Average American piled on more than $1.2K in debt during holidays

Consumers felt good about spending during the holiday, but they aren’t feeling so great now faced with massive credit card debt.

Shoppers who used credit to fund their holidays piled on an average $1,230 in debt over the last couple months. That’s nearly $200 more than the $1,054 in 2017 and $1,003 in 2016, according to a study from Magnify Money by Lending Tree.

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More than 62 percent of those surveyed said they feel stressed about the debt they are now trying to pay back. About 64 percent of the borrowers said they didn’t originally plan to use credit to pay for gifts and other holiday essentials.

Nearly half said it would take more than five months to pay off the debt from their holiday spending.

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The increase in card spending comes partially from a 19.1 percent jump in online spending this year, according to a study from Mastercard.

Millennials spent to most on their credit cards, according to the Magnify Money study.

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