The signs of the holidays are all around us. The weather has changed, pumpkin spice has been added to everything imaginable, and your mailbox is bending under the weight of catalogs – and unsolicited credit card offers.
Credit card solicitations certainly aren’t limited to the holidays, but the intensity of offers tends to pick up
Credit Cards
Do you have a rewards credit card? If not, now is the perfect time to consider one. The holiday season provides two motivating factors – special rewards offers from credit card issuers and the increased spending necessary to take advantage of those offers.
Many cards offer signup bonuses of hundreds of dollars, or the equivalent
What brightens up your holiday shopping season? You may prefer a quiet Christmas season at home, large family gatherings at the home of the relative who drew the short straw, or hand-to-hand combat on Black Friday at the mall. However, everyone agrees that saving money on Christmas shopping gives the holiday an extra layer of
Have you ever had a credit or debit card transaction declined for insufficient funds when you thought you had money in your account? You may have a credit or debit card “hold,” reserving funds that you haven’t spent.
Merchants and service providers set a credit or debit hold on a purchase when the total isn’t
By Andrea Woroch
The upcoming holiday season may have you feeling joyous and anxious at the same time thanks to all the seasonal expenses, gift purchases and travel costs you will take on in several short weeks. Those who don’t prepare ahead may find themselves relying heavily on credit cards and, ultimately, be in debt
Do you have a love-hate relationship with your credit card? After all, it brings you both pleasurable purchases and painful bills.
Credit cards are valuable financial assets – but cards and the companies that issue them aren’t necessarily your friends. Consider these seven things you may not know about your credit card as you reassess
You need a loan and you want the best interest rate possible. You know that a high credit score paves the way for the best interest rate offers – but did you know that your credit card balances contribute to one of the five factors used to calculate your credit score?
Your credit utilization, defined
You shopped around to find the credit card with the best annual percentage rate (APR) for your qualifications. Maybe you’ve got a lower rate than the average – around 17%. The last thing you want to do is incur a penalty APR that ruins your hard work.
If you’ve missed a credit card payment for
Your marital status doesn’t play any role in calculating your credit score – so why could a divorce harm your credit score? Joint accounts are the reason.
Most couples have joint debt like mortgages, credit cards, and loans. A divorce decree may assign responsibility for a joint debt, but the decree doesn’t affect the lender’s
You’re ready to take out a loan, only to realize that your credit score actually dropped since you last checked it. With a low credit score, you’ll be paying higher interest rates than you expected – and you may not qualify for the loan at all.
What happened?
Remember that your credit score reflects your
It’s always best to pay off a loan as soon as you can, isn’t it? Not necessarily. There are several reasons you may not want to pay off your loan early, including the effects on your credit score.
The obvious reason for early payoff is interest savings. By paying your loans off early (especially large
After a long search you’ve finally found out who’s dragging down your credit score.
Surprise! It’s you.
Your credit score reflects your entire credit history as recorded on your credit report. Lenders and creditors report your account activity to each of the three major credit reporting agencies (Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion) – whether that activity
It may seem like you have been paying credit card interest since 3500 BC – but you might be surprised to learn that credit actually dates back to those ancient times.
Historians believe that the Sumerians of ancient Mesopotamia (in modern-day Iraq) extended credit to farmers in the rough equivalent of a consumer loan. The
By Amy Beardsley
Are you thinking of applying for a credit card? You’re in good company with over half a million Americans submitting a new credit card application every day according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Applying for a credit card is simple but getting approved isn’t so easy. Both your credit score and
You prefer the simplicity and the spending limit security of a debit card, but you also like the cash-back rewards associated with credit cards. Zero, a San Francisco financial startup, may have the perfect card for you.
The Zerocard is a unique blend of debit and credit card. Zero’s full package is composed of a
Millennials are supposed to be the cautious generation where credit is concerned. Many were burned during the housing crisis and Great Recession and vowed not to be overextended with credit. However, evidence is growing that millennials are headed down the same dangerous credit path as previous generations.
While millennials do have lower average credit card
If you can get something either with or without a fee, why would you ever pay the fee? Unless you just enjoy throwing money away, you’d have to get something of value in return to justify the fees.
A recent survey from Discover, a major issuer of no-fee credit cards, investigated fees and their effects
Who doesn’t love cash back rewards? We all enjoy the feeling of getting something back with our purchases, and credit card companies know this. They offer rewards programs as incentives – and a recent survey from CreditCards.com shows that cash back programs are the most attractive variety.
Almost one-third (31%) of survey respondents chose 3%
Millennials faced a difficult entry into adulthood. Many came of age during the housing crisis and the Great Recession, facing scarce jobs and crushing student loan debt. It makes sense that Millennials would be wary of taking on more debt – and Experian’s most recent State of Credit Report backs that up.
According to Experian’s
Are your kids ready for the financial challenges of adulthood? The 10th annual Parents, Kids, and Money Survey from T. Rowe Price shows the benefits of early financial education, including both formal schooling and parental guidance.
The T. Rowe Price survey typically polls children aged eight to fourteen years old, along with their parents, to
Debt is no picnic at any age, but it’s particularly rough on senior citizens. Most are nearing their retirement years or have already retired with little time (or money) to pay down debts.
Seniors tend to have better access to more credit if they need it. Their average credit score is 745, well above the
America’s credit card debt is nearly $1 trillion, according to Federal Reserve data. How much of that debt belongs to your kids?
The 2019 Parents, Kids, and Money Survey from T. Rowe Price shows that credit card use has skyrocketed among 8-to-14-year-olds over the past seven years – from 4% in 2012 to 17% today.
Americans appear to be feeling more confident in their finances – at least with respect to their credit card payments.
According to a new survey from CompareCards.com, more Americans are paying their credit card bills in full. As of January 2019, 39% of survey respondents paid all credit card bills in full over the last
How much of your available credit are you using right now? Experts generally suggest keeping your credit utilization ratio – the amount of credit in use compared to your credit limits – below 30% to keep your credit score high.
A new study from CompareCards.com shows that many Americans are struggling to meet that goal,
You see lines on your credit or debit card statement that read “APL*ITUNES.CON/BILL 866-712-7753 CA” or something similar. Where did all those charges from iTunes come from?
Maybe it’s your spouse downloading audiobooks. Maybe it’s your kids downloading their favorite songs or inadvertently making in-app purchases while playing online games. Maybe it’s subscription renewals that
Do you sometimes use your credit card just to get rewards? According to a new poll from finder.com, more Americans are making purchases to chase rewards – but at least we’re spending less in the process.
Finder.com’s recent Chasing Points study found that almost 2 in 5 (39%) respondents have used a credit card just
Has your credit card information been exposed in a data breach? If not, it probably will be at some point. According to the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), 14.2 million credit card numbers were exposed in 2017 – an 88% increase from 2016. Given the collective data breaches, there’s little reason to expect 2018 and
You reach into your pocket or purse, but your wallet isn’t where it belongs. With a sinking feeling, you realize that your wallet is lost, and likely stolen. What do you do now?
Avoid the urge to panic and think of where it may have been taken or lost – but don’t search too long
America’s debt load continues to rise. According to the latest Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit from the New York Federal Reserve, our collective debt is $13.54 trillion as of Q4 2018.
While the vast majority is mortgage debt, credit card debt topped a trillion dollars recently, and we’re compounding the problem by paying
Watch Your Credit Card Debt Are you keeping your credit card debt under control? Recent data from Bloomberg shows that more consumers are having a hard time doing so.
Credit card issuers reported a 3.82% charge-off rate on credit cards in the first quarter of 2019 – the highest percentage of written-off accounts in almost
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