Your banker...

[coollikeme]

does not care about your grade point average or your IQ. You can be one of the smartest people in the world. Your banker only cares about how you handle money. You need to have a good financial education. One of the most dangerous, life changing things, is the credit card. A credit card can either destroy your life or make you rich. You can either go deep into debt or start a business from scratch, with using every little bit of your own money. Unfortunately most people go into debt, so we must be very aware of the terms of any credit card offers. You will get tons of offers and they are very tempting. When you go to the bank to get a loan (mortgage, car, or any other type), the first thing they look at is your credit score, not your grade point average. Here are a couple of tips that will hopefully help.

Tip 1: Don"t get a store credit card, they just take your money at very high interest rates.

Tip 2: Don't have multiple credit cards. It is harder to manage several cards at one time, which makes you lose track of what you are spending.

Tip 3: Just get one credit card for emergencies or to help you invest in something that may make you money. It is good to have a little GOOD credit, that way you can a track record of making payments on time, whenever you try get get any kind of loan. If you are not planning to use a credit card for any of these reasons, you may be better off trying to pay for everything with cash.

I hope everyone is keeping an eye on there credit card and financial situation, because you know banker is always going to look at this information. When it is time to get a loan, for whatever it is you need (of course, most of us will need a loan at some point in our life, it is almost unavoidably), be sure that you are ready. Those 3 tips helped me, I hope they help you too.
Thanks for listening.

[unwiser]

Using a credit card for day to day purchases isnt a bad thing. I do it. I use my credit card for everything. I hardly ever use cash.

As long as you pay it off every month, everything is good.

credit cards allow me to itemize my spending, its safer than cash, and credit cards give you rewards. I have gotten cash back, hotel rooms, service done to my cars . I love my credit cards. I use them every day

[OnionJack]

Originally Posted by coollikeme

Tip 1: Don"t get a store credit card, they just take your money at very high interest rates.

Tip 2: Don't have multiple credit cards. It is harder to manage several cards at one time, which makes you lose track of what you are spending.

Tip 3: Just get one credit card for emergencies or to help you invest in something that may make you money. It is good to have a little GOOD credit, that way you can a track record of making payments on time, whenever you try get get any kind of loan. If you are not planning to use a credit card for any of these reasons, you may be better off trying to pay for everything with cash.

You'll learn a lot more by reading through the threads at CreditBoards (Powered by Invision Power Board) than these simplistic tips. Which don't take into account many situations.

[Peter S C]

Debt can be good and debt can be bad. Unfortunately, many people don't receive much in the way of financial eduction and therefore are financially unintelligent. This leads to them not properly understanding things like credit cards when they get one and eventually they get caught in the debt trap.

Anyway I work in banking and (*** warning *** blatant plug coming up) recently wrote an article titled 10 Dumb Banking Mistakes I See Everyday That Cost You Money.