Ever read/listen to Dave Ramsey? If not, you should. He has a proven program for getting out of debt. It's a bit boilerplate, but the overall approach is sound. Also, his radio show can provide some much needed inspiration (if necessary).

While a senior in HS I decided I didnt need to learn trig and switched a general math class. It was simple, but I think the class was 10x more useful compared to trig. It was the first time I heard of compound interest. Like I said, simple stuff, but obviously very important.

Too many people stand to gain too much $$$ off of people learning about finances through the "School of Hard Knocks". As such, I imagine any initiative to try and "educate" kids about it (i.e. "credit cards are evil", "live within your means", "establish and stick to a budget", etc.) will be undermined, if not outright fought and destroyed by the people and businesses that own the politicians to whom our "educators" answer.

Kudos and dittos...

(edit) Financial freedom is having others pay you interest, financial misery is owing interest. But that's just me...

I live at a means that if I love the job, I could flip burgers and keep my stuff. It wouldn't be fun, but I could do it.

I had a credit card in College, abused it. Its paid off and destroyed now. I have a debt card. If it goes empty I go hungry. Its the way it has to be.

No question about it, Dave gives great advice. However, my opinion of him and his operation took a major nosedive recently. I do accounting and was wondering if Dave had a program to become trained to teach his methods. Sure enough, he does. However, this section from the program's FAQ sort of stopped me in my tracks:

Do you need to be a Christian to attend the Certified Counselor Training?
No. Anyone of any faith or belief system can attend. However, we only “Certify” and recommend on our website practicing Evangelical Christians. The reason for this is simple; our training and our belief system flows from our Evangelical Christian faith. Our teaching comes from our faith in Jesus, and we use the Christian Bible in the teaching process. We love people of different faiths and doctrines, and treat them as our welcome guests.

I hate to admit it, but I did the same. Upon graduation, the "wide open job market" wasn't as wide, or as open as the advisers had indicated.

I eventually recovered. After that, I made sure I had ZERO debt. I bought a cheap used car, lived in an apartment, etc, but had NO debt. I feared debt.

Jump a few years to present day. I have only 1 CC with a $1k limit. I use it for my business purchases, and I pay it off each month. Other than that, my only debt is my mortgage. And with regard to my home, I purchased a modest house that I knew I could afford even on a relatively low paying salary - just in case I lost my job or whatever.

This year, my business hit a wall. My income is down, and I have elected to sell off almost all the play-toys that I bought over the last couple of years, but the one thing I know for sure is that my home is not at risk and that I *WILL* get by.

I've had a credit card since I was 17. It is in my name, put it is attached to my parent's account. All the purchases are pooled and they are not separated by the card at all. However, I have never made a purchase on it that wasn't pre-approved by my parents, or that they didn't receive the cash for immediately thereafter. If I went out to buy clothes or spend any real money, it is better than carrying a few hundred in cash on me, especially if my parents are paying for or helping me pay for something.

A few months ago I finally got my own credit card so that I can start building credit. I have simply started to use it rather than using my debit card. I pay it off in full every month. It is kind of worthless though, because I only have a $500 credit limit. I can easily blow through that in a month, especially once the summer starts when I will actually have an income again. An average weekend of going out is at least $50-$60. Throw in some random purchases here and there and I am out of credit. Hell in the last month, I have purchased nearly $1000 worth of concert tickets (I bought tickets for my family and friends so that I ensured everyone got tickets). I couldn't even use my card for half the purchases because I would have gone over my limit. I want those rewards damnit.

Garrett, imo you're playing with fire...some don't get burned but most do eventually, please be careful. Why "kids" are even allowed to begin a "credit card habit" (even in a somewhat controlled fashion) is beyond me...WHY? Just an 'ole fart's opinion...

My parents had my sister and me in both private schools during college and we both were fortunate to have new cars (she had a Mustang, I had a GTI -good times).
My dad got laid off from his 20 year job in the middle of our college tour.

WHAT DID WE DO YOU ASK?

