الثلاثاء، 18 أكتوبر 2016
These Benefits Might Make You Want to Quit Your Job and Work for Nielsen
The first 2016 U.S. Presidential debate ended up attracting 84 million viewers.
That’s a record number.
Compare that to Super Bowl 50, which glued 111.9 million viewers to the TV. (That was the Carolina Panthers versus the Denver Broncos one.) The reunion episodes of “The Real Housewives of New York” averaged some 2 million viewers.
How am I, the queen of mathematical anxiety, pulling these numbers?
The Nielsen Company, of course.
You’ve heard of Nielsen. It’s the company that’s been tracking what people watch, listen to and buy since 1923.
Nearly 100 years later, the company’s still thriving — and, even better, it’s hiring tons of field representatives across the U.S.
This isn’t your typical work-from-your-home-office gig. As a Nielsen field service representative, you’ll visit and manage Nielsen households near you.
Become a Field Service Representative for The Nielsen Company
Basically, Nielsen pays panel members to be tracked. But it’s not that creepy. The company just wants to know what your consumer behavior is like — what TV shows you watch, what’s in your fridge and what apps you use on your phone.
That’s how the company manages to pop out ratings.
This is where field service representatives come in. You don’t have to be tracked, but you do have to work with the families and households who are.
As a field service rep, you’ll make home visits to install, maintain, troubleshoot and demonstrate the equipment.
Be nice, because you’ll need to maintain these relationships and collect and report demographics and audience analytics. You should be comfortable chatting it up — maybe even sometimes turning into an impromptu salesperson when needed.
Why Work for The Nielsen Company?
The perks are pretty sweet. You’ll be required to spend six weeks in a training program near Tampa, Florida.
But wait, you naysayers. The training is paid, and housing and transportation is provided.
Once that’s over, you’ll return home, where you don’t have to report to an office, and you’ll work flexible hours — including evening hours and weekends. You’ll also get a company car (totally feeling like Oprah right now) with insurance, gas and maintenance included.
Even more: Your comprehensive benefits package goes into effect your first day and includes medical, dental and vision insurance — plus a 401(k).
You’ll also get a laptop and all the required techie things. Oh, and compensation starts at $36,400 with $3,000 regional pay differences.
Am I Qualified to Get This Job — and Those Insane Benefits?
You’ll need some past experience with consumer electronics and to have some knowledge of software systems and networking.
And finally, for you Windows peeps: This position requires PC proficiency (how ’bout them apples?).
A bachelor’s degree — in anything — is preferred but not required, though a high school diploma is. You should also have a valid driver’s license.
For all the qualifications and more details on the position, visit The Nielsen Company’s career page. Search “field service representatives” and more than 500 results pop up. Check to see if your city is hiring.
Want more flexible job opportunities? Visit our Facebook jobs page.
Your Turn: Have you ever had your TV watching habits tracked by the Nielsen Company?
Carson Kohler (@CarsonKohler) is a junior writer at The Penny Hoarder. After recently completing graduate school, she focuses on saving money — and surviving the move back in with her parents.
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Could You Score $25 Off $75 Worth of Groceries? Here’s How to Find Out
I absolutely love grocery shopping.
In fact, I just went last night — and I’ve got the warm and fuzzies just thinking about my newly full fridge, to say nothing of the simple, domestic bliss of carefully selecting the perfect red bell pepper or getting seasonally appropriate sugar pumpkins for 99 cents apiece.
(This might be why I write a lot of The Penny Hoarder’s posts about food.)
Despite an obsession with shopping for and preparing food that would make Martha proud, I realize that not everyone shares my joy when faced with the supermarket.
When you work all day, schlep the kids all over creation and still make time for a side hustle, shopping can feel like another chore waiting to be crossed off your jam-packed list.
Maybe you’ve written off grocery delivery services as a too-expensive luxury. Understandable… although that isn’t always the case.
But if you’ve been waiting to give grocery delivery a try, you might — might — be in luck.
Get $25 off Your First $75+ Order From Amazon Fresh
Amazon’s offering a pretty sweet deal on its grocery delivery service, AmazonFresh… but there are a few big “ifs” involved.
