how much credit card debt do you have? do tell please

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The first rule is you never spend money you don't have.
Zero balance

+1

Oh my gosh, you're right! How come I never thought of that! So what I should have done between 2008 and 2010 when we were underemployed and in dire financial straits is just used all the money I had to pay for my necessities (bills, groceries, health insurance, medical bills)!

Oh...but I didn't have enough money to pay for my basic needs and blew through savings.

And before you get all "don't live above your means" I can assure you that with a new baby, no maternity insurance, and spotty employment despite trying, you can easily make $3k a month and then need to spend $800 a month on other needs. Over a few years, that adds up.

Exactly! I will never get sick or get laid off so that I never have a situation where my monthly bills exceed my income. If only those with two years of living expenses saved could have children, the US would be seriously underpopulated.

[Anonymous]

Zero - family of 4. We got up to about $16k right after we first got married and we said NEVER AGAIN!

[Anonymous]

$4500, but I claimed bankruptcy in 2009. otherwise, would be more like $50,000.

[Anonymous]

zero balance

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I need someone to make me feel like we are not the only family (5) struggling with this. We get it down it just creeps right back up and Christmas is bad. I try to save really do but it's not there.

We use our credit cards as cash flow and so we don't have to carry around large amounts of cash. They are paid off every month. I am risk adverse and thrifty- so I cannot carry a balance from one month to the next. I did this when I had a credit card with a $500 max in college (1980's) up to now. It just doesn't make sense to me to charge things I know I will not be able to cover.

[Anonymous]

Zero, paid off our mortgage early and no car payments as well. It's a lifestyle choice.

[Anonymous]

None. Never have had any. Have no debt of any kind now. Are your daily expenses too high for your income, or are you impulse spenders?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:30k but we make over 360k I think the rule is less then 10% or something like that is ok. THe interest rate is very low under 9% but if it did go up we'd just pay them off.

No way. Carrying that kind of debt really slows your net worth growth.

[Anonymous]

$9k

[Anonymous]

About $38K thanks to our old POS house. We have a plan to pay every card down within 3 years - should make a $13-15K dent this year.

[Anonymous]

I'd like to know about the 360/30k poster- why in the world would you carry debt because you could- but not because you had to?

I pay off my credit cards every month and also use them as a "flow of cash" to get rewards and because they're more secure than debit or notes. But I understand that there are many, many people who live paycheck to paycheck and cannot afford emergencies- and therefore must resort to credit to get by when something comes up.

[Anonymous]

"None. Never have had any. Have no debt of any kind now. Are your daily expenses too high for your income, or are you impulse spenders?"

I also have zero, but I do realize that I'm lucky that I make enough money, and have never experienced any real financial emergencies, so that I've been able to set aside a substantial savings to cover me - at least for awhile - in case anything bad does happen.

[Anonymous]

400k hhi about 39k, fuck it

[Anonymous]

We pay it off every month. If we make a big purchase (say $500 or more) most places will have 0% financing deals....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:0! Why would anyone ever carry a cc balance?

+1

I use the credit card for everything and get reward points for cash back & pay off the balance bi-monthly.

How do people get such high cc debt, don't they get their card declined? Do they have a huge amount of cards - if so that's just asking for trouble (however I understand how money/bills can really add up so I hope those that have the debt can stick to a plan to pay it off and I'm sorry for your stress).