Dan took away my credit cards. And we both have to have an emergency on our hands in order to use them. (That qualifies as something greater than: Our favorite band is playing the Crystal Ballroom! or I want a new shower curtain! or Let's take a trip...!) Well, because we are exposed now as credit card-mongers, I have to ask.... How do people do it? How do normal people NOT use credit cards or NOT get into credit card debt? And if they have squished you, how do you pay them off without selling your soul? Just wondering.... I should go now because Rocco is frantically fighting off the vacuum.
3 comments:
Darr had to help me get my spending in line many moons ago. From what I've read, you should always "pay" yourself first, even if it is only $5 every two weeks. Now, we use credit cards for almost every purchase but we 1. have cards that give us a certain percentage (between 1%-3% depending on the type of purchase) in cash back at the end of the year and b) we pay them off every month.
On a side note, are you still into owls because I see them all over right now and they always make me think of you. :)
I'm lucky to have a spouse that goes crazy over spending. We've made a budget for the month, which includes a payment back to the credit card industry. But when we were in school, we used cards because we needed to. There's not a great answer here.
We use cards for everything as well - but pay them/it off every month. We're still working on paying back other loans - car and school and a home equity loan. We just finished Mike's truck payments so the money that was going to that I added to the monthly car payment. I saw that on Oprah one day - pay off your highest interest card/loan, then once that's done add that amount to the next highest interest. While doing that they suggested making the minimum payment on everything else except the one you want paid off first.
I don't really like to spend money and often feel guilty and return stuff after the fact (I call it bulimic shopping). I did however, go on a nice shopping spree with a "bonus check" from work. I didn't feel guilty because it was cash.
Good luck!
Post a Comment