How far in the hole are you?

I view debt as a form of birth control.

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So, how come poor people have so gosh darn many kids?

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Because they can't afford to do anything but f*ck?

I have no debt at all! I just pay my credit card bill off every month. On time. Now that is dorky.

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I'm an agnostic and interpret the biblical injunctions against usury as paying interest.

Cash reserves are very slim right now--and will likely remain slim, but we're not in debt.

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"Neither a borrower nor a lender be."

...words spoken by one of the great fools of English liter-chur.

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Used to be $92K, but currently about $17K. It varies a lot depending on the economy.

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I'm working on my revolving debt and am using experian credit reporting services that I got with Microsoft Money 2005 (using financial software changed my life, I highly recommend that anyone not using financial software do so).

Anywho, I have a good credit score but discovered some misconceptions I had had:

Anywho, I was going over the reasons Experian listed for my score not being higher. One I didn't know was that the average age of my accounts being over 3 years old made the biggest difference. I didn't know it was that important of a factor.

While I knew that the amount of my available credit that I was using was a factor I had thought it would be the sum of my credit only.

I have a 2,300 dollar card that I don't use much that is near the limit and a 5,300 card that I had paid off completely.

This is what Experian told me:

Quote:

At least one or more of your accounts has a balance that is close to your credit limit, which may be lowering your score. When your balance is high, this can indicate to lenders that you are likely to overextend yourself. Try to increase the cushion between your credit balance and your credit limit to help improve your credit score.

Seems like paying a bit more to the 2,300 card would make a difference in my credit score even though the total balance-to-limit ratio is what's calculated.

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kickycan wrote:

I just pay my credit card bill off every month. On time. Now that is dorky.

I used to go home every night and pay off what I had spent that day. That is more dorky!

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sozobe wrote:

Hanging on by the skin of our teeth. We had to save money to buy a house. Then we had to buy a house. Then we had to deal with the fact that Mr. Science Genius' calculations as to how much money we'd have per month was about $1,000 off (wrong way.) (Genuinely confusing though, academic year salary vs. summer salary oddities.) Right now both of our credit cards keep nuzzling up towards the limit, and we're waiting for a not-so-bad tax return (mortgage interest deductions rock) to get us through to the promised land of summer salary. I'm also looking for work, network looked promising but nothing's materialized yet, now I'm looking more actively. Just a tiny bit would help.

But the end is, hopefully, in sight, so I can't complain too much.

Lol - so familiar!

One salary just doesn't cut it when you have mortgage etc.

Right now, I am chronically just keeping head above the water, but I have constant neck pain from the strain of doing so.

Why, when I have a perfectly reasonable salary?

Because I am paying a reasonable amount into mortgage and into my super.

This is a piss-off - what if I die soon, and have not had lots of fun that I could have had by paying less?

But if I don't - I want some fun later too!

No goddamn mortgage interest tax deductions here - and no good tax refund.

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Craven de Kere wrote:

(using financial software changed my life, I highly recommend that anyone not using financial software do so).

Any chance of you saying how and why?

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Craven, what do you mean by your score being lower because average age of accounts is over three years? It negatively affects your score when your credit is "new," meaning you haven't had credit cards/loans for over at least a year.

And they calculate score on a bunch of different factors. Lenders definitely look at how close you are to your limits, but if they looked at your report it shouldn't raise any flags since you've got that other card zeroed out. If both cards were maxed, they look at it as a possible bubble about to burst.

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Our credit cards gets deducted from our account every month, and we're gooood on that one! Only revolving debt is my iMac, and that's a 50$ a month.

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It depends on if you include my student loans or not. If you include those, I can't vote because it's above 15K. And with my car. And all my credit cards. Sheesh. It's a wonder I am not living in a box down by the river.

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FICO scores are insane. I had some trouble back about 3 years ago and made some late payments. I have not made 1 late payment to ANYTHING in 3 years and my score has not gone up. At all. Figure that one out.

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Re: financial software

I used to keep track of our credit cards and checking accounts using Quicken.

For me, the key to being able to control spending was that each entry had to go into a category (groceries, auto-gas, insurance, housing, home maintenance, entertainment, clothing, etc)

I could run a report anytime and see how much had been spent in a particular category. If entertainment was $XXX, I would know that taking the family to a movie was out until next month. If groceries were over a given amount, I knew to skip the steak cookout for the weekend, and just do burgers.

It's a real eye-opener to see how much gets spent in areas that you feel like don't get that much attention. For instance, we pay cash for gas. I might put in $20 Monday, and Bear might put in $30 on Thursday which lasts until I put gas in again on Monday. I feel like only $20 has been spent on gas for the week since that is all I did, when it was actually $50.

Using a program like Quicken puts your budget into perspective and allows you to see what is REALLY spent rather than what it feels like you are spending. And, when you "click" for it to be shown in a graph form, you get a colorful pie that can give a whole new perspective.

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Hmmm...I should hook up that software.

Monthly Allowances:

Clothing: $30.
Food: $200
Entertainment(sports, ect) $50
Alcohol: $800

I wouldn't even be able to get my buzz on.

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I make the same use of Peachtree, but the main focus is cash, checking, and credit card balances. The expense catagories are interesting, but not worth the bother by themselves.

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I just consciously don't go spend a ton of money on stuff I'm tempted by, like having a Newbury Comics down the street. Place is the devil.

And if you're not familar with Newbury Comics, NO, I don't buy comic books. They have the best cd/dvd collection around here.

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Not a dime. My credit cards are only a vehicle to avoid having to carry large sums of cash. They get paid off monthly. Have always operated on the premise if I can't afford it I do not buy it.

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Good premise.

We did that before the saving-for-the-house thing, and then thought we'd be able to pay it all off soon enough, but the $1,000 less a month than we expected really hurt us.

With that we'd be able to afford to live on one salary, but it'd still be fairly close, so I'm really hoping to find something. (And the fact that it'd still be close with $1,000 more a month tells you something about HOW pitiful we are now... but we do have a gorgeous house.)

dlowan, I know what you mean about now/ later. My next-door neighbors haven't yet paid off the house but they make a monthly mortgage payment that was locked in some 25 years ago and is a laughable pittance, and WILL be paid off soon enough. They have a coupla really nice cars and go off on vacations and seem to have plenty of fun, though they both have pretty average-paying jobs.

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How far in the hole are you?

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