Wow!

Since I started here at ATS, I have not had to ignore anyone.

Yet, as a result of this thread, 4 people have jumped on my ignore list this morning.


It's one thing if you tell me I'm wrong on a public issue. If I say the sky is green and you tell me it's blue, then that is your right. Or, even more appropriate to this thread, if I say the credit system is screwed up and you say it is not, you are perfectly entitled to that opinion and I will respectfully reply to you.


HOWEVER, when someone is so ARROGANT and DISRESPECTFUL as to assume they can tell me I am WRONG about aspects of my life and the things that happened to me, especially to the point of calling me a liar even when they have OBVIOUSLY not read most of my previous posts on the thread, then drastic measures are called for. Since I promised the mods I would be good, the ignore was my best option.



It's a pity. I was hoping I wouldn't ever have to use it.


You should be proud of me mods, I have actively denied ignorance without breaking the T&C hahahahah.

j/k

Jasn

Hm, SimiusDei are you referring to me?

For the record, I wasn't calling you a liar. Just questioning the validity of your facts which don't seem to be solidily based on any actual buisness data. Just because you say something is a fact doesn't make it so even if you lived it. Your perspective as a line-item worker doesn't give you knowledge as to how the buisness itself operates and what would be the cause of a buisness shut down.

And it's almost 5, so I'm outa here. Work gets boring when everyone else leaves for the day.

Hello; I am a high credit risk. Which means if credit is extended, I will take it. If I fall on hard times, I will not pay a creditor. Go ahead, rack up all the penalties the law allows for guys like me, I don't care any more now that I no longer work.

Truth is, I once had it all, divorced, and it all went away. Took some time to regain composure and credit. Years later I bought a $77,000 big rig with $15,000 DP. I towed the line for 9 years extended the business out to $200,000 and payed it all off. My banker would tell the car dealer and Harley dealer, give him what ever he wants. And they did.

Than I had health problems that shut me down. Sold all my trucking equipment off, paid some creditors and filed chapter11 on the rest. Wasn't even 6 months after, and creditors wanted me to have there card.

My health was pretty much gone and I struggled working with a private trucking firm and took 2 credit cards on till one day I lost the job. Now I had no car payment, but I did have 2 card payments and a house payment. I got the unemployment so it kept it together for awhile. I thought I would get a new job in no time at all. Well it turned out to be false and I sank. I let the 2 cards go. The house, I made the payment no matter what. For the next 7 years I endured with no steady job but held onto the house. I don't work and still get credit card offers in the mail. I throw them away. I shop and get asked if I want to take out a credit card; Nope! I say. I just bought a car for $11,000 cash and the dealer wanted me to oh so take credit out on the vehicle. I laughed and said, I have no job and will not be working again.

Credit is the work of the devil. Sell your soul for credit and you will loose it all.

I'll be honest, i've read most of the posts on this discussion and it sounds to me like this -

The OP worked in an electrical supply store in a small town. The store was struggling, as are many other independent retailers these days. Wal mart opened up another store and this was the straw that broke the camels back (as said by another poster).

Now the OP is extremely bitter and many people in the town are blaming Wal-mart when really all they did was give a little extra wind to the candle so it finally went out.

Unfortunately the OPs car broke just at this time and the only way to repair it was using a credit card.. am i right on that? fair enough.. that sounds reasonable.. so what is the problem?

In this situation, most people would go out and find a new job. At just over $6 an hour i don't thinkit would be too difficult to find another job of similar pay in the retail industry?

I'm sorry but all I am hearing is excuses, I have worked since I was 12, I started off as a volunteer and then worked up to a paper round (£7.50 a week!) then when I was 16 got a part time job in a restaurant, since I finished college I have worked full time in 2 industries and am slowly working my way up the career ladder. PLEASE don't tell me you have to have money to make money because I started with NOTHING. My family have nothing of any value, nothing to leave behind when they go and no huge savings.

All you need is to watch where you spend your money, don't borrow unless it is the only option and think ahead as to how you can earn more.

If you want something you will find a way, If you dont, you will make excuses and to me.. it looks as though you are in favour of the latter.

Well fellas I had have it all. Perfect credit, horrible credit, lots of debts that I could not afford, the ones that I have now that I can, and to me the reality of it all is here on this thread.

From my financial and credit experiences I can say that yes credit is necessary, but so does and most important is having savings, I got in debt for many reasons that have been mention here, being young and dumb, trying to leave way beyond my means and all that.

When I came to realize what I had done to my credit it was too late. I finish college and had one purpose, fix my credit, after many years is doable, first I did was like someone mention pay all debts that were mark as open on the CR, the ones that were charge off no need to worry about those.

