Should you get a store credit card?

Black Friday is upon us, and retailers are ready not just to sell, but to lend.

That is, they’re ready to talk you into getting their proprietary credit cards. When you shop in-store, you’ll almost certainly get asked when you pay for your purchases. If you’re shopping online, a pop-up ad will probably follow you all the way to the “pay now” button.

The introductory offers may sound tempting. (Zero interest! Deferred interest! 30% off your first purchase!) But is a store credit card the best choice for you right now, or ever?

That depends. Store credit cards may have their place, especially for those trying to build or re-build credit, but they aren’t always a good idea.

Read more

A free “Credit Score Boot Camp.”

Concerned about your credit score? You should be. Like it or not, that three-digit number can make a big difference in your life. Credit expert Beverly Harzog can help, with a free e-mail course called “Credit Score Boot Camp.”

Every week for six weeks, you’ll get true, actionable advice from Harzog on how to increase your score. Already have a decent FICO? Her tips can help you keep it that way.

The course author is a consumer finance analyst for U.S. News & World Report. But she’s no talking head who looks down on those who have credit issues. In fact, she freely admits she’s had issues of her own: The title of one of her books is “Confessions of a Credit Junkie: Everything You Need to Know to Avoid the Mistakes I Made.” (As an Amazon affiliate, I may receive a small fee for items bought through my links.)

 

Beverly may have a highfalutin title, but she’s one of the most down-to-earth people I know. And yep, I know her in real life, as the kids say. I’ve even stayed in her home and petted her impossibly cute pup, Marshall.

Read more

Black Friday serendipity.

The washing machine finally died. DF can’t remember how old it is, but it’s at least 25 years old and possibly older. It didn’t owe us a thing. But the appliance still had one act of service left: It waited until the day before Black Friday to give up the ghost.

We were lucky it lasted as long as it did, yet we dreaded the cost of replacing a major appliance. Even a quick glance at the ads left us a bit breathless.

Fortunately, we are money nerds who specialize in stretching every dollar. A quartet of frugal hacks helped reduce the financial pain: 

First, DF compared prices and incentives at half a dozen retailers before choosing Lowe’s. (Hurrah for free delivery, setup and haul-away!)

Second, as always, he paid with a rewards credit card. As do I: All of my plastic is rewards plastic. It just makes sense to us.

[Surviving and Thriving has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Surviving and Thriving and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. Opinions, reviews, analyses and recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.]

He further sweetened the pot by raiding the “washing machine fund” jar for another $150. This is one of our easiest stealth saving* tactics: For every load of laundry we run, $2 goes into a jar. Your fund can be for anything you want; in fact, we took money from this jar a few years back to help pay for a new stove.

Finally, I cashed in enough Shopkick points to get $225 worth of Lowe’s gift cards. Since I’m always telling him that the points are for our household, not just for me, this was another chance to put my (free) money where my mouth is. As recently noted in “How I saved $233.07,” these rewards programs provided a pretty nice boost to our home and garden budget this year.

Read more

Credit card requirements easing.

The good news: Banks have lately made it a bit easier to get a credit card.

The bad news: Banks have lately made it a bit easier to get a credit card.

According to the Federal Reserve’s new quarterly survey of bank senior loan officers, nearly 15 percent of large banks and 25 percent of other banks have eased the required minimum credit score in the fourth quarter of 2021. This trend is likely to continue in 2022.

Notice that not all banks are doing this. Notice, too, that I said it’s both good and bad news.

The relaxing of standards could help people who don’t currently qualify for credit, or who qualify only for cards with lousy interest rates and lots of fees. Getting a legitimate card and using it carefully can help them build their credit history. Without a solid credit history, you’ll pay more than you must for things like car loans, vehicles and insurance.

The idea is to get the best possible card and, more important, to have a plan to build credit, not create debt. That’s the “bad news” part: Being able finally to get a card could harm someone who doesn’t have a plan in place. A credit card is not the ticket to the good life, with zero consequences attached. It’s a tool, and like any tool it can be used for good or for ill.

Read more

Monday miscellany: Porch pirates edition.

It’s not enough that inflation and supply-chain issues are putting a crimp in preparing for the 2021 holidays. Those dirty rotten porch pirates are back in business, too. According to a study from SafeWise, more than 60 percent of U.S. residents have had a package stolen in the past year. Obviously the holidays are prime … Read more

Monday miscellany: Debt taboo edition.

