hi what do you do with your credit cards
oh well my husband and i have gotten into some some problems with credit cards we don't handle them very well
we we tend to run them up to the maximum and then ask for more
oh jeez
they they're they're really bad for us um matter of fact we've gotten rid of all of our credit cards except for a MasterCard and a Visa
then and we pretty much keep those maxed out
oh i was going to say that that sounds like like pretty many but i see what you meant you had them for each of the individual stores
yeah we had credit i had probably twenty credit cards
um-hum um-hum
um for i had i had an American Express American Express Gold an Optima all the different department stores um
two Visas two MasterCards
oh gee
i mean i had any time anybody would
you know send me an application you know preapproved or whatever i went i took it and it really ended up getting us in some real serious trouble
oh sure
um
because see the more the more credit cards you have the more people offer them to you
um-hum um-hum
um and the more you use them the more the more they send them to you
but each of these had an annual fee also right
exactly and the American Express was probably the worst the worst
um because the with the Gold card i can't remember how much it was because i didn't even have it very long before i gave it up
um-hum
but i know the Green card was like thirty five forty five dollars a year
yeah i'm forty five
right i i
um
which was a lot because i mean you had to pay it in full every month
exactly you know i that's it i really resented the fact that they were charging me for cards so i sent back all of mine except the ones that were free
uh-huh
and um then then i also limited it to one of each
one MasterCard and one one Visa and here most of the stores will accept those and actually i then got a Discover card since they pay you back
um-hum yeah i had a Discover and that was one of the ones in the group that i ended up um closing
uh
um
it really wasn't my choice though i mean i ended up having i ended up actually losing my credit cards um i ended up going through a credit counseling service
oh
um-hum um-hum
um because my husband and i just don't handle credit very well
um-hum yeah
and um when when you do that they automatically once you start with their service they close your accounts out
oh i see
so i'm still paying on all these accounts but my accounts are closed
yeah
yeah
so and i would prefer to keep it that way once we once we're paid off
um-hum
um
i would prefer just to have one MasterCard and one Visa and that's it
yeah yeah actually i pay off my cards every month only once in my life have i not paid
i think that's a really good way to handle it because that way if you if you paid off every month you never have to worry about well
how much do i have to pay these guys you know this month you know this you buy what you can afford i mean if you handle it just like you would like a check or cash
um-hum
right and
um-hum um-hum
um it's a lot easier to keep it in check
well and also in a sense they're giving you a loan for a month so that
yeah
you know if i were smarter i would have that same amount in savings and get the interest which i don't do but
um-hum
but yeah the
the thought of adding you know X percent to to the price of what i buy i just i can't accept
yeah and i and i think at this at this point in time with the economy the way it is
um
i think that um it's going to get even worse
um-hum
um
i'm i'm glad that we're starting to pay our debts off off now
um
you know we started we started i mean we started this last year
um-hum um-hum
and we probably still have about another year to go before we're completely out of the hole
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but i think this they way the whole economy's is going right now it's just not good to be in debt
that's right that's right
yeah yeah that i would that would be a very scary feeling for me to know that i was you know juggling payments to different people
um-hum
i guess because i never experienced it and it's not because you know i'm rich or anything it's just uh a mental concept that i have
yeah
yeah that i just
well when when it's you when you're getting rid of the whole credit card cycle and if you really get into the mind set
i got really good at juggling money and basically robbing Peter to pay Paul and i and i it was scary because i was so good at it
uh-huh uh-huh
and i thought this this is not right i mean this has got to stop because eventually it'd end up catching up at and catching up with me and it hit me in the face
right right
um
but it sounds like you know you you learned from it and you're coming out of it all right
i yeah i have i've learned a lot from it um i've learned that credit cards are extremely dangerous in my hand
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um-hum um-hum
and my husband's too because he's he's the same way i am
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i don't i don't think that
well when we when we buy on credit we just don't have a concept of how much money we're spending
um-hum
until the bill comes in
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and all then all of a sudden you look at the bill and you go oh my gosh i spent this much
um-hum but now the fact that you still have two cards are you do you use them more judiciously
yeah we pretty much use them for for emergency type things like um
transmission fell out on our car
uh yeah
and that paid for a new transmission
um-hum
um and and things like that um
and we try we try not to use them for you know
purchases
inc idental type things like you know gas and stuff like that
um-hum um-hum
clothing sales sales i find are a pain
yeah
yeah
i've i've gotten i've gotten a lot more away from from credit cards and i i pay by check a lot more now
um-hum
well it sounds good you know like i said it sounds like you're you've really got it under control
i i admire you for for having that um
uh mind set for not not even getting you know past that thirty days i i would that's ideally the where where i would like to be
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um-hum um-hum
yeah and like i said once once it it happened i couldn't because my son's tuition came due and i guess i had you know not really counted on it quite
at that point but um yeah i didn't like it at all i was very uncomfortable so you know and and i mean it was
um-hum
i can imagine
i thought a lot sixty dollars interest or something for for just a couple of months and i'm going jeez that's outrageous but in in you know retrospect it wasn't all that much i mean a lot of people pay a lot more and
yeah
oh yeah
and you know but still i mean i figured i didn't need those items if it cost me sixty dollars more to have them
um-hum
you think about what you can buy for sixty dollars
exactly groceries for a week yeah
yeah yeah
i i think about all all the money that that we've spent on interest
um-hum
on all of our credit cards and it's just incredible
but now did you use to not feel so badly because you could take it off your income tax
we've never been able to take it off our income tax i'm i'm fairly newly married i've only been married um less than two years
um-hum
and before that
i never owned a home or anything so i never had any deductions
right right
so really it was always just money
thrown away yeah jeez
thrown away
and i never really thought about it because
you were good at it
yeah i was so good at it that it just kind of got stuck in the back of my mind and just never
um-hum
um became a real problem until all of a sudden it came an insurmountable problem
yeah i suspect that you know thinking about it and looking at my friends and the number of credit cards that they use and you know the amount that i know they buy i guess probably a lot of them are
in a similar situation and you know just don't talk about it
yeah
most most people don't like to talk about money they feel uncomfortable i think
um-hum um-hum um-hum
you know because i mean i guess for a lot of people it is very personal
very personal
um-hum
yeah and especially if you if you don't feel you're handling it quite right or that somebody might make fun of you or that it would be
yeah
but i i think the the average American is probably
pretty heavily in debt
um-hum
not not including like a mortgage i mean a mortgage is an understandable debt
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um because that's you have you have to have a roof over your head
right
and i would much rather own my own home than than
be renting it like we're doing i mean we're basically you know kind of throwing seven hundred dollars a month away
um-hum
we're renting a house
um-hum
but
but you know right now with the way our credit card situation is there's nobody in the world that's going to
give us a mortgage on a house
right right
but but once i suppose you you prove yourself by paying this off next year you'll be in very good shape
yeah
yeah it's it's going to it's going to take quite a while um hopefully within five years we'll be in our own home
um-hum
um-hum
but um i'm not really counting on it real soon
um-hum um-hum so that's that's been an even harder lesson then if it affected
yeah
