CC Minimum Payment (2006 Rules) Calculator

How long will it take to pay off my credit card balance if I make only minimum payments?

Are you paying the amount due as shown on your credit card bill each month, but the balance doesn’t seem to budge and it certainly never gets paid off? Have you ever thought about how much you’ll end up paying in credit card interest if you only pay the minimum required payment each month? This calculator will show you how much interest you will pay and how long it will take to pay off your credit card if you only make the minimum required payment each month. Show the amortization schedule to see the month-by-month payment breakdown. These numbers, of course, assume you will not continue to charge with the credit card and continue to pay just the minimum amount. This tool can help you determine the best small business credit cards or personal credit card. You may have to dig around or even make some phone calls to your credit card issuer to find out some of this information, but running this calculator can be a real eye-opening experience!

Field Help

Input Fields

Title: A title for these calculator results that will help you identify it if you have printed out several versions of the calculator.

Credit Card Balance: Your current outstanding balance on this credit card.

Interest Rate: The current annual interest rate charged for the outstanding balance on this credit card. You may actually have different interest rates for different balance amounts. This could happen if part of your balance came from a cash advance (many credit cards charge a higher interest rate and no grace period for cash advances), or if you made some purchases during a lower percentage promotion period, or maybe you transferred the balance from another credit card for a special low interest rate promotion.

Minimum Payment Percent: The minimum percentage (usually 2%-3%) of your outstanding balance the credit card issuer expects you pay each month. They usually calculate this for you and it shows up as the ‘Amount Due’ on your statement each month.

Minimum Principal Percent: The minimum percentage (usually 1%) of principal federal guidelines require you to pay each month. Your actual payment will be either just the ‘Minimum Payment Percent’ or the ‘Minimum Principal Percent’ plus interest and fees, whichever is greater. Enter 0 if your credit card is issued by a credit union or other issuer that is exempt from the 2006 federal guidelines.

Minimum Interest Amount: If your credit card has a balance and you’re paying interest, there is probably a minimum amount of interest (usually $0.50 or $1.00) that will be charged for the month.

Minimum Payment Amount: The minimum amount (maybe $5.00) the credit card issuer expects you to pay each month, regardless of what the ‘Minimum Percent Payment’ calculates as. In other words, if the ‘Minimum Percent Payment’ (3%) calculation says you’re obligated to pay $3.75 this month, your ‘Amount Due’ will actually be this amount ($5.00).

Output Fields

Payoff Time: The number of years and months it will take to pay off this credit card balance. This is the ‘Number of Payments’ expressed in years and months.

Number of Payments: You will make this many payments to pay off this credit card balance.

Total Paid: Total amount of principal + interest you will have paid when this credit card balance is paid off.

Total Interest: Total amount of interest you will have paid to get this credit card balance paid off.

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