Some folks would rather talk about religion, politics, COVID-19 safety protocols or even their weight than discuss their credit card debt, according to a new survey from Bankrate.com. These days, that really means something. After all, families have fractured and friendships have evaporated after discussions over the 2020 election, and whether or not COVID is real. Compared to those incendiary topics, debt seems relatively tame.

The survey revealed that millennials are the most likely (62 percent) to be willing to discuss credit card debt, compared to Gen Z (59 percent), Gen X (51 percent), Baby Boomers (47 percent) and the “silent generation” (41 percent).

Ana Staples, a young credit analyst for Bankrate, thinks this is a good thing. “Even though debt is still an uncomfortable topic, young people are less prone to be cautious of its stigma,” Staples notes.

“Credit card debt isn’t something to be ashamed of.”

No – but it is something to be avoided. And many of those surveyed worry that they’re in this for the long haul. 

Read more

Monday miscellany: Love and money edition.

If the Policy Genius “Couples & Money” survey is any indication, one of the things COVID didn’t change was love and money. Specifically, it didn’t change how paired-up households manage their dough.

About 40 percent manage their finances together and 22 percent “keep and manage” money separately, which is consistent with PG’s previous two surveys.

A few other interesting tidbits:

About two-thirds (66 percent) say money doesn’t have any influence on their relationship.

Almost one in three (30 percent) have paid off a partner’s debts. In that group, 44 percent have plunked down more than $10,000 to settle their loved ones’ obligations.

Lots of partners aren’t sharing money specifics. That includes topics like salary (41 percent), retirement savings (49 percent), credit scores (54 percent), debt (42 percent), investments (48 percent) and monthly spending totals (53 percent). And one out of five respondents say they don’t know any of those things about their partners.

Speaking of not-knowing: Almost two-thirds (64 percent) of those surveyed said that lying or hiding money could mean the end of a relationship. Yet one in five of them have an undisclosed will or some kind of secret account (credit card, banking, retirement, life insurance).

One way to get around all the secrecy is simple: Talk about money.

 

Read more

COVID hack: Use rewards points.

According to a recent report from Bankrate.com, about one in three rewards credit cards holders did not cash in any rewards points in 2020.

That’s not surprising, given how many people save their points for air travel. Not much of that last year; only 11 percent of the 2,449 cardholders surveyed cashed in for flights.

On the other hand, 30 percent of those surveyed redeemed points big-time, to the tune of $300 or more worth of gift cards or actual spending cash.

When times are good, rewards points are a savvy consumer’s way of getting the most bang for the buck. And when times are not so good? That $300 cash-in can be a fine budget-booster.

“You could use it to defray big expenses or for small, everyday items to make your life better,” says Ted Rossman, a credit card analyst at Bankrate.com.

To paraphrase the credit card commercial, “What’s in your (virtual) wallet?” That is, what kinds of rewards points are languishing, rather than being given something to do? 

 

Read more

Monday miscellany: Gig-worker taxes edition.

Instacart, Uber, Amazon Flex, DoorDash – these and other gig-worker jobs were a nice side hustle for many people. Since the pandemic began, they’ve helped some laid-off workers keep the wolf from the door. When you spend all your time putting out that day’s fires, you might not have stopped to think how gig-worker income … Read more

How many credit cards should you have?

This is not a fun topic to tackle, since so many people hate credit and the credit scoring system. But in a recent post on The Simple Dollar, “You need at least two credit cards: Here’s why,” I take on the issue of how many credit cards you should have, and also our love/hate relationship with plastic.

You need at least two forms of payment in case of fraud, robbery or card loss. And no, debit card use is not a good substitute; it puts your personal cash at risk and does not help you build a credit score.

Who cares, you ask? Isn’t cash king? Ideally, maybe: We would all buy only what we could afford and pay cash on the barrelhead instead of running up debts.

But to paraphrase Oscar Wilde, life is never pure and rarely simple. Less-than-ideal things happen all the time.

The post explains what might happen when you lose a card or it gets hacked and you have no other form of payment, and also what could happen to those who use debit only.

It also points out the benefits of rewards credit cards, one of my enduring frugal hacks. Every time I cash in points for a birthday gift (which I recently did), a home improvement project or some kind of entertainment, it reminds me how much I like being rewarded for buying something I was going to buy anyway.

 

Read more