The ultimate life hack the government doesn't want you to know
The ultimate life hack the government doesn't want you to know
The ultimate life hack the government doesn't want you to know
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I'm in my thirties and I've never owned a credit card. Fuck paying interest.
People always told me I need to get one so I can have a good credit rating. For what? So I can pay more interest for a mortgage on a house I'll never buy?
Stupid.
Open a savings account and have someone else pay YOU interest.
You only need to pay interest if you don't make your monthly payments. I put gas and some groceries on my card and zero it out every month. By the time I graduated from university I had a credit score of about 775 which is pretty good for a kid who grew up in a <$20,000/yr household with no real financial education or help.
For what? So I can pay more interest for a mortgage on a house I'll never buy?
This is a terrible way to look at credit. You'll definitely be paying more interest with no credit score, if you can even get a loan (you won't). You're pretty much guaranteeing your failure like this.
Open a savings account and have someone else pay YOU interest.
Yeah lmao that 0.3% really pays out big, huh? Most credit cards offer anywhere between 1-10% cash back.
FYI my savings account earns 4.55% p.a.
Also, I know that the money I'm investing is being used ethically, which helps me sleep a bit better
you only pay interest if you miss your payments deadline. I get 2% cash back on every single purchase i make with cc - Last month I got over $50 back.
Meanwhile my savings account I opened with 4% interest and over a grand invested gave me a whopping $5 in the past month.
You do know where that cash back is coming from, right? Everything you buy has credit card fees baked into the price. The business pays anywhere from 1-5% on every transaction to accept your payment, and a small percent of that is returned to you as "cash back" rewards. Its why I've switched back to using cash and any coins I get as change go into a jar. That earns much more than %10 "cash back", and some shops even make the customers pay the CC fee here in aus so I get a small "discount" too.
A lot of what I said applies directly to Australia's economy (which I'm sure I don't need to tell you is absolutely fucked).
I salute you. Physical currency is better for businesses and the individual. Paying "convenience fees" (for what should be a public service), should be a crime.
In a parallel reality, I'm paying interest on water which evaporated.
People always told me I need to get one so I can have a good credit rating. For what? So I can pay more interest for a mortgage on a house I’ll never buy?
Credit gives you options. Furnace goes out way sooner than anticipated and you only have $5k in the bank? Take out a loan for the remaining $3-5k to get it done now. Unexpected car repair and you only have $500 after rent in the bank? Whip out the credit card and put the other $500-1000 on there and throw extra money at it until it's paid off. Yes you'll pay some interest, but you'll have a working car, or a working furnace, or whatever other calamity you find yourself facing.
But the biggest thing credit does it lets you buy property much much sooner in life. Property has a wierd habit of gaining value much faster than it should, the payment stays the same for the entire term of the loan, plus with a mortgage every payment buys you slightly more ownership of the property unlike a rent payment which is just money leaving your bank account every month for nothing other than the privilege of the roof over your head for the following month.
For a real world example, I bought my house a couple of years ago for ~120k. I live in a small town so I figured it wouldn't gain anything other than holding it's value through inflation. My monthly payment is ~800ish and similar places were renting for ~1k/month. Well thanks to the hyperinflation the last couple of years, my house is now worth closer to 180k and rents are up to $1200-1500/mo for a similar place to the one I own, but I still pay $800/mo for my house. That's what credit gets you in the long term. It gets you stability and options for when the going gets tough
Most of what I said comes with the implication that instead of paying interest, you're putting that money into a savings account, instead of racing to 0.
You don't need a get-out-of-jail-free-card(with-interest) when you can just pay to leave like the gigachad saver you are.
I will never own a house, it's not an option for me - it never will be.