Then I got a car loan with my credit being as horrible as it was I got a very high interest for it, but I was expecting that, the purpose of it was to reestablish my credit, I was also paying my student loan. Paid that horrible car loan no problem after a year 2 years got it refinance with a credit union. My credit was reestablish.

The big one that I thought it was going to be the more difficult turn out to be the simplest one, make those charge off and bad stuff disappear from the Credit Report, get a copy of you CR from the 3 leading agencies, Trans Union, Equifax and Experian, see what's on it, if the debts or charge off are close, mark as paid as agreed are more than 5 or 7 years old you can get those removed, just send a letter to the agencies explaining that you want them to investigate that particular item on your CR, they will contact the creditor if they don't respond within 30 days then is off the CR, many companies don't employ personnel to respond to this inquiries from credit agencies, that way I manage to wipe almost clean all my CR's from the top 3 agencies,

After working to reestablish my credit score, it went up 250 points in 2 years.

One final thought on credit, the only thing I truly believe credit should be used by the regular folk is to buy a house, yes before that we need to get it establish, there is plenty of ways to do that beyond falling into debts, but before you even think about establishing credit the first thing we ought to do is establish a some solid savings, if you have a credit card of $2000.00 make sure you have that on savings any other way you just asking yourselves to be in trouble. Savings is the key IMO and buy cash as most as you can.

MOD NOTE:

It seem to me that the OP used his personal experiences to make a point about the state of credit in this country and how many are feeling the effects of an ecomony going bad.
There's nothing wrong with using personal experiences to make a point and many have gone that route, including me.

However, when we start using those personal experiences and discussing the posters and not the topic, the thread can spiral downward.
I see that happening in this thread.

Please discuss the topic, Slaves to Credit, not the members .

Originally posted by Bunch
One final thought on credit, the only thing I truly believe credit should be used by the regular folk is to buy a house, yes before that we need to get it establish...

While it's certainly a good reason to not damage one's credit, there's still no reason to build credit just to buy a house. Many mortgage brokers provide manual underwriting if there is insufficient credit history to obtain a FICO score based loan. They can look at your rental history, your financial statements, and as long as everything is in good order you can get the best of the best interest rates.

This idea that you have to be a slave to credit is a myth conjured up by the lenders themselves. They have suckered this entire country into believing the higher your FICO score, the more successful or better a person you are.

The only legitimate thing I have found where building your credit can truly be helpful is for car insurance. There is a statistical correlation between people with poor credit and a higher rate of insurance claims. It's usually because people who trash their credit are bad with money and can't afford to fix their car when something happens, so they file more claims. I suspect however there will one day be a class action lawsuit filed against an insurance agency or two over this as they are failing to take into account those of us who have low credit scores because we simply don't use credit.

FICO is not our master. We are only slaves if we choose to be.

>

the ones that were charge off no need to worry about those.

I almost missed this... I've seen this come up a few times in this thread and it is very dangerous.

Charge-off does not mean they've dropped the debt and don't intend to collect it. It means they are no longer claiming the debt as a receivable for tax purposes.

At this point you will either be sued, or the debt will be sold to rather unfriendly collectors. If they haven't found you yet, they will.

These bad-debts are best paid one-by-one with the others left alone. You can usually settle them with the original lender for 20-40% of the amount owed. Just be sure to get the settlement agreement from the lender in writing before sending your payment.

[edit on 22-10-2007 by apc]

Man I know what the OP is talking about.

Heres my deal. When I was in college I maxed out 3 credit cards and put about 8k in debt on my name. I had to live and I had zero income even from scholarships and student loans. all of it was going to school. so after two semesters of making the choice with my 75 cents a day budget for food and transposrtation (no joke, it was 75 cents for the day pass on the bus and no food for 24 hours or 75cents for some eggs or a bag of rice, and then to have to walk 6 miles in the snow in freezing weather to school and then another 6 back.) I decided. screw it I'll use my credit cards right.

So thats what I did and incured quite a lot of dept. I was so stupid I kept using the credit cards after I graduated college, why not all my freinds were.

It took me a long time to find work to be able to pay off the credit cards and my living expenses. the credit sunk as I couldn't make payments.

Soon I was getting letters from collection agencies, and once from a lawyer( although I worked his ass into a corner, never get a 27 year old lawyer to do anything important they don't have enough experience period, so I worked him down to about 20 cents on the dollar in the debt, schmuck he was)

So I made a choice. learn to live on my take home pay, loose my social life, ditch my friends and pay off all my debt in full. So I did. Took a long time. Now I have zero debt except for my student loan and my car payment. I have one credit card and I only spend about 50 bucks on it a month which I pay off in full. my credi score was close to a 480 now it's in the low 700's. didn't take too long either.

I only keep that one credit card to maintaine my credit score. I pay for every thing in my life with cash, check or debit. I just think the credit industry is a complete scam.

oh and to all of you guys that work in debt collection or even the people who work at chexsystems that I screamed huge, ingenius, self esteam destroying curse words at.

