Debt Growth Outlook Visualization and Repayment Decision Assitant
A tool that leverages multiple visualizations to show at a glance the outlook for multiple debts. By having a visual representation based on the input data, the user can easily realize which debts would cost more in the long term, helping in the decision of which one to repay more agressively first.
When managing debt, you usually want to save money. As a result, it is recommended to calculate which debt is costing you more money in the long term regarding accrued interest and pay that one more agressively.
Every couple of months, after doing some payments, I find myself re-calculating which debt is growing faster in order to adjust where to allocate money above the minimum payments. This is a relatively simple process when dealing with a few accounts, but it becomes tedious to do repeatedly and periodically for several accounts.
The intention of this project is to create a simple personal finance tool for saving money when repaying debt. This application would allow to keep track of credits and loans, their interest rates, how much is still owed, mothly minimums, etc. Such data will be used to calculate and recommend which debt(s) to pay above the minimum at that particular time and, if the same amount is paid each month, at which point that debt is no longer the one accruing the most interest (in absolute values, not percentages).
The idea is that the user can clearly see which debts are the fastest growing, helping them evaluate which are more beneficial to pay more aggressively first (and up to what amount) in order to save money in the long term and extablish a roadmap to free themselves from debt.
- Easily modify values for remaining principal, interest rate, minimum payment, budget available (these are variable, so this feature would be really useful).
- Present the user with a table of debts/loans that can be ordered based on different criteria.
- Draw a plot, graph, or some other visualization that shows the projected change of the different balances (principal and interest) based on current data.