The service is only for Amazon Prime customers who’ve never used Fresh before, and it’s only in select markets.
How select? Although Amazon doesn’t have a comprehensive list of eligible regions, we played with its location search tool to sleuth it out.
Of course, many of the usual suspects are covered — New York, Boston, LA, San Francisco.
But surprisingly, DC isn’t eligible, nor is Chicago… although Philadelphia and its suburbs are.
Throw your own zip code into Fresh’s front page pop-up to see if your city makes the cut. Unfortunately, our own St. Pete does not… otherwise, I definitely would have taken advantage of this deal!
Another thing? AmazonFresh isn’t a free service, even for Prime members.
In fact, it’s pretty darn pricy: $14.99 per month, on top of the $99 annual charge for Prime! Yeesh.
But the grocery deal’s a good one, and especially as holiday stress sets in, we could all benefit from feeling like kings and queens for a day. So if you want to take advantage of the deal, here’s what I’d recommend:
- If you’re not already an Amazon Prime customer, start your 30-day free trial here. The site specifies that free trial Prime members are still eligible to take advantage of the Fresh deal!
- Then, start your AmazonFresh 30-day free trial, so you can nab the $25 off $75 grocery delivery deal.
- Put your order in ASAP. The offer expires at 11:59 PT on Dec. 31, 2016 — or whenever all the promotional codes are used. Plus, the rules specify you need to claim the offer within seven days of opening your free trial anyway, and the longer you wait, the more likely you are to forget to cancel your trial. So jump on it!
- Use the promo code FRESH25 at checkout to claim the discount.
- Then, either set a calendar reminder to cancel your free trial(s) — or cancel them right then and there. If you don’t, you’re looking at a $10.99 monthly charge for Prime, and a $14.99 monthly charge for Fresh on top of it. That would be a costly error if you don’t plan on using the service!
Of course, maybe the convenience of having your groceries delivered is worth a monthly $15 to you — in which case, have at it, and enjoy the introductory deal! We all have our splurges, after all.
A couple of caveats to keep in mind: You can’t use Amazon gift cards to make the purchase, and you can’t use it for orders containing alcohol. (But you can use your rewards credit card to earn travel points or cash back!)
You’ll also need to purchase all your items in a single order and ship them to to a single address.
Even if it’s just a one-time thing, $25 off $75 worth of groceries is a pretty darn awesome deal.
And for many of us, the luxury of having someone else walk the aisles in your stead is almost a holiday miracle. It’s certainly worth canceling a couple of free trials for.
Meanwhile, I’ll be busy applying to become a shopper for Fresh, Shipt, Peapod or another of their ilk. Hey, making money off your quirks is what penny hoarding’s all about — right?
Your Turn: Can — and will — you take advantage of this AmazonFresh promotion?
Jamie Cattanach is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. The grocery store is her happy place. Find @JamieCattanach on Twitter to wave hello.
Disclosure: This one time, Kyle came into the office with $6 worth of Taco Bell that he planned to eat over the course of three meals. By clicking the affiliate links in this post, you help us help Kyle seriously ease up on the Taco Bell.
The post Could You Score $25 Off $75 Worth of Groceries? Here’s How to Find Out appeared first on The Penny Hoarder.
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Study: Stock Markets Favor Clinton Victory
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Government axes plans for secondary annuities market
The government has ditched plans to create a secondary market for annuities, which would have allowed pensioners to sell their retirement income for a lump sum.
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Handling Financially Irresponsible People
One of the greatest challenges for people attempting to adopt or maintain a life of financial responsibility is the presence of financially irresponsible people in their lives. You have people who leverage social pressure to convince you to make bad spending choices or adopt bad financial habits. You have people who leverage their relationship with you in order to convince you to give them money. You have people who will ask to borrow money and never repay it. You might even have people who will directly access your funds and use them for unwanted things.
Regardless of how diligent you are about your own good financial choices, these things can seriously disrupt your financial progress. That’s because, in each and every case, financially irresponsible people can leverage aspects of your life beyond your finances to encourage you to make poor financial choices. They can leverage family, romantic, social, and even professional areas of your life to subtly (and not-so-subtly) push you toward poor money behavior.
