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- If you need credit, and fast!
- New Credit Cards rules coming
- Friendly tools to help your New Year’s money resolutions
- Swapping Gift Cards: it’s now possible to get what you really want!
- Reining in Holiday Spending, without breaking the bank
- Credit Room: addressing personal finance issues for women
- Use Less Miles And Fly More Often.
- Election 2008: the day after
- Congratulations Mr. Barack Obama
- Today November 4, 2008: you can make a difference
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If you need credit, and fast!
Planning is great, but there are times when you need access to credit fast, either to deal with an unforeseen medical emergency, to take care of some business expenses, or to manage the post-holiday bills that will surely come due soon.
If you are a trust-fund baby, you need only to reach for the phone and get an allowance deposited into your checking account, but then, if you were a trust-fund baby you would never have need for money.
Recently, many Americans have addressed their need for fast access to credit by applying for one of the now available instant approval credit cards. With a few clicks of the mouse you can find out which card meets your needs and your criteria, and apply right on the spot from the comfort of your own home, and – in most cases – have an instant answer. If approved, while your actual physical card will arrive in the mail in a few days, you can start using your new card for online purchases, and often for cash advances as well.
You can also combine your new card with PayPal and settle cash debts as easily as sending an email.
While we are not advocating indiscriminate use of credit cards, we strongly believe that credit cards are a wonderful tool highly useful in anyone’s personal finances. Credit cards are the only tool that allow individuals and businesses to tap their credit ‘on-demand’, add extra consumer protection to their purchases, and give the choice (not the obligation) to extend the repayment in flexible terms, from one or two months to a longer period of time.
And as an added bonus, many cards offer rewards in terms of cash back, airline miles, or perks.
Therefore, be wise with your spending and all of your finances, and do keep in mind instant approval credit cards; because life will always throw you some curve balls.
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Photo Credits: Dana Spiegel
New Credit Cards rules coming
Credit cards: love them, hate them. After long negotiations between consumer advocates and industry representatives, the new credit cards rules are now set to take effect July 2010, and while it seems like a long time from now, you can expect some credit card companies to start phasing in some of the changes in the next few months.
The major changes are highlighted below:
- Credit Card issues have to make disclosures easier to understand;
- Consumers must be allowed a ‘reasonable amount of time” to pay their bill, at least 21 days;
- No more double-cycle billing, where the interest is calculated using the average balance of this period as well as the prior period, a very complicated and – according to many – unfair process;
- No more rate increase to existing card balances unless the consumer is 30 day late on payments;
- Lastly, and maybe the most important of all: when different interest rates apply to different balances, credit cards issuers must allocate payments above the minimum to the balance with the highest rate first.
While these rules are a welcome addition to the industry, now more than ever it is important to make sure that you read any and all of the fine print, and pay your bill on time in order to avoid late fees and maintain your credit rating.
If your card uses double-cycle billing you might want to consider switching to another card with more favorable terms; and if you have a card with dual interest where you took advantage of a low interest rate for balance transfer, use another credit card for your necessary recurring expenses, and pay off this balance each and every month, this way all payments made on the old credit card will go toward paying down the existing balance.
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Photo Credits: Emmaline
Credit Room: addressing personal finance issues for women
Ever wonder “What if there was a personal finance web-source devoted to women, powered by women?” Finally, there is: CreditRoom.com!
Credit Room is a first grade personal finance source, with the extra bonus of being geared toward the needs of women, providing consumers with the most up-to date and detailed facts regarding credit cards deals, latest news, and useful articles to help women take control of their personal finances and stay up to date with new developments in the industry and new tools available to them.
The all-women management of Credit Room takes pride in always being on the forefront of what’s new in the world of personal finances, and selecting the relevant news and best products that fit their mission to inform and empower women with their finances. For instance in their ezine section you’ll find articles on identity theft, housing credit, retirement, and many others.
Visit and Bookmark CreditRoom.com today, it will become your source for Visa credit card offers and much more.
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Photo Credits: Angela 7 Dreams
Use Less Miles And Fly More Often.
