Credit Score Slaves

[merime]

In a thread I had started about an elderly woman who was able to live well after defaulting on her credit cards. She was able to rent an apartment ,(in a really nice area ), purchase a car all without even knowing her credit score. In past generations before the internet , people lived their daily lives without credit cards. Progress is sometimes a catch 22 sort of thing. Technology makes so many things easier and not all of that is a good thing. Even when you log on to this site the first thing you see is free credit score. i wonder how many people in their 70s know or care about their score. We all have become slaves to our credit score. Some feel it going down is as serious as a heart attack. My God, if anyone has ever lost a child to cancer or gone missing-that is tragedy/the unbearable/the unthinkable. That is life altering. Credit scores are not .

[IamOld]

AGREED. THe credit score has become a form of social control of the population.

[ryan]

Very true. I haven't had cards, other than debit ones for over a year and a half.

It's been fine.... of course I have not had to buy anything major that would require a minimum credit score. When everything blew up for me, I remembered thinking I was 25 years old before I got my first credit card. By then I had a house, a car and other things. How did I get those things without credit cards and no prior credit purchases?

A good credit score, while nice, I doubt will be critical the balance of my life. My car is paid for, and pretty nice. I really only need to rent a home in the future...which may be helped by a good credit score, but all these other penalties i constantly read about I just don't see. My insurance is no higher even though I recently changed companies, bank treats me the same, opened a new bank acct recently - no problem.

I honestly believe credit scores may serve as more of threat by lenders, than a benefit for consumers.

[IamOld]

Ryan, you're quite right!!! Of course if you look a the "mainstream" media, it is touted as THE way to measure you as a human being...hence my comment about it being a form of social control of the masses.

[DebtHater]

She was able to rent an apartment ,(in a really nice area ), purchase a car all without even knowing her credit score.

It's easy to rent an apartment and buy a car with a low credit score.

Most private landlords rent with out checking your credit.

No one checks your credit when you buy a car. Then only check it when you try to get a loan to buy it.

[merime]

I can not believe how many people are scared to death of bad credit. I think it is no different than 60 years ago when people in debt jumped off bridges. we live in fear of collection calls, summons and creditors contacting family. In many ways its no difference than old fashion loan sharks. I have about $100,000 in bad credit credit card debt , but today I actually got approved for a car loan- a 2011 Mazda 6 just by EXPLAINING MY SITUATION. The shocker was that my interest rate would be no different than than my nieces who we were actually looking into cars for. She has steller credit-LOL. Of course I am not going to take out a car loan, but its sure nice to know that the door is not slammed shut and locked on my life because of a silly credit score.

[sunshinepa]

It's funny how many people worry about it. Five years ago, I had 25,000 in savings, was loving my retirement and had a score of 840. Then I spent a long time nursing my father at home with brain cancer, slowly watching the life drain out of him. My son lost his job, had no unemployment due to being self contracted and I used up all my savings helping him and over the two years he could not even get hired at WalMart or McDonalds I went into debt running two households. At the same time I was spending what felt like 48 hrs. a day caring for my dad.

Guess what..........I am awaiting discharge and would not change helping my son. And if going further into debt would have helped my dad have more time here on earth, I would have done that, gave up my house and all my possessions to keep him with us. What is a credit score but a number.........I will survive without credit cards and that big number. Heck, if I didn't have that big score, I would not have had access to over 200,000 dollars and have used 58,000 of credit. Granted, I would have had to go back to work, hire my father full time home care and my son and his family would have been living under a bridge somewhere in NJ. So does that score mean anything to me.............H_ll NO!

Because in the end, family, friends and good health are the most important things in life! And I wish them all to the folks on this forum!!!

[merime]

best post I have ever read

that is what I am talking about!!! God bless you and all that is dear to you!!!!

[catleg]

I call that "monetizing your credit score". :-)

[dman]

I think it's good to be aware of credit reports, scoring, how it affects you, etc. Perhaps you discover that if your score was 50 points higher, you'd save $20/mo on your car insurance premium. You discover that you can get a loan and pay $XXX in the course of one year, which will probably (but NOT definitely) raise your score 60-80 points. You may decide that it's worth it to basically pay for a better score. Or...you could simply shop around for a better insurance rate.

Saw a letter the other day...car dealership congratulating on a discharge...and stressing how important it was to get a new car loan right away to help rebuild your credit. It went on to say that even if you were still paying on your existing auto loan, it may no longer be reporting to the credit bureaus, and your credit score would suffer (so...basically you needed to run down to the dealership and trade it in!). Sad thing is...it probably works on a lot of people.

[merime]

I am not going to be a credit slave. Besides I do not have the luxury of being able to do anything to fix it.