The dilemma that many people feel in these situations is that they feel as though they’re having to choose between money and people and that it feels wrong to choose the money. Here’s the thing: the money you have is almost always the result of your personal hard work and hard choices. You made a lot of sacrifices to earn that money. If you had spent it foolishly, you wouldn’t have that money. By using it in a foolish way or giving it to someone who would spend it foolishly, you’re not wasting your money, you’re wasting your life. You’re sacrificing all of the hard choices and hard work that it took to improve your financial state.
I should know – I’ve made many of those kinds of mistakes. I’ve spent money to “keep up” with friends. I’ve given money to friends and family, knowing that it would never be paid back (and sometimes hoping that it would, only to be disappointed). I’ve had my spouse spend more than I expected (and, honestly, I’ve done the same to my spouse in the past, I’m sure). I’ve had people tap my personal relationship with them to ask for money or to invite my wife (it’s always my wife) to a “party” where social pressure is used to convince her to buy overpriced goods.
Every single one of those things was a mistake. Every single one of those things happened as a result of letting financially irresponsible people have too much of a stake in my life.
So, I started limiting that stake. In general, I took one of two approaches: I either found ways to minimize the ability of financially irresponsible people to affect my finances or I gently minimized their role in my life. Here are some of the specific strategies I’ve used or that I recommend for people in those situations.
Financially Irresponsible Spouses
Many financially responsible people are stuck with financially irresponsible spouses. This can happen in several ways, but the most common routes include a person having a financial epiphany after marriage that isn’t shared by the spouse or someone getting married while believing that he or she can change their spouse. Both are problematic and both require difficult solutions.
First and foremost, the two key elements to any rough edge in a marriage is communication and compromise. You have to be willing and able to talk about the subject and to do that without anger or personal attacks. If you can’t have a civil discussion about a rough edge in your marriage without resorting to a screaming match with personal attacks being thrown back and forth, you need to seek a marriage counselor who can help you reach a point where you can have civil conversations with the type of communication that a healthy marriage needs.
Once you’re able to sit down and discuss the issue in a healthy fashion, the thing to realize is that this isn’t an issue of “right” or “wrong,” but differing values. A person who is financially minded simply values things in a different way than someone who is not, but that’s not to say that either person is inherently wrong. The solution is to find a compromise that works well for both of you. One good solution is to set up a budget that allows each partner to have money that they can freely spend on personal things, gifts, hobbies – whatever he or she wishes – but said money has a monthly cap so that there can still be positive financial progress made.
The main issue that can undermine this is trust. If one partner or the other willfully and repeatedly violates an agreement that the two of you have, then there is a deep trust issue in the relationship, one that is likely a sign of some deeper relationship issues. Again, I recommend speaking to a marriage counselor before jumping to any further steps, but lack of trust between partners is something that needs to be fixed as soon as possible before it can completely corrode the relationship.
Financially Irresponsible Parents
Some people unfortunately find themselves in a situation where their parents are financially irresponsible. In some cases, the parents directly ask for financial assistance from their children; in many other cases, parents will overspend and just have an unspoken assumption that if the worst case results happen, their children will take care of them.
Many children go along with this out of a sense of not being ungrateful to their parents, who raised them and (hopefully) protected them through their childhood. Still, it places a real financial burden on the children as they have to deal with the financial demands of their parents while still keeping their own financial ship afloat.
Communication is absolutely vital here. If you don’t communicate, both sides will continue to operate with unspoken assumptions and such assumptions will eventually come to bear, resulting in a very nasty conflict that can easily damage relationships. If your parents tell you to your face that they are not expecting to rely on you in any way, then follow through with it.
Even with that type of communication, however, many children face intense guilt if their parents are struggling financially. What do you do in that situation, where their struggles aren’t just an imagined future, but today’s reality?
First of all, look for non-financial ways to help. Help them with household chores. Help them with budgeting. Help them with running errands and shopping. You may even go further and help them by cohabitating. Those are ways you can help without simply throwing money at the problem.
If you decide that you do wish to help, budget for it. Figure out carefully how much you can afford to give them and then plan for it. Don’t simply open your wallet on the spur of the moment unless that money is coming from the flexible spending part of your budget. If you’re going to consistently help, you need to plan for it starting right now.
