You've got a truck payment, a couple of credit cards, maybe a personal loan hanging around. You've finally got some money to throw at the pile. So which one do you kill first?

It's a question that stops a lot of roofing sales reps cold. They freeze, spread a little money across everything, and end up making no real progress on any of it. Nothing dies, and it all feels stuck.

The good news is there's a simple way to figure out which debt to pay off first, and it's not complicated math. Once you have the order, you point your big commission checks at the top of the list and start knocking them out one at a time. Let's walk through how to decide.

How to Decide Which Debt to Pay Off First

Here's the core idea. You don't attack all your debts at once. You pick one target, throw everything extra at it while paying minimums on the rest, and only move to the next one after the first is dead.

Attacking everything at once feels productive, but it's actually the slowest way to get out. Your money gets so spread out that no single balance drops fast enough to feel like a win, and wins are what keep you going.

So the whole game is picking the right target to go first. There are really only two sane ways to rank your debts, and both beat the scattered approach by a mile. One ranks by interest rate, the other ranks by balance size. Which you choose depends on what keeps you motivated, and we'll get to that.

Either way, the move is the same. One target at a time, everything extra pointed at it, big checks doing the heavy lifting.

Start With High-Interest Debt

If you want the answer that saves you the most money, it's simple. Pay off your highest-interest debt first.

High-interest debt is the stuff working hardest against you every single day. It grows faster than everything else you owe, so every month you leave it alive, it quietly costs you more. Killing it first stops the most bleeding, plain and simple.

Think of a high-rate balance like a leak in your roof. You don't patch the small drips first while the big one keeps pouring. You go after the worst leak, because that's the one doing the real damage. Your most expensive debt is that big leak.

For most reps, the highest-interest stuff is credit card debt, which is exactly why it usually sits at the top of the list. Attack the priciest debt first and more of every dollar you pay goes toward the actual balance instead of feeding interest.

Where Credit Cards Fit

Credit cards almost always belong near the front of the line. The rate on a carried card balance is brutal compared to most other debt, and it compounds against you fast.

Here's what makes cards especially nasty. If you're only making minimum payments, most of that payment can go straight to interest, barely touching what you actually owe. You can pay for months and watch the balance crawl down an inch at a time. That's the trap cards are designed around.

That's why wiping out a card with a big commission check feels so good and does so much. You're not just removing a payment, you're shutting off the fastest-growing debt you have. One $5,000 check aimed at a card can undo months of slow bleeding in a single move.

If you've got multiple cards, rank them by interest rate and hit the worst one first. Then roll that payment onto the next card once the first is gone.

Where the Truck Loan Fits

The truck is the debt every roofing sales rep wants to talk about, and it's a different animal from a credit card. Most truck loans carry a much lower rate, so by the pure-math ranking, the truck usually waits its turn behind the high-interest stuff.

That doesn't mean you ignore it. It just means that if you've got a high-rate card and a low-rate truck loan, the card gets your firepower first, because it's costing you more. The truck can sit there getting its minimum while you kill the expensive debt.

There's one exception worth naming. If that truck payment is so big it's choking your whole budget and keeping you from attacking anything, trading down to something cheaper can free up the cash you need to actually make progress. That's less about the interest rate and more about breathing room.

For most guys, though, the order is clear. Kill the high-interest cards first, then turn the same firepower on the truck.

Two Ways to Rank When You Want Momentum

Pure math says highest interest rate first, and that's the cheapest path. But there's a second, equally valid way to rank your debts, and for some reps it works better.

Instead of interest rate, you rank by balance size and attack your smallest debt first, no matter the rate. You wipe out that little one fast, feel a real win, and use that momentum to roll into the next. It costs you a touch more in interest, but if quick wins are what keep you in the fight, it can be the smarter choice for you.

Neither ranking is wrong. The best debt to pay off first is the one on a plan you'll actually finish. I break down the full comparison of these two approaches inside my complete guide to getting out of debt on commission income, so you can pick the one that fits how you're wired.

The point is to pick a ranking and commit. Scattered money is what keeps you stuck, not the choice between these two methods.

How Commission Income Changes the Order

On a steady paycheck, whichever debt you rank first just gets a fixed extra payment every month. On commission income, your firepower shows up in bursts, and that changes how you execute the plan.

Your minimums keep every debt current month to month, no matter how slow things get. Your big checks are the weapon that actually kills the target debt. When a monster commission lands, a real slice goes straight at whatever sits at the top of your list, before that money can leak out on other stuff.

This is why reps on commission can knock out debt faster than a salaried person if they're disciplined. A single strong month can wipe out an entire balance that would take a paycheck guy half a year to clear. The order tells you where to aim. The big checks are what pull the trigger.

In slow months, you don't panic and you don't move your target. You cover minimums, hold the line, and wait for the next big check to resume the attack.

What This Looks Like With Real Debts

Say you've got three debts. A $4,000 credit card at a high rate, a $2,000 store card at an even higher rate, and an $18,000 truck loan at a low rate. These numbers are made up just to show the order.

Ranking by interest rate, you'd hit the $2,000 store card first since it's the priciest, then the $4,000 card, and leave the low-rate truck for last. Ranking by balance, you'd still start with that $2,000 store card because it's also the smallest, then the bigger card, then the truck. In this case both methods agree, which happens more than you'd expect.

Now add commission income to the picture. A single $6,000 check could wipe out that store card and take a big bite out of the next one in one shot. That's the power of aiming your big checks at the top of a ranked list instead of dribbling money across all three and watching nothing die.

A Simple Way to Rank Your Debts

Let's make this something you can actually do tonight. Grab a piece of paper or open your notes app and lay it all out.

Here's the simple ranking process:

1. List every debt you owe, with its balance and interest rate
2. Pick your ranking style, highest interest rate first or smallest balance first
3. Put your debts in that order, top to bottom
4. Set every debt to its minimum payment so nothing goes late
5. Aim all your extra money, especially big checks, at the debt on top
6. When the top debt dies, roll its whole payment onto the next one down

That's the entire system on one page. It takes about fifteen minutes to set up and it removes the freeze that keeps most reps stuck. You're no longer guessing which debt to pay off first, because your list already told you.

Once it's set, you barely have to think. Every big check has a home, and every payoff makes the next attack bigger.

Which Debt to Pay Off First When They're Close

Sometimes two debts are close enough that the ranking feels like a coin flip. Similar rates, similar balances, and you're not sure which deserves the top spot. Don't overthink it.

When it's genuinely close, pick the one that'll give you the bigger mental win and move on. Maybe that's the slightly smaller balance you can kill in one big check, or the card that's been nagging you the longest. The tiny difference in interest won't make or break you, but momentum will.

The worst move is to sit there analyzing while doing nothing. A decent plan you start today beats a perfect plan you keep putting off. Any reasonable order, executed with your big checks, gets you out.

So when in doubt, pick the debt that feels best to kill, aim your next big check at it, and go. You can always adjust the order later once the first one's dead.

Pick Your Target and Fire

Deciding which debt to pay off first isn't complicated once you strip it down. Rank by interest rate to save the most money, or by balance to build the most momentum, then attack one target at a time with your big checks.

The reps who get out of debt aren't the ones with the perfect spreadsheet. They're the ones who picked an order, stopped spreading their money thin, and pointed every big commission at the top of the list until the whole pile was gone.

Make your list tonight, pick your top target, and the next time a big check clears, send a real chunk straight at it. Then do it again on the next check.

If you want the full system for attacking debt and surviving the slow months at the same time, I put it all in a free guide. Grab the Feast-or-Famine Survival Guide at roofmoneypro.com/guide and start knocking out your debts in the right order.