I'm sorry I did that.......NOT!!!!!! You stupid a holes deserve every syllable of the abuse and grieve I gave you! get a real job and not some dispicable go nowhere proffesion as debt collection. Oh and maybe if you moved out of your parents house you too might know what it's like to actually have financial responsibilities that are more important than the stupid account you are trying to recoup on. BTW I've paid back every cent I had in debt and still think these people are scum for being debt collectors. seriously you are. I don't think god is going to let people who take advantage of others hardships and then screw them over is following gods morality.

I've always hated the idea of credit. I grew up watching my parents go into debt and decided I never wanted that to happen to me.

So I used cash for everything. My first car was paid in cash ($3400). I was lucky enough to have made a small profit at home by working online so I didn't need a car for work. I didn't have a credit card... I used either cash or my debit card for purchases.

Then when it came time when I wanted to get my own apartment, I couldn't. To make matters worse, every time I applied for a credit card I was denied - and every time that happens it just makes your credit eve worse! I guess when you get all those credit card offers when you're about to turn 18, you should take a couple. No one had told me how much of a problem it would be to survive in this world without credit.

Long story short, my mom co-signed on my second car for me and that helped me establish some credit. It took years though, despite how responsible I had been. Meanwhile I saw people running up their credit cards every day who were buying things they couldn't afford.

It makes no damn sense, until you realize that the credit companies don't want to do business with responsible people. They want you to get so deep that you end up paying the interest for the rest of your life. As for me, I now use only 1 credit card and I pay it off in full every month. They won't get a dime of interest from me. My house on the other hand... not much I can do about that. I'll end up paying an extra 150k or so on a house I bought for 120k unless I pay it off sooner, and I plan on doing just that.

Originally posted by apc
They can look at your rental history, your financial statements, and as long as everything is in good order you can get the best of the best interest rates.

I have never and I mean NEVER seen the process that you describe being use as a way for mortgage lenders to corroborate your ability to pay, the way I have experience it is that they dont only look to your 3 major credit reports they will look into whatever they have access to check your worthy of the amount you intend to apply for. Specially now with the credit crunch I will guarantee you that you will not get a loan if you can not show an establish credit history and a damn good one.

This idea that you have to be a slave to credit is a myth conjured up by the lenders themselves. They have suckered this entire country into believing the higher your FICO score, the more successful or better a person you are.

Credit has its good and bad things, giving an 18yo a 2,000.00 credit limit credit card is irresponsible, but giving the opportunity to a 25+ the chance of obtaining a $200,000.00 to buy a house is a good thing.

FICO is not our master. We are only slaves if we choose to be.

Agreed, IMO it has to come down to personal responsability, dont need credit dont use it, dont have the means to pay it, dont take it. Save, Save, Save...........

And what I mean about charge offs is that yes the collection agency might sue you, but that will depend in the amount you owed, the less you owe the less the chance they going to sue, and after they get tired of calling you they going to move to the next victim, my balances were to low for them to consider worthy of legal actions, and since the 5 years already expired for them to be on my credit report, the credit agencies had no other option than to take them of my credit report.

Originally posted by DontTreadOnMe
MOD NOTE:


However, when we start using those personal experiences and discussing the posters and not the topic, the thread can spiral downward.
I see that happening in this thread.

Please discuss the topic, Slaves to Credit, not the members .

Everyone should heed this note because if they don't the thread will be closed and that would be ashamed, because we can all learn something from each others experiences here.

I would also like to add if your going to post a critical response, try and post some type of a constructive solution as well.

Very interesting thread. OP gets from me.

[edit on 22-10-2007 by Realtruth]

double post, somehow! please delete

[edit on 22-10-2007 by Bunch]

I didn't feel like reading the whole forum but here's some special tricks of the trade..

i.e. CREDIT FENCING

1. Obtain credit card A. for what ever amount lets say 250.00
2. Obtain credit card B. for 250.00
3. Have an income of 300.00

Use card A to purchase an item for 25.00
Use card B to do a cash advance of 25.00 to pay off card A
Use your Income to pay back the cash advance of 28.32 from card B
This is called fencing credit to are using 2 cards to build credit And you do this so on and so on. Each purchase increasing 25.00 on card A

25a.......25b......apply 25b to 25a. Add income to 25b with intrest
50a.......50b......apply 50b to 50a. Add income to 50b with intrest

Just don't purchase any thing over 250.00 right away.
after a year your credit limit will be raised from 500-1000 on each card keep in mind your income level ,never spend more than your income.
I have unlimited credit on my 2 cards I have been doing this with since I was 18 and I'm 35 now.

P.S. banks hate this also but they can't do anything about it.