Americans now owe over $2.8 trillion in auto loans, credit card debt, and personal loans. To shed light on growing debt hotspots, the personal-finance company WalletHub has released its latest report, Cities Where People Are Adding the Most Debt to highlight emerging areas of concern. This analysis follows our recent Household Debt Report.
The study ranks 100 of the largest U.S. cities based on increases in credit card, auto loan, and personal loan debt from Q1 to Q2 of 2025, using WalletHub’s proprietary data. Some key findings from the report are highlighted below.
| Largest Increase | Smallest Increase |
| 1. Winston-Salem, NC | 91. San Francisco, CA |
| 2. Anchorage, AK | 92. Fresno, CA |
| 3. Laredo, TX | 93. Detroit, MI |
| 4. Riverside, CA | 94. Hialeah, FL |
| 5. Boise, ID | 95. San Bernardino, CA |
| 6. Scottsdale, AZ | 96. Lincoln, NE |
| 7. Washington, DC | 97. Buffalo, NY |
| 8. Fort Wayne, IN | 98. Madison, WI |
| 9. San Antonio, TX | 99. Newark, NJ |
| 10. Glendale, AZ | 100. Des Moines, IA |
For the full report, please visit:
https://wallethub.com/edu/
Key Stats
- Q2 Results: Total household debt increased by $28 billion during Q2 2025. That is 5.8X more than the increase in Q2 2024.
- Household Average: The average household owed a total of $152,653 at the end of Q2 2025, which is $13,809 below the all-time high.
- Total Debt-to-Deposits Ratio: The ratio of total household debt to deposits indicates consumers are in a stable position. It's still below pre-Covid levels and roughly 47% lower than the early-2000s peak.
- Total Debt-to-Assets: The ratio between total household debt and assets, at 9.57%, continues to be at a very healthy level.
For the full report, please visit:
https://wallethub.com/edu/d/
“Increasing the amount of debt you have isn’t always bad, but it becomes a problem when it accumulates too quickly for you to be able to make on-time payments. With how high interest rates are currently, it’s easy for borrowing to become unsustainable. People in the cities where consumers are adding the most debt should therefore make sure they have a viable payoff plan. The best plan is to focus on paying the highest-interest balances down first while maintaining minimum payments on the rest, then repeating the process until debt-free.”
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“Winston-Salem had the biggest overall increase in consumer debt during the second quarter of 2025. The average credit card balance in Winston-Salem increased by nearly 6% from Q1 2025 to Q2 2025 to a total of $9,900, the biggest increase in the country and the fifth-highest average balance. The average Winston-Salemites' personal loan balance increased by around 3.6% during the same period, the largest increase in the country. In addition, the average auto loan balance in Winston-Salem went up by nearly 4%; this increase was the highest in the nation.”
- Chip Lupo, WalletHub Analyst
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