Poor folks in a 100% Chapter 13 - Journey Thread

[Carmella]

Renting cars was a challenge, I found Enterprise would often rent cars in their small local offices (i.e. away from airports) when one only has a debit card; when I really needed a car when I was on the road I would take either an Uber or local transportation to an Enterprise office and rent from there. Last year after my discharge I went out and plunked down $5,000 for a secured credit card so I made darn sure I could rent a car where and when I wanted to. Of course Mr. Murphy (of Murphy's Law) had something to say about my move, COVID put a complete halt to my traveling, and now, nearly two years after my discharge, I have yet to rent a car.

Enterprise had no problem at all renting me a car for 30 days using my Debit card.

[Carmella]

womanonfire In the beginning I wanted to get a credit card to help build credit, but then I waned on that issue.

Do you have all the terms of your Chapter 13? In ours we can only have $500 each in debt. That put me off on getting a card right away and then as time has gone on I think about it, but am not in a rush. Maybe next year closer to the finish line I will. I never asked the attorney what that $500 meant. I don't know if that means you can have a higher limit, but only charge up to $500. Although if we even would qualify we would probably start at the bare minimum which I think is $300.

I have used the services online like Afterpay or Klarna to buy things in payments without any interest and automatically deducted from my account. They also have a "one time credit card" which provides you with a credit number, expiration, etc so you can charge something online, but it's actually the service, I think it's Klarna where I used that to buy my husband a game system bundle for $299 for Christmas which was a "steal of a deal" I have 4 payments one every two weeks to pay it off. It's half paid off already. I haven't asked the attorney about this if it counts as debt, my GUT feeling (not legal reason) is that since I am allowed the cell phone "payment plan" that these are also payment plans. I am still cautious keeping it under $500 just in case.

I figure credit is going to suck through the BK and in our case we didn't think we would need credit to buy anything. But now we have to replace the totaled car and thru that process I found out my credit score was 528 and my husband's was 530. We were able to get credit for a car loan at 11% interest which I think is acceptable, if not very good for our position since another bank was offering 20%.

I feel like we are kinda of stuck waiting to rebuild credit and I probably should start thinking about a secured card.

I really wish even though we, collectively, went into Chapter 13 indicating there are credit problems that if we are paying our Chapter 13 payments timely it should count as something positive. If we make it through to the end it should boost our credit score. It really stinks that I am paying almost 1/2 of my paycheck to Chapter 13, paying on two cars and made the mortgage and still making HEL payments and cannot get credit for paying timely. I know BK is for the creditors benefit more than ours, but it would be "nice" if we could at least get credit once we get out of Chapter 13 some little bump in credit with extra credit for making it through!

[womanonfire]

No we do not have all the terms of it yet. Where would that be? It is not mentioned in the plan.

[shipo]

Enterprise had no problem at all renting me a car for 30 days using my Debit card.

Agreed, it seems the only Enterprise locations which will not rent to you with a Debit Card are the locations near a major airport.

[shipo]

I feel like we are kinda of stuck waiting to rebuild credit and I probably should start thinking about a secured card.

I didn't even know secured credit cards were a thing until after my discharge; had I known early on, I would have definitely jumped on one in a heart beat.

[flashoflight]

Another pro tip to handle car rentals: Get into Navy Federal and get their secured card. It still comes with car rental collision damage waiver. Not a single predatory card I'm aware of has CDW anymore. One of my unsecured predatory cards did have CDW but it disappeared during the pandemic.

[womanonfire]

I'm with a CU and I'm going to ask them about this! Thanks!

[shipo]

Another pro tip to handle car rentals: Get into Navy Federal and get their secured card. It still comes with car rental collision damage waiver. Not a single predatory card I'm aware of has CDW anymore. One of my unsecured predatory cards did have CDW but it disappeared during the pandemic.

If I recall correctly, the secured card I got from TDBank also had CDW. I think I've also read the secured card from FNBO has it as well; but don't quote me on that.

[flashoflight]

If I recall correctly, the secured card I got from TDBank also had CDW. I think I've also read the secured card from FNBO has it as well; but don't quote me on that.

I took a quick look at TDBank and it appears CDW is only for the business card. Even the consumer Visa Signature doesn't have CDW. FNBO doesn't appear to offer CDW either.

Ollo, Mission Lane, Credit One, Aspire, Apple Card, and Indigo do not have CDW. That's most of the CH13 friendly lenders outside of Navy.

[shipo]

Well that's annoying; I checked my Benefits for the TDCash card from 2020 compared to this year and not only has the CDW disappeared, FTFs (foreign transaction fees) have been added.

[justbroke]

When it came to rentals, I had an interesting experience. I was able to rent from Hertz, AVIS, and National/Enterprise with my Business Debit Card from PayPal. In fact, that card saved my travel life many times as they allowed me to have up to a $1,000 authorization without hitting my checking account! I had no trouble renting from any of the majors with that PayPal debit card at all.

(I used that debit card for everything from airline tickets, to hotel, to rentals. As I wrote, I eventually obtained a secured card, but I still used the PayPal for some things. Besides, I was grandfathered at 1.5% cash back on PayPal debit for the last 10+ years!)

I get primary coverage from AMEX but only if I decline all those additional things (CDW, PAI, etc). AMEX then adds a charge of $12-25** to cover a rental with a rental period of up to 42 days. The nice thing is they cover up to $100,000 and some of the cars that I rent were certainly approaching that value.

I enjoy secondary coverage on my VISA Signature cards. But, most of the VISA/MC CDW coverage is secondary only. Additionally, this secondary coverage is only for up to 15 days, whereas AMEX is 42 days and primary but for a modest fee. (I actually never purchased CDW because my company had contracts with the major rental companies and we didn't need to purchase CDW for corporate or our own personal leisure rentals.)

** price varies by State. Florida it's $12.25 ($75,000 coverage) - $15.25 ($100,000 coverage) for the entire rental period of up to 42 days.