I also strongly discourage loans, which is something that’s going to pop up a few more times in this article. Don’t lend money to family members or friends, ever. If you’re going to open your wallet and hand over money, do it as a gift, not as a loan. Acting as a lender to people in your life makes your relationship into a lender-borrower one and no one has warm feelings for their banker.
The most important thing to remember is that you do not have to help. Sometimes, relationships can become demanding and controlling and negative and those are things you never need in your life, even if it is your parents. Don’t be afraid to walk away from a negative situation.
Financially Irresponsible Adult Children
What if it’s your children that are financially irresponsible? Perhaps they ask for money constantly or even have a regular stipend from you. Maybe they even live at home without adequately contributing to the finances of your household. How can you handle this?
For starters, it’s important to remember that they’re the young ones with many years of life ahead of them. They’re the ones with energy and with lots of earnings potential. They also have the capacity to take a low-wage job – they don’t have to keep holding out for some kind of perfect job. (I certainly didn’t – one of my first jobs was literally shoveling dirt.)
In other words, you can cut them off. Young people have the energy to find a way to make things work in their life. They can find an entry-level job or two. They can find an apartment for themselves. They can balance their own budget. They can find resources to help them make ends meet if needed. In fact, they need to do such things, as it’s part of learning how to live.
I recommend giving your children a cut-off date. Let them know that financial changes are coming in the fairly near future and that they need to take action to deal with the changes. They need to find a job. They need to find an apartment. They need to adjust their budget to live without that deposit into their checking account.
At the same time, offer as much non-financial support as you can give. Ask them if they want help, and if they do, dive in. Help them find an apartment if they want that help. Help them seek a job if they want that help. Help them move out. Offer as much advice as you can if they ask and give them an open door for that advice. Some children will want this; others won’t. Just make sure you’re available.
Often, children need that final push to finally get out of the nest and find their own path to financial responsibility.
Financially Irresponsible Extended Family Members
What about the uncles and cousins and adult siblings and other people in your life that might have a financial impact on you? What do you do when your brother or your niece knock on your door, asking for a loan or some other help?
First of all, don’t loan money to family members. Don’t. Ever. Avoid it. You do not want a lender-borrower relationship with extended family members. For one, there’s a good chance you won’t be able to get them to pay you back. For another, that lack of payback is going to cause a family rift that will cause problems for many years to come. It’s a story that happens over and over and over again, and it’s never worth it. Don’t lend money to extended family members. Don’t.
Instead, openly offer non-financial help. Give that person a ride to work. Give that person some advice. Help that person find a job. Invite them over for dinner. Provide an ear for them to talk to and a shoulder for them to cry on.
What about when extended family members do things that encourage overspending, like maintaining an expensive gift-giving tradition or suggest expensive trips together? As is always the case, communicate, but do it outside of the framework of those expensive situations.
For example, if your family has an expensive winter holiday gift-giving tradition, the correct time to talk about it is in the spring or summer, not in the late fall or winter. If you do it right on the precipice of that event, you’re likely to cause hard feelings as people have already begun to plan for it. Instead, do it far away from any such planning. Similarly, if expensive trips happen in the summer, talk about it instead in the winter.
When you talk about such things, suggest a reasonable compromise. Instead of expensive gifts for everyone, do a gift drawing or perhaps put a cap on the cost of the gifts. Instead of expensive travel, do a more modest trip together (for example, I’m a huge fan of our national parks, so that’s a modest vacation that I want to go on). Don’t just say that you don’t want to continue the tradition because that appears as though you’re rejecting them and not rejecting the expensive routine.
Financially Irresponsible Romantic Interests
You’re dating someone and you find that they’re much looser with their spending than you are or have been that way in the recent past. That person spends money with almost frightening ease, particularly when that person’s income seems to be unable to support it. You notice a lot of envelopes from Chase or Bank of America in their apartment. Those are things you’ll notice as you grow close. But, aside from that financial concern, the match seems great. What do you do?
