Political Discussion

Joe Mac said:
Don’t close the account then. Stick the card in a drawer and don’t use it. But seriously do not hold long term credit on card. Consolidate on a loan that will wipe the liability in a fixed term. You will never pay it off and the balance will often rise even with paying the minimum. Plus a properly serviced loan massively positively affects your credit score.
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Already doing that. I haven't used any of my credit cards in 3 years. I use my debit card exclusively. The issue is is my payments are just barely covering interest. Pay $225 a month on one credit card. Only $5 a month actually does to principal. The rest to interest.

Closing the accounts I feel is the only way I can make any real progress. Or borrow against my 401k which financial advisors say you should avoid doing.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Already doing that. I haven't used any of my credit cards in 3 years. I use my debit card exclusively. The issue is is my payments are just barely covering interest. Pay $225 a month on one credit card. Only $5 a month actually does to principal. The rest to interest.

Closing the accounts I feel is the only way I can make any real progress. Or borrow against my 401k which financial advisors say you should avoid doing.
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No I am saying take out a personal loan! Pay off the balance outright in one go consolidating the debt. The loan will be a positive on your credit score you will have a set monthly payment and you won’t owe money in 2-5 years. The credit card won’t be closed it will just have a balance of $0 whilst sat in your drawer.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
I've considered it. But that also would really negatively affect my credit. Because I rent, and don't have a mortgage, my credit score is primarily made up from my credit cards.

My credit score is based on the age of my accounts, on time status, and credit available.

If I close the account that's a negative dig in itself. But then I lose account age and credit available.

To rent most places you need to pass a credit check. So for example, if I close my accounts, then try to move when my lease is up there is a good chance I will not have a high enough credit score to get approved to rent a new place. It's a total trap.
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The more loan you have, including on your credit cards, that also affects your credit score.

@Joe Mac is right - consolidating your loan to get a lower interest rate should be looked into seriously. In the end, you want to keep your purchasing power and not lose it all to big interest payments.

If you can be responsible, after you close out your bad cards, you can always start up another card if you make sure you always pay your balance at the end of the month. Never let any balance stay on it. That kills.

EDIT: or don't close out the card once it's paid like Joe is saying. That's better.
 
Turbo said:
The more loan you have, including on your credit cards, that also affects your credit score.

@Joe Mac is right - consolidating your loan to get a lower interest rate should be looked into seriously. In the end, you want to keep your purchasing power and not lose it all to big interest payments.

If you can be responsible, after you close out your bad cards, you can always start up another card if you make sure you always pay your balance at the end of the month. Never let any balance stay on it. That kills.

EDIT: or don't close out the card once it's paid like Joe is saying. That's better.
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I need to look into a loan again.

I tried last year before I got my last raise. No one would approve me because of my income to rent ratio.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
I need to look into a loan again.

I tried last year before I got my last raise. No one would approve me because of my income to rent ratio.
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Do you have a local credit union? If you become a member and start a little savings account with a small defined monthly payment. It doesn’t have to be a lot, I started mine 15 years ago when I was skint with €50 a month. They’ll often be a lot more relaxed about lending to their members once they’re saving with them too. Also be clear to the lender that it’s for debt consolidation, even giving an undertaking that that’s what you’ll do.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Already doing that. I haven't used any of my credit cards in 3 years. I use my debit card exclusively. The issue is is my payments are just barely covering interest. Pay $225 a month on one credit card. Only $5 a month actually does to principal. The rest to interest.

Closing the accounts I feel is the only way I can make any real progress. Or borrow against my 401k which financial advisors say you should avoid doing.
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Borrowing against your 401k is a great way to go - you are paying yourself back with interest and there are no fees to take out a loan. Note that this is different than withdrawing money from your 401k which is a big no no.

A number of years ago I borrowed like $12,000 to get out of credit card debt and have had like $125 taken out of each paycheck to go directly to paying it off. I have like 5 months left and will be complete done paying myself back.
 
tvham said:
Borrowing against your 401k is a great way to go - you are paying yourself back with interest and there are no fees to take out a loan. Note that this is different than withdrawing money from your 401k which is a big no no.

A number of years ago I borrowed like $12,000 to get out of credit card debt and have had like $125 taken out of each paycheck to go directly to paying it off. I have like 5 months left and will be complete done paying myself back.
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What sort of interest do you pay yourself for something like that? We don't really have anything like that here (I think) except for first time home buyers where you have 5 years IIRC to pay it back but it has no interest.
 
