Question for people the people of this thread because I am financially illiterate.
My CC company which is mastercard has not made a cent of profit on me. I have had it for 1 year and every single time the payment period is about to end I simply eliminate the balance to avoid interest. I have to ask the question, does this improve or stagnate my credit score? Since they never have to worry about not getting their money back, i am sure that looks good on me. But at the same time, I realize that me not having any interest on my credit card at all means that I just inflate my score by spending money I already have, but charging the credit card company?
How is this affecting my credit score, and if it is affecting it negatively, how would I go about making it so that my credit score improves. having had only 1 year of real world experience i want some advice from veterans so that i can make better choices.
Sounds like you are doing the correct thing. If you want to maximize your credit score, the trick is to make sure you have a small non-zero balance when your statement posts and then pay that off right away.
One of the largest factors affecting your credit score is something called revolving debt utilization. Basically you can think of this as the percentage of your maximum credit limit(s) youâve actually used up. You want that number as close to zero as possible- the only trouble with leaving a balance at exactly zero all the time is that if it is reported at zero for too many months in a row some scoring models stop counting that particular account in your favor.
So ideally in a perfect world youâd have some tiny purchase on each of your credit cards once per month, wait until your statement posts (ie you get your bill) so that the credit card company reports it to the credit bureaus, and then pay your bills in full so that no interest ever accrues. If you happen to put more on your credit card on some particular month, try to pay it down to not quite zero before your statement posts, then pay it off after the statement hits.
The interesting thing is that it doesnât really matter what your maximum credit limits are when you follow this behavior. Having higher limits only helps your credit score when you are carrying balances for more than a month- which isnât really something you want to be doing anyway if you can avoid it because of interest.
Btw, your credit card company isnât really Mastercard, it is whichever bank issued the card to you. Mastercard and Visa donât issue credit cards directly, only through some other bank that actually owns your account (so like Citi, or Chase, or your local bank for example). Amex (usually) and Discover (always) on the other hand do issue cards directly.
Hope Iâve explained that clearly- what Iâve typed looks a little wordy but I donât have a lot of time to edit at the moment.
One of my biggest gripes with credit score is how paying off debts actually hurts your credit score which makes the system inherently biased towards people who operate as debt slaves. The biggest factors affecting your credit are:
Age, number, and amount of your accounts
The amount of debt you carry on your revolving credit and your debt to income ratio
Your income
The number of hard inquiries made (as in applications to new credit)
Negative issues (late payments, turned over to collections, etc)
Just make payments on time and every so often get them to increase your credit limit. Even if you never use it pushing your credit limit up + the age of your account increasing will slowly build up your credit.
you are correct and the magic number you are looking for is less than 30% of your credit limit per month. as long as you have less than 30% of your limit on your card when the statement comes then you are doing it right.
Is anyone investing in gold right now? It was trading at record lows a month ago, and with the stock market going nuts, it seems like a good investment at the moment.
yea when the market and/or the economy are in bad shape, gold usually thrives, its the ultimate insurance policy. many investors say you should have gold as part of your portfolio.
as for a good place to invest in gold, the most streamline, affordable way to do it is with the ETF GLD. you kind of already missed a nice little ride this past couple weeks. it was as low as like 102 per share, now its up to 110.
I think Iâm going to invest in actual bullion, rather than gold etf. If the gold etf fails, I donât think you have a claim on any assets, which defeats the purpose of buying gold.
Fiscal policy is pretty annoying right now because the stock market is over-inflated and going nuts, and you canât really generate any money with savings accounts of any kind.
Gold literally seems like the only reasonable thing right now. I contribute enough to get the company match for 401k at work, but otherwise donât mess too much with the market. Speculating on stocks isnât my job.
I did see earlier in the page that someone was getting good interest on their savings at a credit union, so Iâm looking into that. Might also help when I buy a home in the future.
I also donât exactly trust gold ETF either, because if the value of the dollar plunges what can you trade the ETF for exactly? IMO gold is a good hedge against inflation, but isnât a great investment once you are already balls deep in inflation, unless you are afraid inflation will get much worse. Also there are quite a few shady gold dealers so I would be wary of buying gold from just anyone.
I donât know much about commodities really, but given that the price of gold seems to be driven so much by perceived value rather than intrinsic value I kind of get the impression investing in gold has a lot of the same issues investing in stock does.
Makes me wonder why people who ârun to goldâ donât run to other tangible commodities. Or do they and they just keep it quiet?
Wow, this thread makes me feel like a hippie. Iâm a concept artist/illustrator. I have a diploma but it matters jack shit in the art world. Itâs a completely different world than regular business/degree oriented jobs. I know a few people who create 2D assets for shitty android games, but they do a ridiculous amount of them and end up making anywhere from 60-70K a year. Itâs just a shitload of workâŚyet you get to work from home in your underpants.
Iâm trying to go from videogame to film concept art. Thatâs where the real cheese lies.
My FAFSA will take four weeks to process, meaning Iâll have to pay for my own books for the first time. Thankfully, itâs only $100 or so, meaning I wonât have to come out with $400+ as I did one year for books I actually needed, and I also found out about a site where I can order my books at a significantly cheaper price. I did manage to enroll into a class I needed for both an Upper Level GEP credit and Culture credit, and dropped another course in its place, but re-enrolled into the class I dropped since the both credit class required me to buy about five books. My schedule is settled now and all is well financially (aside from paying out of pocket for books), but I hope being part-time wonât ruin my FAFSA when Iâm just trying to settling into the new environment. Yesterday, a friend and I took a tour around the campus to find out where my classes were.
A co-worker and I discussed today about how college isnât really a âgateway to successâ as well; his sister is a hairdresser and assists with weddings on the side, so she makes about $1000 a day. His cousins are also doctors and nurses as well. Though I became hesitant about transferring to a university because I didnât feel mentally prepared, it was my decision to transfer in the first place and I didnât want to put off school as Iâve done with important matters such as getting my license. Plus, I felt I needed more than an AA in my possession, and the proper training and credentials to achieve my goals. However, Iâve been wondering what can I do with my writing, since I write reviews and original fiction from time to time, while enjoying video-editing and art.
this semester all my classes went for the latest editions. No one had a decent used rate, in fact two were more expensive used than new. And these are books im going to actually keep and reference in the future.
How many classes did you take? I feel you on schools only selling the latest issues, thus forcing you to put out more cash. Iâm buying my books tomorrow and calculated that I should have to pay $117 or so (if tax is included). Had I stuck with the double credit course, I wouldâve been paying about $180 or so for books.
I checked out textbooks from the library or pirated books all through college. I only bought books my first semester. Book buying is a racket. This is especially true for classes like Calculus and Algebra. I used a 15 year old book from the library for trigonometry, and it was exactly the same as the 150 buck new edition. Itâs not as though trigonometry has changed much in the last 50 years anyway. You also might consider a book a few editions back to save some paper from half.com.