Co-op maintenance? You live in a big ole building in a big ole city right, so that’s your share of the building repair and update kind of costs?
Yes, and property taxes plus salaries for the super, porters, and doormen. Basically like a condo fee plus your share of property taxes.
Me too, but on the plus side, I have a couple, like Verizon, who give me money off for using an automatic payments from my checking account. Verizon is $10 off, even better than cash back.
Wow, that’s really good. I track it, and I made $1,100 cash back last year.
Good to know. I am not even sure if we have condos around here. A few are “condo-like,” but I assume the like is because they are not condos.
I remember only oh 10 years or so ago the generation above me mocked me for using credit cards all the time. I finally told them I want the points, and don’t find it useful to carry around wads of cash.
This finally makes sense to me now. Thanks, guys!
Definitely going that route next time.
We run everything possible through credit cards, too. Some things require a direct debit from our checking account (like the mortgage & car payments), but we try to never use our ATM card for anything except the rare occasions we get cash from the ATM. It makes keeping the budget updated a pain, so I’m down to just asking my wife for ballpark figures for variable categories she pays with her cards like groceries and medical bills. It does add up. Our microwave died recently, and she just found one she liked and paid for it and installation with statement credits.
A bit of a bump, and my apologies if this question is answered upthread, but I’ve been considering having my wife apply for a new card because she is hurting her credit rating a bit by not having enough credit available.
My question is, do low interest credit cards just not exist any more? For myself it is a moot point, because I completely pay off all debt every month, so I don’t pay any interest, but I don’t trust her to do that, so I am less interested in perks and rewards than I am in a low-interest card. Yet the best I can find starts at 12%, and it just goes up from there.
Am I missing something, or are the days of a sub-10% card just gone?
If she doesn’t have enough credit, not likely. My lowest is with USAA at just under 10%, but it scales up to 18% depending on credit.
Consider a secured card if she’s just wanting to raise her credit. She’ll need to use it and pay it off, repeatedly. Nearly every bank has them. They typically have low limits but it’s based on how much you secure. I think BoA is up to 5K. But even something like a $500 secured card used for lunch or meal deliveries and gas but paid off monthly will raise her credit quickly. I did this with my girlfriend, now wife for the past 6 years. She was coming out of a bankruptcy and has turned things around considerably.
We started with a secured card. We moved on to a Prime card as we both use it and pay it off with Prime / Whole Foods purchases. Then we got her a car loan which she’s nearly paid off as well. She’s up to “good” credit range but still has a ways to go.
Some pitfalls to avoid: don’t add her as a second user on any cards of yours that you keep a large balance on. That affect her credit MUCH more than yours when done that way. Keep things separated for now.
Thanks for the comments. I NEVER leave a balance on any card. She does, unfortunately. I try and try to break her of it, but so far no luck.
I’ll look in to a secured card. I have also encouraged her to talk to our credit union about raising the limit on her current card, which is capped at $5k. Mine from them caps at $15k, so I know they go higher, and just expanding the gap between available and used credit would help some. Right now she is on the border of good/excellent, whereas I am about 40 points higher, and it all seems to be due to just having more available credit.
Just set your bank to autopay in full every month, nothing to it, if you have the money of course.
This. Don’t you have direct debits over there?
Yes of course, that’s what I was referring to.
Amazon is taking on Visa over interchange fees, at least in the UK:
Wait isn’t the Amazon PRIME card a Visa card?
Yup (at least in the US of A).
Only applies to credit cards issued in the UK. Non UK cards are still good.
I have 6 credit cards, 4 of them for their various rewards systems, one for Costco, and one is a lower interest rate card if I ever need it. My big spenders are my Citi Double Cash and my Apple Card, both getting 2% (I use the Apple Card only when Apple Pay is available, which is a lot). Those two get most of my spending, about 4 times as much use as my AmEx Blue Cash Reserve that gets 6% on groceries. I only use that card at grocery stores and for online media (which might be 6% as well).
The AmEx paid the most cashback in 2021 despite it not being my biggest spending card. And not because of groceries, but for all the little things they do. Earlier this year they did a thing like spend $10 at a local business and get $5 back up to $60. Or promotions for things I was already planning to buy ($25 back on an annual subscription to HBO). All the little things add up quite a bit over the months.
I have been using Amazon less and less, so despite its 5% at Amazon, my Chase Amazon card was the smallest cashback amount of the year.
I’ve gone minimalist on my wallet, which means not carrying everything with me all the time. I ditched my traditional (and bulky) leather trifold with a Peak Design Slim Wallet
And I no longer carry my debit card with me, as it is faaaar easier to deal with a stolen credit card than a stolen debit card. Besides, the rewards for using a credit card responsibly (I always pay the full statement balance every month) means you’re throwing money away using a debit card.
Instead, all the slim wallet contains is my driver’s license, medical insurance card, my Costco Citi Card, and my Amex Everyday card. (If I need to hit cash, my debit card is in my Apple Pay, so I can access it that way).
I also got an invite to the Amex Blue Cash Preferred Rewards card and even though it has an annual fee next year, the rewards should easily pay for itself. 6% back off on groceries, 6% back on streaming, 1% back on everything else (bills) and $300 back if I spend $3,000 in the next six months, which is easy because I’ve got a bunch of big purchases coming up very soon. So I’ll replace my Everyday card with that going forward.
Amazon purchases still happen on my Amazon credit card, which gets me 5% back.
And Costco CitiCard is for both purchases (2%) and gas (4%) at Costco.
3% back on gas also. ;)