I quit my fun job at the camera store, got a 20-30 hour a week job at Hughes Aircraft as an engineering assistant (student engineer at the time) and they picked up the tab for school!!-- I did this knowing that. It took me longer to graduate, but I paid for the last 2-3 years myself.:cool:

Dad created his own wholesale business and he did well enough to finish putting my sister through college, buy a new house, etc...:cool:

NO CC ISSUES. Not the solution. If you go this way, you should be on your own. Sorry: Stupid is as stupid does....:(

(note: my comments do not apply to illness, etc -personal opinion)..

WE have become a country of excuses. Kind of odd that way......

+1

I have little use for self-proclaimed "evangelicals" and absolutely NO use for ones who feel the need to turn everything they do into a way of proselytizing.

Sounds to me like it's just a form of religious discrimination. I bet if I opened a counseling business like his and said "we won't certify any evangelical Xians" these people would be spinning out of control within minutes.

The double-standard and hypocrisy is something I just can't stomach. I'm done reading/listening to his stuff. There's just as much good advice out there from other people without an "agenda".

That's a real shame about Ramsey, I didn't realize he put that requirement on his instructors. It's an overall good message and program that he has, pity he has to limit his audience. There's millions of Americans that could benefit from the conservative approach to spending that he teaches.

Oh yeh...the credit card meltdown is coming in about 6 mos. It will make the mortgage meltdown look tame.

Sometimes why it makes me wonder why my wife and I killed ourselves getting out of debt. We never had it bad, I don't think we ever even went anywhere near $10k. But we haven't had a dime of it in over a year now. Makes me think we should have just loaded up, what with the pending holocaust and all. I could've bought myself a BMW E39 M5 on my Visa with the limits we had...they're all canceled now.

dtw,

because with debt you are going like this:
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1207770342.jpg


rather than like this:http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1207770361.jpg


You're definitely smart to be out of debt. The credit line is a total gimmick.

I was speaking sarcastically of course. I've taught that class before (where your charts came from). My point was that it is frustrating having gone to all this effort to be responsible when everyone else is just having a free-for-all. We could have just gotten our slates wiped clean in the pending bloodbath, rather than actually paying it down ourselves. Chump...that's the word I'm looking for. Because we have pride, dignity, and ethics, we're chumps. Paying our own debt was a chump move.

We can fix it, though. Our take home cash is a few thousand smaller than the divorce case cited above. We save a ton of it. That's clearly a chump move. My BMW 530i is an '01...time to trade that thing in and get an '08 750Li and finance the balance that my trade doesn't cover. A $1k/month car payment still won't kill all our savings...better get my wife an H2. She loves trucks. And everyone knows that heavier, taller SUVs are safer. Bonus.

My wife and I put all our expenses on a credit card and pay it off monthly, with cash back rewards it gives us about $800 a year. However, we want to try something and I figured I would run it past the group here because it seems like there are a few financially intelligent people.

We have a second card with a limit of $25,000, that currently has a promotion for a year of 0% interest on balance transfers and cash advances. There is no fee for using a "convenience" check, so is it feasible to write ourselves a check, deposit it in our savings, earn the interest off the savings and pay back to the card throughout the year? I normally would never touch a convenience check, but I'm not seeing the downside here.

A friend of mine (and his wife) have $35k in credit card debt right now.
About once a year they draw off their home equity line of credit to pay off the credit cards, then they run em up again. Only problem is instead of having all kinds of equity, they basically have none and their mortgage payment keeps going up. They are spending money they don't have and living in a way they can't afford but they've been doing it for many years.
I think all that is gonig to come to a sudden stop very soon. They bank cancelled their line of credit, they missed a CC payment so the interest shop up through the roof.
if they hadn't tried so hard to keep up with the jones' they'd be sitting pretty, now they are in danger of BK and they will deserve everything bad that happens to them, but they'll manage to blame someone else for it including each other. This will end badly and I predict they'll have a hard time staying together once they realize they can't pretend top be rich anymore. Did I mention that they have 4 kids and the oldest is 5?
Hope it was all worth it.
this isn't an education problem, it's a character problem.

What on earth are the buying? Really, I wanna know....

I think it's the way you are raised.

My parents never paid a penny in credit card debt in their life, and never had a car loan. If you only had $500 to buy a car, you bought a $500 car. Grandparents were the exact same.

My parents (now retired) were very successful with their small business. I doubt I can replicate their financial success.

