November 16, 2025
The cost of living is crazy. And it appears – lots of folks are getting by…by just putting it on a credit card…which is plunging people deeper and deeper into debt. That’s according to a new report that found house hold debt in the United States of America just hit a record high. I’m talking about mortgages, car loans, credit cards and – student loans. But despite all this debt – there may be a little silver lining… which I’m going to tell you all about in this video.
Ok – I’m going to switch things up – before I talk about the bad news which is all the debt we’re all drowning in – I want to start with that silver lining. So the New York Fed puts out this American household debt and credit report every quarter…and they just released all the data for the third quarter of 2025– so for July, August and September. According to the New York Fed – the silver lining is household balance sheets – which is what the Fed calls the financial health of a household – they say the balance sheets of American households “look pretty good, pretty strong.” Meaning overall when you take everything into consideration – when you combine households assets and liabilities generally people are “pretty good.” Of course that does not mean everybody and it certainly does not mean that people are thriving. The New York Fed said generally, US households are doing pretty good. This third quarter report also shows that delinquencies are stabilizing. Meaning the rate of people who are delinquent on their loans aren’t going like this – skyrocketing. They’re leveling out. That’s not to say it’s not happening – it is – which I’m about to show you…its just means the delinquency rate increase isn’t as jarring as it was a few years ago. I know that’s not much of a silver lining – but I just report the facts and that’s what i got.
Ok now – let’s talk about this debt— because the fact is based on the third quarter numbers – households in the United States – when you combine mortgages, car loans, credit cards and student loans – are sitting at $18.6 trillion in debt. That is a new record high. Every single debt category has increased by double digits when compared to last year. And you can really see it when you compare the third quarter of 2025 to the third quarter of 2024. Mortgage debt is up $478 billion, credit card debt increased $67 billion, card loan debt increased by $11 billion. But we need to talk about student loan debt. Because that debt increased $47 billion year over year. But it’s not just about the increase in the overall student loan debt – it’s the percentage of serious delinquencies that is alarming. The New York Fed considers a loan seriously delinquent when you haven’t made a payment in at least 90 days. So the number of people who are now seriously delinquent on their student loan debt is more than 14% higher in the third quarter of 2025 than it was in the third quarter of 2024. That was by far the biggest delinquency increase of any of the types of debt the New York Fed looks at. Now – a 14% increase doesn’t sound like a lot…
But when you look at the chart –you can really see it. See that red line shooting up starting in the first and second quarter of 2025? Yes – overall more people are in serious delinquency status for their credit cards – but no other debt has this kind of spike. Why? What specifically is going on with student loans in 2025? Why are we seeing that crazy spike that doesn’t appear anywhere else in the chart? It’s because when president trump came into office – as I reported – the Department of Education put an end to the student loan forbearance program and started sending people to collections for not paying back their student loans. And this chart proves what we’ve been hearing anecdotally. People can’t afford to live – and if they can’t afford to live they’re sure as hell not going to pay their student loans – hence the spike.
I also want to point out one other place where we are starting to see a dramatic spike in serious delinquency – which again means – you haven’t made a payment on your loan or debt in 90 days. And it’s right here. Do you see that light blue line spiking up? And also this spike is a little more subtle – but do you see that red spike? The blue line represents serious delinquencies on all types of debt among 18 to 29 year olds and the red line represents serious delinquencies among 30 to 39 year olds. Now in the chart you can see everyone of all ages since the first quarter of 2025 is seeing an increase in serious delinquencies but the young people are seeing it much much more. And if you break it down – you can see the same trend when it comes to auto loan debt, credit card debt – and you can really see it when you break out student loan debt. The New York Fed says the spiking debt of young people is very concerning and it is not a good sign for the economy. Sure – student loan debt and credit card debt and auto debt look really dramatic on these charges but for the record –
The vast vast majority 70% of the house hold debt in this country is from mortgages. Mortgages are orange. As of the third quarter of 2025 – US households were sitting on more than $13 trillion in mortgage debt.
Read the data from the NY Fed here.
Read the press release here.
