, you give yourself a very slight reward, than apply the same process to the next highest debt on the list.