First credit card

inthezeroroom

WillPS said:

inthezeroroom said:

Yeah, you don't need a credit card. You just need to pay off the debts you have as quick as you can. The danger with balance transfers (if it were even possible in this case) is that they make you feel like you 'did something' or 'paid off your debts', which you didn't; you just moved them.

Sorry if that's stating the obvious.

It's far quicker to pay off debt when no interest is being charged than it is to pay off a debt when 20-40% interest is being applied.

But people don't pay it off quicker. Instead they relax and use the interest-free period, and then forget (or are unable) to transfer again. The CC providers know this; they don't offer 0% because they're nice people.

By all means, transfer to 0% especially if it's a free transfer, and then immediately cancel the original card – how many people do that?

WillPS

inthezeroroom said:

WillPS said:

inthezeroroom said:

Yeah, you don't need a credit card. You just need to pay off the debts you have as quick as you can. The danger with balance transfers (if it were even possible in this case) is that they make you feel like you 'did something' or 'paid off your debts', which you didn't; you just moved them.

Sorry if that's stating the obvious.

It's far quicker to pay off debt when no interest is being charged than it is to pay off a debt when 20-40% interest is being applied.

But people don't pay it off quicker. Instead they relax and use the interest-free period, and then forget (or are unable) to transfer again. The CC providers know this; they don't offer 0% because they're nice people.

By all means, transfer to 0% especially if it's a free transfer, and then immediately cancel the original card – how many people do that?

I have no data to hand other than to say I have done exactly this many times, and also helped friends and family who have reported to do the same.

Paying more to service a debt just to avoid the potential of creating more debt is not money saving.

inthezeroroom

WillPS said:

inthezeroroom said:

WillPS said:

inthezeroroom said:

Yeah, you don't need a credit card. You just need to pay off the debts you have as quick as you can. The danger with balance transfers (if it were even possible in this case) is that they make you feel like you 'did something' or 'paid off your debts', which you didn't; you just moved them.

Sorry if that's stating the obvious.

It's far quicker to pay off debt when no interest is being charged than it is to pay off a debt when 20-40% interest is being applied.

But people don't pay it off quicker. Instead they relax and use the interest-free period, and then forget (or are unable) to transfer again. The CC providers know this; they don't offer 0% because they're nice people.

By all means, transfer to 0% especially if it's a free transfer, and then immediately cancel the original card – how many people do that?

I have no data to hand other than to say I have done exactly this many times, and also helped friends and family who have reported to do the same.

Paying more to service a debt just to avoid the potential of creating more debt is not money saving.

If you've done this many times then it clearly hasn't worked. The idea is to get out of debt and stay out of debt. I don't meant to pick a fight, and I've probably made more mistakes with money than you have, but I didn't get out of debt until I stopped trying to be clever and actually paid it off.