Getting started

Six things to know before you dive in.

1. 1. Build a $1,000 emergency fund first. Before you touch any debt, add a goal in the Savings buffer section below (call it whatever you want) and check "This is my emergency fund" under it. That's what tells the focus panel to prioritize it over debts until it's funded - the name itself doesn't matter, the checkbox does.
2. 2. Add each debt, with both payments. Click "+ Add debt" below and fill in the name, current balance, "High bal" (your original starting balance, so the progress bars work), your minimum payment, and what you're actually paying. Both matter - the gap between them is what the focus panel below uses to figure out where extra money should go.
3. 3. Enter APR for every debt. Without an interest rate, "months to payoff" can't be calculated correctly - it just guesses balance ÷ payment, which is wrong once interest is involved. Debts missing an APR show up in a "Needs APR" warning on the KPI row so you don't forget one.
4. 4. Let "Where to focus" tell you what to attack. Once minimums and actual payments are filled in, this panel tells you exactly one debt to throw every spare dollar at - ranked by avalanche (highest APR, saves the most interest) or snowball (smallest balance, fastest wins). Toggle between them anytime; everything else just gets its minimum.
5. 5. Trend history logs itself. Every time you save a change to a debt, today's total is automatically snapshotted into the chart. You never have to manually plot anything - that was the whole point of building this instead of the old spreadsheet.
6. 6. 401k loan and other goals are optional but recommended. If you use a 401k loan as part of your payoff strategy, fill that section in too - it gets its own trend chart the same way.

If you go more than 30 days without an update, a reminder banner will show up here automatically - you don't have to remember on your own.