Turbo said:
What sort of interest do you pay yourself for something like that? We don't really have anything like that here (I think) except for first time home buyers where you have 5 years IIRC to pay it back but it has no interest.
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I'll have to look it up later when I get home but I don't think it's very much.
 
tvham said:
I'll have to look it up later when I get home but I don't think it's very much.
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No worries. I was just curious because I don't think we can easily take loans out of our retirement plans here, but I may be wrong because I never looked into it.
 
Credit Karma shows me this offer.

Tried a similar one last year and was denied.

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Would it be worth consolidating 6 credit cards into one 18% loan though? It shows I could pay them off in 60 months, which is better than the 18 year estimate I couldn't get from my credit cards when making minimum payments.

But I'd imagine I could do better.


My local credit union doesn't do loans to pay off debt. Only car loans and home loans. I've already looked into them.

A quick check of my 401k, and they will only allow me to borrow up to 10k. Nothing more at the same time.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
Credit Karma shows me this offer.

Tried a similar one last year and was denied.

View attachment 157992


Would it be worth consolidating 6 credit cards into one 18% loan though? It shows I could pay them off in 60 months, which is better than the 18 year estimate I couldn't get from my credit cards when making minimum payments.

But I'd imagine I could do better.


My local credit union doesn't do loans to pay off debt. Only car loans and home loans. I've already looked into them.

A quick check of my 401k, and they will only allow me to borrow up to 10k. Nothing more at the same time.
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18% seems extraordinarily high unless your interest rates over there are in a different place to ours.

But yes put as much as you can afford onto the loan. Preferably all. 18% seems high to me for a personal loan, I am in a different country though, but is infinitely preferable to paying a possible APR of up to 60% on a credit card and only making the minimum payment which is just trapping you in a never ending debt cycle.
 
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Joe Mac said:
18% seems extraordinarily high unless your interest rates over there are in a different place to ours.
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When compared to a car or home loan yes. But a general purpose I need cash loan, it seems to be in par with most offers I have sen over here. There are many that are much higher as well.

But of course you have to remember that all these offers are by for profit companies. Rather than going for offers I bet I could do better if I did a lot of research.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
When compared to a car or home loan yes. But a general purpose I need cash loan, it seems to be in par with most offers I have sen over here. There are many that are much higher as well.

But of course you have to remember that all these offers are by for profit companies. Rather than going for offers I bet I could do better if I did a lot of research.
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Fair enough your market is higher then. I could get a home/car loan for around 5% and a standard personal loan for around 9%.

18% is still infinitely preferable to credit card rates. It’s miles lower than the reality that they pose.
 
RenegadeMonster said:
When compared to a car or home loan yes. But a general purpose I need cash loan, it seems to be in par with most offers I have sen over here. There are many that are much higher as well.

But of course you have to remember that all these offers are by for profit companies. Rather than going for offers I bet I could do better if I did a lot of research.
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Just looking real quick, my credit union will do personal loans with rates between 9.9 and 17.9. Credit score may be what's pushing the rate a little higher, if not you should be able to find a credit union that'll do personal loans with a better rate than you're seeing. Like Joe said, get an account and be a member for a bit and that may help.
 
Indymisanthrope said:
This is poorly written I think. Other sources report that Target’s Q3 earnings reflect $400M cumulative losses due to shoplifting in 2022 so far, not for Q3 alone. Target is currently projecting shoplifting will result in $600M of loss for the year overall. This article describes results 2-3x worse than they actually are.
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They are blaming inflated pricing on shop lifting not record profits.


  • Comparable sales growth was driven by 1.4 percent traffic growth and a 1.3 percent increase in average ticket.
 
www.epi.org

More than $3 billion in stolen wages recovered for workers between 2017 and 2020

Each year millions of workers across the country are victims of wage theft—meaning they are paid less than the full wages to which they are legally entitled. Between 2017 and 2020, more than $3 billion in stolen wages was recovered on behalf of workers by the U.S. Department of Labor, state...
www.epi.org www.epi.org

Here is something you don't see talked about too often. Wage theft. I bring it up because corporations and the media as well as politicians like to sensationalize shoplifting. But almost never bring up or seek to address wage theft.

One can only assume because wage theft benefits corporations and shareholders and pursuing wouldn't put the poor or minorities behind bars.
 
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