credit

How to escape from your debt.

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th-1Some money experts come across as professional scolds who harangue us about the bad things we’ve done and the good things we haven’t done.

No wonder some people prefer to unload their money woes to friends. Even if our pals gently point out our goofs, at least they’re not telling us how stupid we are.

The problem is that not all friends will hold us accountable, either because they don’t want to hurt our feelings or they don’t know much about money themselves. Thus we run the risk of getting advice that’s well-intentioned but not really in our best interests.

Ever confess to having gone a little off the rails at the mall only to have your BFF blithely chirp, “Oh, well, it happens to all of us!” Or fret about how you shouldn’t have gotten such an expensive car and have some other dude say, “Aw, come on! Live a little!”

Beverly Harzog won’t tell you anything like that. Instead, she’ll be the friend everyone should have: One who cares enough to convince you to get control of your spending and who offers to stand by you every step of the way.

Harzog recently released a new book, “The Debt Escape Plan,” and it’s up for grabs in this week’s giveaway.

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Why Iowans pay less in interest.

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thAs I recently noted in “A simple way to save $159k,” people with poor or nonexistent credit will feel the sting of higher interest rates. Specifically, they’ll pay an average of $159,464 more in interest over their lifetimes, according to Credit.com’s Lifetime Cost of Debt Calculator.

The number-crunchers over at Credit.com have now revealed the states with the highest and lowest lifetime credit costs. Alaska isn’t in either the top or bottom ten. However, the state of my birth, New Jersey, is home to the fourth-highest average lifetime cost of debt. Yay.

Short form: If you want to pay less, improve your credit score and then move to Iowa.

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A look back (and forward) at credit.

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thWhat was the best card of 2014? According to two reputable sources, it was the Citi Double Cash Back.

Both NerdWallet and CardRatings.com praise the card’s unique conceit: Consumers get 1 percent cash-back on the items they buy and an additional 1 percent cash-back when they pay off the card.

“It’s the first (and, so far, only) card on the market that provides a lucrative incentive to make monthly payments in full,” notes Lindsay Konsko of NerdWallet, who calls the card “a game-changing product.”

Citi also is putting EMV chips in all of its consumer and student credit cards, making them safer than the typical magstripes. Other card issuers are putting EMV in some of their products, and apparently EMV chips for debit cards are also on the way.

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What’s the weirdest thing you ever charged?

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th-1The folks at CardRatings.com recently commissioned a survey about offbeat credit card purchases. Some 57 percent of those surveyed copped to a bit of buyer’s remorse, i.e., “What was I thinking?”

“Adult entertainment” was the top culprit, with 6.7 percent admitting to have purchased temporary jollies. Men are “about four times more likely than women to use a credit card for this purpose,” according to the CardRatings blog post.  

You don’t say.

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Two ways to get free credit monitoring.

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thTarget is offering a great big mea culpa as a result of its recent data breach: a year’s worth of free credit monitoring through Experian. This is for anyone who shopped at Target stores in the United States between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15.

Personal finance expert Liz Weston offers some best-practices tips plus a legitimate URL where you can sign up for the service. According to the Target website, consumers need to be wary of e-mails and phone calls by scammers pretending to represent the company but who “are really trying to get personal information from you.”

Experian may try to get something from you, too, according to Weston: “It will try to sell you upgrades, such as a peek at ‘your credit score’ – actually a PLUS score that isn’t used by lenders.” But you don’t have to give a credit card number or pay for anything, because Target is picking up the tab.

You do, however, have to provide your Social Security number and some other info, so that Experian can make sure it’s protecting the right person.

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