It can be quite disheartening to apply and qualify for an airline credit card only to discover later that it takes an eternity to actually accumulate enough miles to purchase a ticket. What point is there in endeavoring to use one card for all your purchases just so you can get a free airline ticket when it takes years to do so? Really, there is no point to that which is why the WorldPerks Visa Signature Card is a tremendous opportunity for someone is looking to garner free airfare.
The best feature of this card is that you can redeem award airfare tickets for as little as 19,000 miles. That is really quite low considering that you can receive 20,000 bonus miles just for qualifying and receiving this credit card. You get a free ticket right off the bat! However there are a plethora of other benefits that come with this credit care. You receive double miles for purchases direct from Northwest Airlines and there is no cap on the miles you can earn. You can also redeem only 10,000 miles up to six times a year for a $100 discount on a Northwest Airlines ticket.
Another excellent benefit which is free with this card but costs non cardholders $135 a year is membership in the Hideaways Aficionado Club. This membership allows you to enjoy VIP perks at many different hotels, resorts and cruises all for absolutely no cost. And when you are vacationing you know that you’ll need to rent a car. Use this credit card to secure your car rental and get a free day on any 3-day weekend rental from National Care Rental. The WorldPerks Visa Signature Card truly rewards its owner with a bounty of benefits.
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Photo Credits: Tvol
Money spending psychology
In today’s way of living, most people don’t consider charging something to their credit card as having spent the money; they only look at their minimum monthly payment as the way they spend money. To make matters worse they consider the credit cards’ monthly payment a given, just another monthly payment at the same level as the electrical bill, water bill, rent, phone . . . a utility of some sort. This habits leads to the misconception, helped by many years of advertisement, that the sticker price is not as important as the monthly payment.
For instance, take the process of buying a car, car A has a price of $17,000 and can be financed for $390 per month for 48 months (4.74% interest), while car B has a price of $20,000 and can be financed for $331 per month for 72 months (5.99% interest). Most buyer will disregard the price of the car, the interest rate on the loan (interest rate = the price of money), and the length of the loan and look solely at the monthly payment, buying car B because it has a lower monthly payment. In reality Car B will have a much higher TCO (Total Cost of Ownership), since a higher priced car will surely translate into higher costs such as sales tax, excise tax, insurance cost; and generally speaking, higher priced cars have higher maintenance costs, and higher gasoline consumption.
The correct way to look at these transactions, is that once you charge something, or have signed the car loan documentation, you have indeed consummated the transaction; you’ve bought the car or the TV, and now you have a loan servicing agreement with the credit card company or the auto loan lender. Think of it as two separate events: in the first event you were given money in your hands (in exchange for the loan), in the second event, you have turned around that cash and given it to the seller of the car or the seller of the TV. Soon you’ll forget the excitement and novelty of the new car or the new TV, but you are stuck with the loan payments for a very long time.
The “I already paid that off” syndrome. Once you get into the game of revolving balance on your credit cards, whether you transfer from one card to another, or pay it off using a home equity line of credit, is is a condition, that persists until your total consumer debt is back to zero, as in $0.00. That trip that you took 10 years ago, adding to your pre-existing total balance. If you still carry on consumer debt, you haven’t really paid it off, you’ll never pay off. The rule of thumb is this: is your total consumer debt (all debt except your manageable mortgage, manageable car loan, and in some cases – but not all – manageable student loans) decreasing on a monthly, quarterly, and annual basis? Numbers don’t lie. If you are playing the trick or robbing Paul to pay Peter, moving balances from one card to another one, charging monthly expenses like grocery or gasoline and then rolling over the balance every month in order to pay that 3 month overdue electrical bill, or if – even worse – you take cash advance to pay your rent or mortgage; stop fooling yourself, you are living beyond your means, and you might be in trouble. Stop fooling yourself, and take action to change things around.
