The Snowball Plan

This is the strategy engine. The app takes every debt you've entered, ranks them, and tells you the one thing you need to know each month: which debt to eliminate first.

Why smallest balance first?

The debt snowball pays off your smallest balance first, regardless of interest rate. It's not the cheapest method on paper — but it's the one most people actually stick with, because it delivers a real win fast. That first "paid off" account is rocket fuel for everything that follows.

How the plan is built

1. Rank. All active debts are sorted by current balance, smallest at the top. The smallest is flagged as your TARGET.
2. Cover the minimums. The plan assumes you pay the minimum on every debt, every month.
3. Pile on the extra. Any extra payment you set (in Settings) plus whatever your Budget frees up is thrown entirely at the TARGET debt.
4. Roll it forward. When the TARGET is paid off, its whole payment — minimum plus extra — rolls into the next smallest debt. The amount hitting each debt grows as you go. That's the snowball.
5. Schedule it. The app projects month-by-month how each balance falls and when each debt hits zero, all the way to debt-free.

Which debt do I attack? (Reading the plan)

You never have to guess. The debt marked TARGET is the one to throw everything at this month. Pay the minimums on the rest. The payoff schedule shows, for each upcoming month, the Payment going toward your focus debt and the Balance remaining — so you can see the finish line for each account.

Recalculating

The plan is live. Any time you add a debt, update a balance, change your extra payment, or mark something paid off, the snowball re-ranks itself automatically. Keep your My Debts balances current and the plan stays honest.

Setting a target date

On the Grinder plan and up, you can set a target debt-free date in Settings. The app works backward from that date and tells you the extra monthly payment you'd need to hit it — turning a vague goal into a concrete number. The Dashboard then tracks whether you're on pace.

Exporting your plan

Grinder and Boss members can export the snowball plan as a CSV — useful for your own spreadsheet, sharing with a partner, or keeping an offline copy. See Billing & Plans for what's included in each tier.