A really funny thing was I had a credit card before they did! I got a credit card when I was in college (early 80s). It just came to me in the mail. Of course I didn't have a penny to my name. My parents, who were paying every penny of my tuition and expenses, then applied for a credit card . . . and were rejected!

But I've followed their financial habits. I've never paid a penny in credit card interest, always pay it off. We use a "cash back" card, so we actually make money by using it. Never had a car loan, either. I wouldn't be able to sleep at night knowing there are things in my house or garage that aren't paid for.

http://123-guide-to-plasma-tv.com/pa...nk-to-us-4.jpg
http://urbanupdater.files.wordpress....ereligions.jpg
http://www.googlesina.net/products_p...d/10079A-2.jpg
http://www.stratton.com/NR/rdonlyres...ncy_dinner.jpg

+1

Same here. WE pay off everything and charge as much as we can on the card. We get the mileage and this pays for our flights on vacation!:D

As long as there aren't any catches it sounds like a plan. . . Then again, why screw with basic savings - I'd look at at least a CD.

I'd also make sure there aren't one of those "we reserve the right to raise your rate without notice at any time for any reason or no reason" clauses in there. I suspect banks/lenders are going to be getting desperate soon and try such tactics.

I'm carrying a balance for the first time in many years this month. It's from the move, which was way more expensive than I had planned and my company didn't pay a dime for it. To add to the pain, my wife's wallet got stolen out of her car recently and she hasn't gotten her ATM card replaced yet. So I had to fund her car transport via cashier's check last week from DC to Phoenix. I could pay it all off, but with the wife's and my job situations kind of shaky at the moment, I don't want to deplete my cash reserves anymore with no assurance of it getting replenished quickly. Luckily, our monthly outlays here will be several hundred $$ less than they were in VA. I'm eating lunch at home every day, since I work at home now. We cook every night instead of going out and have just about everything we need. I haven't gone through 1/4 tank of gas in the car since I got here March 24th, since I can ride the bike everywhere now at 50 mpg. The ammo is getting expensive though.:cool:

just do not miss a payment, that is the typical reason they cite to jack up the rates.

CC for me are like tax refund checks. :) Wells Fargo (and others, probably) offers cash rebate checks as one of their "Rewards"..

Honestly, I've made far more in cash back rebate checks than I'll ever pay in CC interest. And I have a free RT ticket to China coming from one of my other cards. So I'm not too worried. It's just a little jarring to be in a tight spot at the moment.

Finally finished watching this entire series.

Scary.

on ferrarichat there's a story about a 25 y/o that bought a Lambo ($115) on 9 credit cards...

what really crushed him is the car had a defective title - car got repo'd and he didn't have the money to even license the car, let alone get an attorney to rectify the situation.

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=191248&page=66

all I can say is, wow.

The real story is on page 2 of the 65 page thread. Reader's Digest version: Guy puts a large down payment on a lease, but says he needs title for the paperwork. Leasing company (duh) sends him an open title on good faith. Guy takes the car to a dealer with the title and sells it for cash then flees the country. This dealer sells it to another dealer. That dealer sells it to the poster. Leasing company figures out they've messed up and has the car picked up. Should be a fun one to sort out. The guy who bought the car sounds like he's a 14 year old.

I just watched the whole series, too. Do I know people in these situations, most definitely, In all directions. The American Dream turning into a nightmare. My stepson ran his credit up first to run his business, then when his main customer bellied up and he couldn't find a job they were making house payments with Credit Cards. He's now found a good job (Engineering Graduate from Texas A&M) but the debt service must be monstrous. They say nonchalantly in the series that for every dollar of principal there are 2 dollars of fees.

I don't see why there is any problem with having a lot of debt on credit cards...as long as you can make the payments. I have had $60K to $100K on credit cards and it has never really caused me any problems. I have about $40K on a card right now at 3.99% interest. It doesnt bother me in the least.

Like any loan...just don't borrow money that you do not have the ability to pay back.

Oh yeah, it can be cheap access to money, as long as it's for something useful.

Since it's easy to finance anything, foolish or not is where you get in trouble.

That Lambo kid - I'm just blown away. I've seen it done for like a $15K car (ex GF HAD to have a BMW convertible when she was 20) but $115K on a car - WOW!

rjp