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December 2025: Deck the Halls With A Debt-Free Holiday

Welcome to the December edition of Financial Friday, Oklahoma Money Matters' online personal finance newsletter. The holidays should be a time of joy, not stress — but nothing sparks anxiety faster than mounting expenses from overspending. Discover practical tips to keep your season merry and bright while maintaining financial peace of mind.

With the holidays and year-end approaching, I’m feeling stressed about the debt I’ve accumulated. What’s the best way to start digging out and regain control of my finances?

While the holiday season can bring joy and fellowship, it can also evoke feelings of doubt, worry and panic when it comes to finances. There is societal pressure to have it all together and to assess how much we care for one another through consumerism this time of year. You are not alone in having debt, feeling overwhelmed by debt, and desperately wanting a way out of debt. There is light at the end of the tunnel, but it will take work and patience to get there.
  • Step 1: Be honest with yourself. If your concern is credit card debt, the first step toward regaining control is to understand how you ended up in this situation. Are you using credit to support a lifestyle you can’t really afford? If that’s the case, taking time to understand how and why you spend can help you make smarter choices moving forward — so you don’t end up in the same situation again. Creating a realistic monthly budget will allow you to set healthy parameters.
  • Step 2: Know where you stand. Do you know how much you owe, and to whom? Pull statements and call creditors to find out exactly what you’re dealing with. Once you have the facts, create an at-a-glance debt chart that shows the total amount owed, interest rate, minimum monthly payment, and monthly payment due date for each account. If you have a card with a high interest rate, ask your creditor for a rate reduction or transfer your balance to a low-rate card (pay attention to the fine print…some cards only offer a low rate for the first few months.) Compare credit card interest rates online at Rate.com.
  • Step 3: STOP SPENDING. You can’t pay down debt if you keep adding to it. This holiday season, look for creative ways to show you care — like homemade gifts or shared experiences — instead of overspending. Keep your credit cards out of reach: lock them up, freeze them or leave them at home so they’re not easily accessible. (Just don’t close all your accounts, as that can negatively impact your credit score.)
  • Step 4: Activate your payoff plan. Choose one account to focus on and pay as much as you can each month — double your payment if possible — while continuing to make minimum payments on your other accounts. Once that account is paid off, roll the amount you were paying into the next account, and keep increasing your payments whenever you can. Repeat this process until all balances reach zero. To speed things up, apply any extra funds — such as holiday or birthday money, tax refunds or other windfalls — toward your debt. This strategy is known as the Debt Snowball Method. Check out OKMM’s flyer for more details.

If you’ve examined your situation and feel that you may need professional help to reclaim your financial power, take the next step and learn more about dealing with excessive credit debt by visiting Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Central Oklahoma or the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.

Focusing on one account at a time will help you keep “the big picture” in perspective. You’ve already admitted that you need to make a change; that’s the hardest part. Keep going! OKMM is here to support you!

Don’t forget to check out our Your Money Matters Guide to assist you on your journey to being debt-free.

View our Your Money Matters Adult Workplace resource

 

If you have money-saving tips you'd like to share, email us at OklahomaMoneyMatters@ocap.org.

Thanks for participating in Financial Friday. Remember, there is always time to take control of your financial future! 

The OKMM Team

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