My honest suggestion is to be very wary of this relationship. I don’t mean that you should break it off immediately, but that you should apply more of a critical eye to the whole relationship. A drastically different view about spending can be something that becomes a major problem in marriage as you’re combining your financial lives together (whether you keep accounts separate or not), and drastically different levels of financial responsibility is going to result in some issues down the road.
This is also a good opportunity to start to learn how to communicate about such issues. The key to a good marriage is good communication, and there are few issues that rely on good communication more than money issues. If you can have a healthy money discussion about your differences in spending and can come up with a good strategy that has some compromise in it for both of you, then that’s a good sign for your long term relationship. If this conversation is difficult or impossible, then that’s another strong negative sign.
Once you have a compromise in place, does your partner stick to it? This is a trust issue, as you’re trusting your romantic partner to be able to stick to the things you’ve promised. Again, if you’re able to talk about a compromise and then your partner doesn’t stick with it, then there’s a trust issue. (There’s also a trust issue if you don’t stick with it, too.)
Financially Irresponsible Friends
Let me be blunt here: there are many, many financially responsible people in the world that I could be friends with, so I don’t really have the inclination to maintain friendships with people who encourage me to overspend. Period. I just don’t put effort into maintaining friendships with people with whom it is expensive to maintain friendships.
That doesn’t mean I don’t have friends with expensive tastes. It just means that when I do things with those friends, there’s no expectation whatsoever of spending money and that we do things together that are usually really low cost.
The vast majority of my close friends simply invite each other over for social things. We have dinner parties, game nights, movie nights, and binge-watching marathons. When we do other things, we usually talk it over and have the two best bargain hunters (me and one other person in the group) search for discounts and coupons and plan out the cheapest way to do it.
What do you do if your friends seem to have expensive tastes? Suggest less expensive options at least some of the time, for starters. Very few people will object to sometimes doing things that don’t require as much spending. If they do, then there’s a deep value disconnect between you and that other person. It’s okay to occasionally do something expensive with friends, but it should not be the norm.
You should also never accept negativity and criticism from “friends” because of your inexpensive tastes. If a “friend” is ridiculing your car that you bought out of an intentional strategy to save money, not only are you seeing a values difference, you’re also seeing an abandonment of kindness between friends. That’s a friendship that it’s perfectly okay to walk away from.
Another strategy is to choose social events for yourself that are low-cost and try to meet people there. Many of my closest friends over the last few years have been ones I’ve met at community game nights and at volunteer events. Almost all of those friends are pretty frugal people and our social activities are usually really inexpensive. If you follow this strategy, you’ll find that your social calendar becomes more and more filled with inexpensive events.
Financially Irresponsible Coworkers
In the workplace, you’ll sometimes find social pressure to do things like go out for expensive lunches or dinners or to buy expensive things like watches or gadgets. That pressure to “fit in” at work and build strong relationships can cause you to spend a lot of money that you might not otherwise spend.
Here’s the truth, though. The most lasting workplace relationships are built out of other things, like reliability and kindness and healthy candor. They aren’t built out of spending $50 on lunch. They’re built by being a great coworker, taking care of things that you promise to take care of, stepping up to challenges, not backstabbing people, and being an active participant in workplace conversations.
Another strategy is to intentionally spread out your lunches across a lot of dining companions. Bring your lunch in some days and eat with people who stay in the office for lunch eating leftovers. Get to know them. Go out to eat sometimes with the expensive crowd, too, but sometimes grab a bite with the cheap lunch crowd. Not only does this cut down on your lunch spending, it lets you interact with a lot of people and perhaps get to know people you didn’t know as well.
Simply going out with the expensive crowd isn’t going to do much to secure your spot at work. Being a good coworker will secure that spot more than anything else.
Final Thoughts
The strategies in this thread all boil down to a few key principles. Don’t lend money personally to people. Seek out lower-cost social activities and cherish the relationships with people who share those activities with you. Communicate clearly if you desire lower-cost obligations (and do it out of the context of the situation). Don’t be afraid to update your social circle. Communicate, communicate, communicate with your loved ones.
It’s only through those strategies that you’ll be able to maintain healthy relationships with some less financially responsible people in your life without going down a financially irresponsible road yourself.