The fist step you can take is to stop adding to your existing credit card debt and consumer debt, this includes bank lines of credits. You’ll need to cut your expense. The secret of cutting your expenses is to eliminate as many expenses as possible: do you really need 300 cable channels? Dinner our is not a necessity, nor is take out food. The other addendum to the secret of cutting your expenses is to curtails those expenses that you could not eliminate. When was the last time you bought generic brands at the grocery store? In a blindfolded test, would you be able to tell the difference between the brand name peanut butter and the store brand? Try the blindfolded test on your significant one or your friends, you might actually like the store brand more, and save 30%-40% in the process. How much do you spend in grocery and food in one month? The typical family of 4 spends between $600 and $900 in grocery, dining out, and take out food (including buying lunch) per month. If you are in financial trouble start brown bagging your lunch, eliminate dining out and take out food, switch from buying prepared food to buying ingredients and cook, switch from brand names to generic; this way most family can cut their “food” budget by a factor of 40%-50%, even more in some cases. Could your family use an extra $5,400 per year?
Take a hard look at the choices you make when it comes to money, are they really YOUR choices, or are you being influenced by externalities like ‘everybody does that’, or advertisment? Regain control of your finances and your life, and free yourself from unnecessary debt and habits. It might be the best present you could ever give yourself or your family.
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Photo Credits: LyzaDanger (cc)
Financial Weapons of Mass Destruction
Warren Buffett once called speculation in Financial Derivatives “Financial Weapons of Mass Destruction” and presently the collapse of the markets for CDO (Collateralized Debt Obligations) is blamed for the present state of the World Financial Market and the main reason why you are dreading checking your 401K statement.
CBS’s 60 minutes has a very interesting segment on the issue, that might shed some light into the matter:
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Photo Credits: Ethan Bloch (cc)
Young Adults and Credit Card Debt
U.S. Statistics revealing credit card debt among young adults are frightening, young Americans are being strapped along by the burden of credit card debt. These are some of the facts:
- Between 1992 to 2001, the average credit card debt among young adults increased by a whopping 55%;
- Between 1991 to 2001, the rate of bankruptcy among young Americans have the second highest rate after the age group of 25 to 44 years; which signifies that they were more likely to file bankruptcy than any other age group once you account for the number of people in each age group;
- In the income bracket below $50,000, which is 2/3 comprised by younger households in the age group of 18 to 24 years old, the debt hardship occurs nearly one in seven cases, and it is due to credit card debt in 94% of the cases;
- The average young American spends nearly 25 cents of every dollar of income in payment to non-mortgage debt, mostly credit card debt and personal loans;
- 96% of the college seniors have credit card debt;
- In 2007 the rate of late or missing payments among the 18 to 24 year olds stood at nearly one out of every five.
In order to control the credit card debt among young Americans, they need to learn to live within their means. A recent Reuters report stated that young American are the worst offenders when it comes to credit card debt. This is probably due because they are new to the workforce and they are trying to cope with the rise in energy cost, food bills and gas prices, but also because their apparent addiction to frequently use credit cards whenever they want something and have no money in their checking account. According to another survey by the Ovisory Group, individuals 19 to 35 year old feel that they are making less money compared to the higher and rising cost of living; while 43% of them feel that rising gas prices hits them the hardest.
Therefore they feel somewhat justified in their use of these credit cards as the only way for them to afford their lives. The side effect of such nonchalant use of credit cards, is that most young American will grow into adults with little or no Personal Finance planning skills which will hurt them in the long run, leaving them unprepared for life’s emergencies like unexpected loss of work, or big medical expenses.
No matter where you find yourself in your life, if you don’t have a good grip on your finances, your fist step has to be to learn how to control your temptations to purchase big ticket purchases like a new car, or that large screen HDTV, and then to gain control of what, when and where you spend your hard earned dollars, so that you can make the most of your life.
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Photo credits: mikebaird (cc)
If you are carrying a balance on your credit card, stop everything you are doing right now, it’s time to save some money
Do you know how easy it is to have your credit card lower the interest rate on the balance you are carrying? It’s as easy as making a brief phone call. For the non-believers in you, it was demonstrated by CBC News at a mall where they approached 10 shoppers at random who then called their credit card company on the spot, and 6 of them got their interest rate lowered, in one case from 18.9% to 10.9%. With the average household carrying a $8.500 balance on their credit cards, it would translate into a saving of over $680, what could you do with an extra $680? You would put it toward paying down your balance, of course!
In one more case one of the ‘lucky shoppers’ had been paying 18% for the previous 30 years.
