Hey All!
As a woman, future wife, and someone with a family, I am ashamed to say I am some one who used to have a ton of credit card debt. It was very irresponsible of me, but frankly I had no idea about my finances and no one ever taught me the value of money. My mother was a shopaholic and she honestly would just buy and buy to keep up appearances with the rich neighbors we used to have.
Trying to keep up with a rich lifestyle when you’re poor only makes you more poor! She had to declare bankruptcy twice! Yes twice. I vowed to never do that, but when I was in college I wanted to make movies and attend film festivals. I didn’t have the money, so I charged everything I wanted to do. I thought of it as an investment in my education and didn’t think about all the money I would have to pay back afterwards.
While I was living it up in college I had at least 10 different credit cards! By the time I left college I not only had over $100,000 in student loans, I also have $25,000 in credit card debt! I refused to file for bankruptcy, so I found a debt consolidation agency and red tons of amazing articles like this one called Women and Money – Why You Need to Take Control Now.
I paid off my credit card debt and I’m much more financially literate now. It was a challenge to learn to live with out credit cards, But I truly value money now and I’m happy I don’t have any credit cards! I try to teach my family to not make the same mistakes as I did. When I have a little girl of my own one day, she’ll learn early the value of money and won’t make the same mistakes I did!
This Genworth Financial Guide for Women is a great resource for helping you learn how to maintain your finances and to teach you to be financially literate.
I hope this info helps you to be more a little smarter with your finances!
Welcome!
Comments
My parents never really taught me about money either, and I had a bunch of credit card debt after college too although it was mostly from groceries & bills.
Credit Cards can be great tools if you know how to use them properly. I think that should be something that is taught in school. That’s where I feel as homeschoolers we haven an advantage with our daughter’s education. She’s had a crash course in how the interest on credit cards work and can figure out how much something costs in the end if you don’t pay it off right away. I think it’s really difficult in this day and age to teach kids things like that because they really are being raised as an entitlement generation.
I hate student loan debt. I just graduated last spring and have started paying them back. It sucks, but there was no way I could afford college without it.
I got into a pretty big hole at one point myself, but I dug out and I’m never going back!
I love having no credit card debt.
My parents never taught me about money (all I knew was there never was any). So it’s important that I teach my son about money.
I’m happy you took care of your CC debt. We seem to make those types of decisions while young. The only official debt we have is our house and our car, both of which are up to date and current accounts.
Kudos to you for paying off your credit card debt. You should be very proud of yourself.
Love your super cute wallet
I would be quite happy never having a credit card again.
I’m so glad you didn’t go into the evils of credit cards. Used correctly, they aren’t all bad!
I worked in a bank, so I’ve seen what debt can do to people and I never want to be there!
I was pretty careless with money in my twenties, but finally figured out how to be more responsible with money.
My finances need a little tune up for sure.
We never carry CC balances. That way we don’t have to worry about it.
I avoid credit cards like the plague after paying one off when I was 21, so no debt for me.
Love your wallet.
We don’t use credit cards at all anymore and are debt free as far as that kind of debt goes. I hate them because of how easily people’s lives can be made incredibly difficult or even ruined because of their misuse.
I was equally uninformed when I moved out of my parents’ house. I spent thousands on credit and I ended up bringing it into my marriage, which can still be a point of contention. Thank you for this post and for the hope of getting informed financially.
Great article! Thanks for sharing.
I try to use ONLY my debit card. I only use cc for gas (online). I like to not be in debt also.
I’ve been working on paying off credit card debit and loans for so long now. I think there may not be hope at the end of the tunnel its very depressing