Good luck!
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These 7 Gifs Reveal What No One Tells You About Buying Your First Home
Watch a lot of HGTV? Me, too.
So you’re probably beyond excited by the prospect of buying a house for the first time.
Yes, it can be really fun, but you’ll also encounter many surprises along the way — including many that aren’t so fun.
And you’ll wonder to yourself: How did I manage to watch so many HGTV marathons without realizing this?
Here are seven things no one tells you about buying your first house…
1. It’s Nothing Like “House Hunters”
Unless you’re a millionaire, that is.
On the show, people turn up their noses when a house doesn’t have granite countertops, dual vanities or walk-in closets.
If you’re on the same budget I was, you’ll be lucky if you don’t think the master bedroom is actually a walk-in closet at first glance.
In other words, the House Hunters drinking game will not apply to your search…
2. You Become Obsessed With Your Credit Score
As soon as you start talking with a realtor, they’ll want you to start talking with a mortgage broker.
And as soon as you start talking with a mortgage broker, they’ll want to know every single thing about you — including your credit score.
So you’ll become obsessed with making it better.
You’ll log onto a site like Credit Sesame to get your free credit score, read up on ways to improve it, and then check back every day to see how your report is faring.
3. Unattainable Houses Tempt the Bejesus Out of You
You probably scorn the HGTV people who look at houses outside their budget. (Just like you side-eye the women who try on over-budget wedding dresses on #SYTTD.)
But when you get down to it, and see what you can get within that carefully-calculated, oh-so-responsible budget, you’ll realize one thing: Your budget sucks.
So you’ll just “take a look” at houses you definitely can’t afford — and oh boy will they tempt the tender loving pants off you.
Don’t. Do. It.
4. You Spend Your Life Filling Out Forms
Not since you went to college did you have to fill out so many freaking forms.
Your mortgage lender will want to know what street you lived on in second grade, who your first kiss was and where you were when Brad and Jennifer broke up. Or at least that’s what it feels like.
Just get ready to dig through the archives for all sorts of arcane info — and get a hand cramp from signing your name so often.
5. Cash Buyers are Sneaky Sons of Satan
This is the part they really never show on TV — probably because it’s the people on TV who are outbidding the poor normal souls like you and me.
Here’s what happens: You finally find a house that isn’t horrific and is somewhat in your price range and you make an offer.
Then, your realtor calls with the news you’ve been outbid by an ALL-CASH buyer.
Basically, it’s someone who doesn’t need a mortgage because they can just drop hundreds of G’s on a house — most likely a contractor or investor who wants to flip it and then sell it to some sap like us for double the original asking price.
Lame.
6. The Price on Zillow = Lies
You’re looking at a house on Zillow, and you think to yourself: Wow! I could get all that for only $600 a month? That’s less than my rent payment!
Yes, except that it’s not.
When you buy a house, you’ll be shocked by the endless expenses that pop up and up… and up. Appraisals, inspections, closing costs — and that’s before you even move in.
Once you’re a proud homeowner, you’ve got taxes and insurance and utilities on top of your mortgage payment.
Oh, and repairs…
7. Your To-Do List Never Ends. Ever
They say a boat is a hole in the water you throw money into.
A house is the same thing — just on land.
When you’re a renter, you just call your landlord if something breaks. When you’re a homeowner, you’re the landlord.
And the lawnmower. And the painter, plumber, landscaper, blown-fuse-finder and any other kind of thing-fixer you’re forced to become…
Welcome to the American dream! `
Your Turn: Are you a homeowner? Which item on this list did you identify with most?
Disclosure: This post includes affiliate links. We’re letting you know because it’s what Honest Abe would do. After all, he is on our favorite coin.
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Fifth issue of How to Retire in Style hits the news-stands
The latest issue of Moneywise’s sister magazine, How to Retire in Style is now in sale from all good newsagents including WH Smiths, Sainsburys and Easons in Ireland.
Alternatively you can order your copy here.
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Standard Life annuity holders may be due redress for mis-sold policies
Retirees with an enhanced annuity from Standard Life may be due redress, as the firm has confirmed it’s been forced by the regulator to review all non-advised annuity sales since July 2008.
