Using HELOC to lower DTI?

[Bryan Stocklas]

I have a $50k HELOC on my primary residence and I was thinking about using $40k of it to pay off personal debt and was curious if I do that will this improve my DTI? Since it's my understanding that lenders will add up minimum payments on your debt to calculate your DTI and the HELOC payment would be much less than the minimum payments I currently have. Just curious if anyone has done this before thanks