Oh, what a momentous day! I just checked the balance on my two credit card accounts, and both read $0.00. Ali and I have finally emerged from credit card debt! For all of you who haven't shared this burden, I congratulate you. It is a hell from which we have now emerged.My credit card history is a long and exciting one, so I'll regale you all with the story! Like many before and since, I got my first credit card during freshman orientation in college at Notre Dame. I'll never forget my first credit card purchase - the Totally 80's double CD set!!! What a great purchase! Throughout college, I had a nice $500 limit on my Citibank card. I never had any problem paying it off every month. That pattern continued through grad school and my first job. I had a zero balance when I started medical school in 1999. I also had a pretty new Platinum card and a very sizable limit, as the credit card companies continued to entice me to make larger and larger purchases.
Unfortunately, med school gives you a meager living expense stipend that inevitably would run out 6 weeks before the next loan check arrived. Unlike law school (I'm not bitter), med students do service projects in the summer for free, and attend clinics year around after the second year, so we can't earn any cash. So I would resort to using the credit cards to pay utility bills, car payments and even buy groceries. When Ali and I got married, we needed a honeymoon - thanks Citibank! Of course, the balance grew. The end result was a significant amount of debt.
We did the smart thing and did a giant balance transfer to a new American Express Blue card - with 0% interest on balance transfers. We slowly paid it down while making only rare credit card purchases from there on out. Finally, we paid it off last month! So now I will happily close out that AMEX Blue card and put the old Citibank card away. Screw those companies and their ever increasing interest rates. I will be very happy to use my debit card! Secretly though, don't we all long for the final scene from Fight Club? You know I do!
5 comments:
The flip side of that coin is that if you never carrier a balance on your credit lines your credit score actually goes down. Also, opening and closing credit lines for short durations (< 2 years) to, say, transfer balances, also lowers your credit score. To have the highest credit score possible you want long-standing accounts that consistently carrier lower balances to prove that your are a responsible customer. But that's a small price to pay for not having to make interest only payments month after month...
Oh, to be debt free. I have had a zero balance on my credit card - kept around to avoid just what Ian is talking about - for a few years now. But that is little comfort in the face of all my law school loans. If it's not one place, it's another...
Hear me and be amazed- I have never had a credit card balance that I have not paid off at the end of the month. That's right, not once have I ever not been able to pay my credit card balance. So I say thanks mom and dad for paying my living expenses during grad school and teaching me that credit cards are the devil.
I never said anything about DEBT FREE! We still have med school loans, but those are "good debts". Very low interest, long repayment, not factored into credit score calculations.
You want to shoot yourself in the mouth and permanantly become Edward Norton?? :confused:
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