<prompt> Human: This is not for me, but for my parents. Throwaway account. My parents have around 30k in credit card debt on various credit cards. It used to be 40k, but Ive made them start paying it down in the last year and stop putting extra debt on the cards. My mother used to have an extremely bad shopping addiction, and just love spending money in general. She used to spend 1-3k each month on an extremely high interest 22.9 Nordstrom credit card. I have now talked her down to spending only up to 500 a month on that particular card, and use it for necessities such as grocery spending and medicine. Here are the approximate balances currently:Chase Bank 7.24 APR about 0.00Chase Bank 8.24 APR 15,000Citibank Credit Card 0.0 APR ? 3,000Nordstrom Credit Card 22.9 APR 330Chase Bank CREDIT CARD 10.24 5,700Chase Bank Credit Card unknown APR less than 10 5,000I know the standard advice is to always pay off credit cards as it is a guaranteed return however, I am getting worried as my parents are 44 years old and only have 100,000 in my dads 401k saved for retirement for the both of them. This amount seems extremely minimal to me. Should we only focus on paying off the credit cards, or put money towards retirement as well considering their age? My dad makes 150k yearly before tax, and my mother makes 0 because she is a stay at home mom. And no, she wont take a job or earn any money. She thinks she has helped out already by cutting her 1-3k a month shopping habit down to only essentials and maybe only like 200 of wasteful spending each month.For what its worth the Chase Credit Cards are all balance transfer cards with a temporary 0 APR and the balance is only due Jan 2015. The Nordstrom card and the citibank are regular cards.  <response>: Pay off the credit cards starting with the one that carries the highest interest while maintaining the minimums on the others. What good is saving for retirement if the returns on the savings are eclipsed by the interest on the credit cards? You have to pay it off sometime. 