It does depend a little on what your debt is, and what interest you are paying, but as a general rule I would pay off debt first. Certainly the high interest CC debt, needs to go ASAP. Read the "your hair is on fire" post by MMM. I wouldn't bother building up an EF first, certainly not one as big as 6 - 9 months expenses, as it's a very inefficient way to do it (paying lots of interest on a debt while earning a tiny amount of interest on a savings acct). As you obviously already have a CC, the money you pay off that balance works as an EF if it's a REAL emergency, but you have to learn not to use it for regular expenses that you haven't planned for.