[terry1156]

It's great to hear that your credit is still intact and good. You have done an amazing job with the debt to keep current with all that and should congratulate yourself on that. You should be able to reduce that 16.9% which will help some.

I think that the place you can save big is with your "home business." What you need to do is set up an area in your house that is exclusive for your business. I think you mentioned that you tried something earlier that didn't work out and are now doing a bit of eBay. Keep track of all those expenses since you can deduct them from your taxes.

Now, of you can make an area of 10% that is for your home business, that will cut 10% off your taxes. If you can make the area 15%, that is 15% off your taxes and if you can make it 20%, that is 20% off your taxes. So, this is how it would look come April 15th:

@ 10%

Mortgage: $ 934.00 = $93.4 x 12 = $1120 Deduction
Sewer bill: $ 58.00 / month = $5.8 x 12 = $69 Deduction
Phone bill/Cable TV, Internet and cell phone: $156.00 = $15.6 x 12 = $187 Deduction
Electricity: $ 95.00 = $9.5 x 12 = $114 Deduction
Local RE taxes: $234.00 = $23.4 x 12 = $280 Deduction
Propane: $ 90.00 = $9 x 12 = $108 Deduction

Total: $1878 deduction on your taxes. If you can devote 20% of you house to the business, you can deduct $3756 from your taxes. Since you husband is working, these can be taken against his earning. You can probably even find more depending on how carefully you keep records.

This won't help on a monthly basis. You still need to reduce the monthly fees so that you are at least breaking even. But this will give you a nice amount back on your taxes when you file and you can use it to pay down credit card debt. If you do that, that will lower those payments and I think you'll begin to see the light.