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Inflation hits 22-month high
Inflation, as measured by the Consumer Prices Index (CPI), has climbed from 0.6% to 1% in the year to September, its highest level in almost two years, with UK prices under pressure due to the weaker pound.
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Four Ways Holiday Shopping Can Crush Your Credit
The tradition of holiday overspending is as American as apple pie. Tradition or not, bad holiday spending habits can undoubtedly take a toll on your wallet, but that’s just the beginning. What you may not realize is that going overboard with your spending during the holidays can also damage your credit as well. Here’s where the problem will likely occur.
New Credit Inquiries
“Would you like to open a credit card account today and save 20% off your purchase?” You will likely hear this question, or some reasonable derivative, over and over again at the mall or at other retail stores this year. Everyone likes to save money, especially if you’re making a big purchase. But if you want to protect your credit scores, it’s probably best to answer this question with a solid “no thanks,” no matter how tempting the offer.
Opening unnecessary retail store cards can hurt your credit scores several ways. First, the inquiry or credit pull itself can have a potentially negative impact on your credit scores. This potential damage could be compounded even further if you apply for multiple new retail store cards during your holiday shopping spree.
Of course, new inquiries alone probably won’t sink your credit scores. The inquiry category of credit scoring systems makes up only a small percentage of your FICO and VantageScore points. But still, as a rule of thumb it really is best to only apply for credit when you really need it.
Too Many New Accounts
If you apply for a new retail store card, or numerous cards, you could be facing even more potential for credit score damage beyond just the new inquiries. FICO and VantageScore consider the average age of the accounts on your credit reports when calculating your scores.
This metric holds more weight than the inquiry metric, so beware! People with an older average age of accounts are rewarded with higher credit scores than those with younger averages. And applying for several at the same time will compound the problem.
More Accounts with Balances
Another way holiday shopping can come back to bite you occurs when you increase your number of accounts with balances. Whether you open new retail store accounts, take out new personal loans, or charge new balances on previously paid-off credit cards, the impact on your credit scores will not be positive. Scoring systems will penalize you if you have too many accounts with balances, which always happens when you open a new account at the register and use it to pay for your purchases.
Higher Utilization
I saved the worst for last. Credit scoring systems consider a metric called “revolving utilization,” which in English means the relationship between your balances and credit limits on your credit card accounts. This metric is as important as the previous three combined. The higher your balances, the more of your credit limit you’re using up, which means a lower credit score.
The problem with retail store cards, other than their sky-high interest rates, is their very modest credit limits. Most, if not all, newly opened retail store cards have a credit limit well below what you’d normally receive on a newly opened Visa or MasterCard. That means even modest purchases are going to result in a higher utilization percentage and a lower credit score, even if you pay the balance in full each month.
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- How Much Could You Save for the Holidays if You Started Right Now?
John Ulzheimer is an expert on credit reporting, credit scoring, and identity theft. He has written four books on the topic and has been interviewed and quoted thousands of times over the past 10 years. With time spent at Equifax and FICO, Ulzheimer is the only credit expert who actually comes from the credit industry. He has been an expert witness in over 230 credit related lawsuits and has been qualified to testify in both federal and state courts on the topic of consumer credit.
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Green subsidies set to add £110 to household bills in 2020
Households have today been warned by the National Audit Office (NAO) that energy bills will rise by more than planned in future due to the impact of green subsidies.
It says consumers should expect to pay £110 more in 2020 - £17 more per year than planned - than they do today for a typical dual-fuel energy bill.
Source Moneywise http://ift.tt/2e3N3GC
Weekend Jobs You Can Do From Home
By Christy Schutz Did you know there are nine more Mondays until Christmas? A daunting thought, I know. It is right about this time that I wish I had picked up some part-time work or weekend odd jobs for extra cash. So, I thought I would use today’s post to brainstorm about some weekend job […]
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More peer to peer Isas on the horizon as Lending Works gets FCA authorisation
Lending Works has joined a handful of peer to peer lenders that is fully authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), meaning it will soon start selling innovative finance individual savings accounts (Isas).
Source Moneywise http://ift.tt/2ei3e2M