Comments on: The DOLP Snowball method to pay off Credit Cards

By: coral gables homes

coral gables homes — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 04:03:27 +0000

It’s best to go with the Highest balance rather than the Highest interest. High interest would definitely spend you more money.

By: Robert

Robert — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 05:52:20 +0000

If I have to be honest the best way to pay off credit cards is not to use them.

By: LuLuGal

LuLuGal — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 11:49:15 +0000

@ Elisha,
When I started to snowball my debts I actually started with my smallest balance account first. Then I moved on to the highest interest accounts after that.

I guess the main idea of all these is to target one debt and pay it aggressively, while keeping the others at a stable level so you can see some progress.

By: elisha

elisha — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 04:19:06 +0000

For the original snowball method you listed just
(1) highest balance or

(2) highest interest rate

But I’ve actually seen LOWEST balance used more frequently than highest balance. Also, you can do it based on the minimum payment percent of the overall balance (which I think is what the DOLP strives to do in an uber-complicated way).

By: Blog Carnival: Personal Finance Oct 27

Blog Carnival: Personal Finance Oct 27 — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 22:03:21 +0000

[...] Money presents The DOLP Snowball method to pay off Credit Cards posted at How I Save Money.net. Learn how to settle your debt with this DOLP method – Dead On Last [...]

By: Widows Quest

Widows Quest — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 12:13:09 +0000

How to Solve Your Money Worries…

Welcome to the October 19, 2007 edition of how to solve money worries.

Tim Ramsey presents 5 Ways to Try and Reduce Your Debts and Outgoings posted at My Debt Relief Blog, saying, “Anyone that has a high level of debt or a number of creditors t…

By: Debt Consolidation Lowdown » Blog Archive » Carnival of Debt Management #26

Thu, 18 Oct 2007 10:16:11 +0000

[...] Money presents The DOLP Snowball method to pay off Credit Cards posted at How I Save [...]

By: Commenting on the comments | How I Save Money.net

Commenting on the comments | How I Save Money.net — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 13:49:32 +0000

[...] The DOLP Snowball method to pay off Credit Cards [...]

By: cashgoat

cashgoat — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 16:58:09 +0000

I like the Dave Ramsey plan the most because of the benefits of seeing more consistent progress. I think it has the most chance of success for most people who are trying to fix their debt problem. As he says himself, “If it was all about math, they wouldn’t be in debt in the first place.”

In my case, Dave’s plan doesn’t work so well. The reason is that there are 3 debts but all of them are over 10k. Progress is going to be pretty slow no matter what method is used.

I came up with a modified plan that seems the same as the dolp method. I listed my debts largest payment to smallest payment. Starting with the largest minimum and working my way to the smallest will have the end result of getting me out of debt a little faster and the psychological benefit of the Dave Ramsey plan will kick in after the first one is paid off because the next one won’t be far behind thanks to the larger payment of the first one.

I’m now down to two payments and still making progress. Of course I’ve also come to hate credit now so I disagree with Mr. Bach when he reccommends leaving the accounts open after they are paid off.

By: Jagular

Jagular — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 15:14:57 +0000

I came across the DOLP snowball a while back, and that was the first thing I asked, too. What’s the purpose of figuring out the DOLP?
What I came up with is that by paying the smallest DOLP score first, you would be trying to get the most efficiency out of your payments, especially early on when your snowball is the smallest. The higher minimum monthly payment relative to the balance will be added to your snowball, causing you to pay off the debt that will be paid off most efficiently as opposed to fastest. For most people, the order won’t be much different from Dave Ramsey’s smallest to largest method. The main way that it would be different is if you have a debt with a high payment that would have been paid off soon anyway. This gives you the outside chance of getting a higher debt paid off first and being able to add it into your snowball from the start.

There’s a lot to be said about the logic of using the DOLP calculation. Mathematically it makes a lot of sense.

However, it does not take into account what Dave Ramsey’s method would call The psychological boost of paying some of the debts off quickly. Because anyone who has listened to Dave Ramsey for any length of time would probably agree that most of the problems that most of the people have with money is not math, but behavior. The early payoff can give you the boost you need to encourage you to make the changes that need to be made. You could potentially save money in the long run using the DOLP, but it won’t be much. And if you start strong and then end up quitting for lack of psychological support it won’t benefit you at all.

And again, mathematically, the converse could be true, too. Taking the inverse of the DOLP could be better for some people if they end up putting their money on debts that would have taken a long time to pay off and the smaller ones that are close to payoff end up paying themselves off before you reach them with the snowball. I guess if you are doing the reverse of the DOLP you would have to call it the PLOD method.

Ok, that’s my two cents.