Credit score has little value if you don't plan on borrowing money from bank.
True the only times the credit score is really needed is when you get a mortgage on the house or on a car.
The rest of the time a credit score is not very important.
Get a Home Equity Loan ..even if it costs you some coin as your catastrophic emergency fund to draw on
at 30k for my house and 3.99% APR ....well sure beats a credit card for those emergences
Get a Green of Gold American Express card ($50 usd green card a year $75 gold card) If you get the gold
card they have as a perk the equiv of AAA car service club (that also costs $85 a year) so I call it a draw.
The reason for the amex card is in an 'emergency' I can put on 10k or more ..then I have like 40 days or
some such to pay ..you HAVE TO PAY with the above cards or face them being taken away or paying some
high interest rates like 28% or some such....but that is the purpose of these cards..that is why they
call them 'privilege cards' the $$$ are made on he merchant 3-4% not 1-2% like accounts that let you
carry a balance
anyway it is better to drop the 10K on the card in an emergency and then go to bank and take out
the old home equity loan you have setup already then when you have time the $$$ needed from the home equity loan and
pay 3.99% then have a Visa with a cc balance and pay 19% more or less...You can use such cards
to get out of debt with your current cards..me cut up my 2 visa cards paid them down ..used this card
to get out of debt in 2 years on the visa stuff w/o danger of using a cc card (the amex) too much
because it always had to be paid off each month
anyway I still use the amex cc all the time ..but don't get caught in the revolving balance trap and
that you can't get caught up at 19% cc interest/fees...my only card is the gold amex card (23 years)
only cost is the $85/year and that includes the equiv of the AAA road plan I used to have instead...
the amex card makes its money off the merchant
last point this is what applies to credit score..NO I don't care about it
Also the credit card score agencies etc like
Transunion and Experian and Equifax (sp?) the top 3..the main one used on house/car loans/ cc cards etc
.lock them all out with a security lock..best decision I ever made ...no one wants my credit info to steal now too hard
.IF YOU call them up they will allow you to put a PERM SECURITY CODE on these major credit score agencies
for like $15 I think ....That means NO ONE can see your credit score..or send you spam
or take a loan out in your name etc via Identity theft with any hope ..if they have to get
a credit scrore etc to get said loan..new cc card or whatever..impossible your credit rating is locked up
to way for scammers to get info to make a fake cc or loan in your name
so if you need to buy a car or something that needs a credit score ..you call them
(may have to google the 800 numbers) and give code and they can ..usually standard
take your security lock off your info ....usually standard 30days and then it goes back
on.if I remember this is $5 to take it off for 30 days then it goes back on is standard setup
So no spam no people trying to get you to buy cars or get the newest cc etc because
when they try to get your credit score to spam you or rip you off it is locked
anyway my 2c worth the above works really well....getting out of debt is equiv
of dropping that 2nd part time job...helps a lot your piece of mind and with the
above you are covered in any emergency w/o getting ripped off...with the added
benefit is it is always in the back of your mind on the amex card it has a limit..so
if i need that new car or whatever I go to the bank ..get the old home equity
line of credit $$$ needed in cash and pay them off month to month at 3.99% interest
as an example I have 7500 usd on my home equity loan..the interest is about $25
the amount applied towards principal (loan) is around $25 the min you can pay
is $50 on such a monthly payment plan
I pay if off in 2 months ...I"m down $50 in cost
Hope it helps but NO...credit scores mean little ..except as a basis to block info
so you are not bothered once the 'real world' finds out you have no debt...thus
the credit score security locks...once out of debt you are pretty careful in that
you don't want to go thru the pain in the ass of paying 19% cc cards off again!
IF you still have debt on a visa...cut it up ..get the amex card that at least
you know you can't float over the limit forever w/o consequences or it gets
taken away (only gold and green amex thou .not the other amex new cc)
lot easier to pay that visa card down to 0 after you cut it up ..if you are
not adding to it any emergency..need a simple emergency fund don't have
your house paid off? get to a point where you can get an auto loan...for say 5k
and just pay it back in full in say the next month..main thing is you have the
line of credit now for 5K....(or a car.....that hopefully you can pay down
to have the extra as equity fall back)
well hope it helps it got me out of 10k of cc debt on 2 visa cards once I
did this after cutting up the visa cards and just using the amex card
and the car loan line of credit quick for emergencies (cataract surgery
for a hit to an eye ....2.5k not on the visa on the car loan equity thingy)
anyway just saw the does your credit score matter question here
in the above cases you could care less what your credit score is
because w/o debt it is gonna be like 840 to 900 excellent anyway
esp with a paid off visa/car loan /house and legit gold amex card!
so no credit score don't mean squat if you manage to get out of debt!
or at least have a backup cash plan outside of just a 19% cc option.
good luck
Searing
Thanks I was wondering what a security lock was and looked it up good stuff from 2007 nice, and I agree with you that taking a Home Equity loan is way better than a Visa for pinch borrowing, that or perhaps a line of credit if you can get a good rate.
As long as its paid off its fine otherwise they take the house but it's a calculated risk.
Courts have held that a bank may freeze a HELOC in instances where a home's value decreases substantially, which is deemed by courts as a 50% reduction in value.
With the credit cards as long as it doesn't mess with my Bitcoins that's fine with me
Although I guess a rewards card that gives cash or something is best
I'm a Mustachian and a fan of responsible credit card use: they can help you raise your credit score, they offer purchase and consumer protections you can’t get anywhere else, plus they automatically track your purchases and provide healthy amounts of cash-back rewards each year as well. Just be sure to use them in a Mustachian way.
http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/credit-cards/That said I'm all for gaming the system
(Teach them to put people into debt with the revolving balance trap)
I value my credit score in that I can get a bunch of promo offers and free money heh
http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/23/gaming-the-system-with-rewards-credit-cards/And sometimes you can get a 3% rate a tad lower than the line of equity in a house for a year while combining a rewards system to it.
FROM MMM
Sometime around 2006, when interest rates were high and yet credit was still loose, Chase started sending me checks for my business card that could be used to pay any bill – and they were offering a 0% annual percentage rate. After reading the fine print, I saw that the conditions were favorable. So I used one of those checks to max out the card’s $50,000 credit limit, and used the proceeds to pay down a construction loan which had been charging me 7%. This allowed me to pay the much better rate of Zero percent for one year instead. Meticulously noting the payment deadlines, I played it carefully and paid it off on time, saving several thousand dollars in interest.
Today, the credit card companies still send similar checks, but they now have much sneakier conditions like “0% APR for one year!” (except a fee of $10 or 3% of the balance, whichever is greater). Excuse me, but that’s a 3% APR, about the same as my existing home equity line of credit. Trying to mislead customers like that is a huge FAIL and should be illegal. So I now mutter a few swear words at the bank as I shuttle each of these offers from the mailbox to the document shredder.
On cancelling credit cards
It will probably cause temporary dips to your credit rating, since you are triggering inquiries on your account. But by eventually cancelling any unneeded temporary cards, and being sure to keep your oldest card active, you should still end up with a continually increasing credit score. I don’t care about my own credit score in the short term, since I have no borrowing planned. In the long run, however, I do want to keep it up in the 800s in case I ever want financing on a future house or investment.
__
..getting out of debt is equiv
of dropping that 2nd part time job...
Amen to that debt is slavery in a sense that you will always be indebted to something until you pay it off completely.
Swords
Show Posts
.