Read the article Skeptics surprised after negotiating lower credit card rate which will give you an idea of what to say.
DO IT NOW!!!
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Photo Credits: Landii (cc)
Credit Card surveys reveals the need for better finance planning
According to a national survey in the United States 35% adults said that their credit cards are maxed out, or close to being maxed out. Looking into the details, women are a more likely than men to have their credit cards maxed out (37.3% for women vs 33% for men). When analyzed by age group, the highest level of 43.1% occurs in the 25 to 34 years age group, speculating that in this age group, incomes are lowest and wishes are highest. As expected, the age group of 55 and older is the most conservative with a credit usage of less than 50% of their credit limit, or 47.5% to be exact.
Enjoying life through credit cards is risky business for the ones who don’t have a sound management of credit and spending.
Planning and budgeting is the best way to gain control of one’s finances, and the best way to avoid having finances take control of your life. And it’s not that difficult. Take a good look at your incoming cash flow, from all sources, from work income to royalties and investment income; then take a look at your necessary expenses like rent or mortgage, debt payments (credit cards, auto loans, student loans, personal loans), insurance, job related expenses like commuting expenses, groceries, dry cleaning etc. Account for savings for both long term savings and to build a cushion for unexpected expenses like car repairs or home maintenance; what’ left is your true disposable income that you can use to enjoy your life. What happens if there’s nothing left for your true disposable income, of if it’s not enough?
You have three choices:
- Increase your income: either by finding a better-paying job, or get a second job, or both;
- Decrease your expenses: simplify and eliminate how you spend your money;
- Both 1 & 2 above.
Make a yearly budget, which includes your vacation budget, and your holiday budget. You can use a spreadsheet, or one of the financial softwares, or just an old-fashioned pen and paper, it doesn’t have to come more complicated than you can handle. Break down your yearly budget into a monthly budget, and then further more into a weekly budget. When you’ll be facing an expense which is not into your budget, don’t do it! Just say NO! If you think this new expense is still necessary to you and your life that you MUST do it, go back to the drafting table and re-work your budget, add the new expense, and cut off some other in order to have a ‘balanced budget’: there’s no free lunch, something’s got to give.
This way each week you’ll know exactly what expenses you’ll expect to pay, including enjoying your life in terms of going out to dinner, trips, movies, hobbies, and whatever else you like to do. And having to give up little things here and there, assures you that the big things like vacations, savings and investments are taken care of. That’s the difference between being in control of your finances and your life, and having your finances control you by having to manage collection calls, late notices, shut-off letters, bad credit, and not having the means to take care of the unforeseen expenses, those curve balls that life throws at you every so often.
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Photo Credits: m o d e (cc)
Re-negotiate your mortgage instead of re-financing? Diane Smith did it!
Ingenuity, innovation, creativity and common sense are the foundations for the economic dominance of the U.S. Economy; and often times things appears more complicated than they are, but they are simple.
It’s no secret that many Americans find themselves facing foreclosure or finding themselves on the path of their own personal financial crisis, let alone the national financial crisis that we are all experiencing.
Banks also find themselves in a tough spot, since while they are very good at dealing with money and loans, they are not equipped with dealing with the business of property management, and foreclosing on mortgages puts them in the property management business, and having to hire subcontractors and consultants in order to liquidate foreclosed properties, with the end result of significant monetary losses.
If you are a homeowner facing foreclosure, holding a mortgage at a too-high interest rate, or a mortgage that is about to reset its interest rate to a higher level, it’s worth it to be proactive and call your mortgage company asking to re-negotiate the mortgage, especially if your mortgage is with IndyMac Federal Bank, you can back your argument with the story run by BusinessWeek in their IndyMac’s Fast-Track Mortgage Modification Program article.
It’s a simple, win-win solution. The homeowner gets to keep their home, the bank gets to hold a more reasonable mortgage contract that will no longer be considered a ‘toxic asset’, and in the case of IndyMac, their program also offers financial coaching for the homeowners.
The idea is so simple and brilliant that it is being considered as a blueprint to be rolled out nationwide by the FDIC, to all at-risk mortgages nationwide.
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Proto Credits: TheAlieness GiselaGiardino (cc)
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