<prompt> Human: My husband passed away 5 years ago, and Im trying to get back on my feet financially. I was a stay at home mom when he died, we have four kids ages 21, 18, 13, and 6 and I made some questionable decisions with the little life insurance money we had, trying to get us through those first 3 years. It was spent on 2 trips to Disneyland and many different activities and classes for the kids, to keep us busy through those first few years. The state of mind I was in was not great and I beat myself up about wasting the money every day but I digress... I work part time and my kids get survivors social security. My oldest aged out of that 2 years ago and is moved out of the house, and my second oldest just aged out also but still lives at home. Im applying for my own survivors social security benefits and from what they told me at the social security office the monthly amount we receive should be the same. If I make more than 17k a year they start to take away my portion of our benefits, so until I start working full time at my job which should happen within the next 3 years as two people are retiring I dont want to work more hours somewhere else. When I get full time I will get full health benefits for me and my family PERS...but right now I need to watch our income so we can stay on our states free healthcare. My problem right now is trying to pay off my credit cards. I have zero savings and 14k credit card debt. Last year I refinanced my house and paid off 10k in credit card debt, paid off the loan on a small commercial building I own from my late husbands business and lowered my montly mortgage payment. Over the past 6 months I have gotten one of my credit cards originally 2000 down to 900 and between ebaying and upping the monthly payments, will have that one completely paid off in September. That will leave me with 2 credit cards one with a balance of 12,000 at 20.99 and one with a balance of 1000 at 26.49. My plan is to pay off the 1000 one first using the extra payments from the soon-to-be paid off card, and once that is paid off, tackle the 12k debt the same way. The commercial building is old and in really bad shape, so I cant rent it out. It is in a fairly desirable area in my small town and is a decent sized lot, but small businesses in my town are few and far between right now. There are a lot of empty buildings. My plan is to put it up for sale...right now it only costs me the property taxes which is 400year but a friend of mine is paying me 75mth to store some things there. The lot is assessed at 45k but I doubt I will be able to get that much out of it when I do sell it. Ive been reading a lot of personal finance books, but so far I havent found a good answer to my question. How do I save when Im trying to pay off credit card debt? Should I be setting aside money before I pay off my credit cards? Ive set aside money here and there but with 3 kids at home it always gets eaten up right away. Right now its back to school supplies, fees, clothes etc. though my parents do help me with that. But theres always birthdays, holidays, car house repairs I have to replace our furnace this fall. An aside: my 18 year old has a part time job and goes to school and buys his own things but I pay for his food and dont charge him rent and we have an agreement that I wont do that while hes getting good grades and working. Should I pay just the minimum on my two remaining cards until I get some savings built up and if so, how much?, or pay the cards off first? Those are my only big expenses my car is paid off. The cost of living in my area is fairly low and Im able to keep costs down by cooking at home and not going anywhere. I literally have a 2 minute commute to work and can walk if needed. I do pay for Netflix and YouTube TV, Google music and most recently HBO through Amazon Prime because we are home ALL the time and I feel like we get our moneys worth out of these things and it saves us money in the long run we rarely go to the movies, and I exercise at home while listening to music or watching TV instead of having a gym membership. BTW my parents pay my Amazon Prime membership because they order things through my account all the time. And yes, my 12k card is my Amazon Prime card.Net Income 3350807 Mortgage332 Credit card 1 if I just pay the minimum29 Credit card 2 if I just pay the minimum222 Electricity averaged out through the power company, very high but power is used constantly with all of us300 Cell Phone for all of us, and I still pay my 21 year olds bill72 Water30 Garbage53 Heat gas furnace74 Car insurance65 Cableinternet35 YouTubeTV14 Netflix15 HBO I know this probably has to go...It has a lot of my favorite shows :17 Google Music and Extra data Storage lots of old photos and videos60 Counseling I pay out of pocket for a counselor that has a sliding scale. Great counselor, this is a must for me800 groceries which Im sure I can cut back on if Im more careful at the grocery store50 gas for the carIf I sell my building Ill obviously pay everything off, but I cant count on that. My main question is how much to put away for savings and when before or after or during the paying of the cards. Any suggestions would be great.  <response>: Credit cards. No investment or savings will beat 16 or your apr 