@teenastie wrote:I can't say that I PIF every month. But I have set a goal to not pay a dime of interest nor pay any overdraft, late fees for 2012. I can say this because I honestly don't have much in available CL. I AM currently carrying a balance on a 0% BT. Everything else goes on a charge except for gas on my revolver. 2 years ago DW and I spent 3K in overdraft fees and countless more in Late payments and CC interest (very very dark time). I haven't paid interest in 8 months and I do not want to go back!
I remember those days myself. Recalling them can definitely be very self motivating. 
From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".
@Anonymous wrote:
@teenastie wrote:I can't say that I PIF every month. But I have set a goal to not pay a dime of interest nor pay any overdraft, late fees for 2012. I can say this because I honestly don't have much in available CL. I AM currently carrying a balance on a 0% BT. Everything else goes on a charge except for gas on my revolver. 2 years ago DW and I spent 3K in overdraft fees and countless more in Late payments and CC interest (very very dark time). I haven't paid interest in 8 months and I do not want to go back!
WowI don't think I've spent even 10% of that in fees and interest in my whole life. Glad you're better off now, overdraft fees and late payments are really the worst, since you're just wasting money for absolutely no reason. And that generally only digs people deeper into a hole.
I kid you not... it got to the point that DW and I would go to the gas station together and get as much gas that we could on 1 swipe to try to reduce the amount of overdraft fees. 
As late as August of last year I was over 80% utilization. Started paying off my balances around the beginning of November. Just paid my cards down from 35% in December to less than 5% this month. Just waiting to see what happens to my scores now.
@teenastie wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
@teenastie wrote:I can't say that I PIF every month. But I have set a goal to not pay a dime of interest nor pay any overdraft, late fees for 2012. I can say this because I honestly don't have much in available CL. I AM currently carrying a balance on a 0% BT. Everything else goes on a charge except for gas on my revolver. 2 years ago DW and I spent 3K in overdraft fees and countless more in Late payments and CC interest (very very dark time). I haven't paid interest in 8 months and I do not want to go back!
WowI kid you not... it got to the point that DW and I would go to the gas station together and get as much gas that we could on 1 swipe to try to reduce the amount of overdraft fees.
Yep, nearly all of us have some dark days in our pasts. 
Thumbs up to you and your DW for coming out of yours.
FWIW though, I do PIF every month.
I guess maybe the reason that it's not hard for me to do is because I only use CC's for things that I would buy anyway, and that I have budgeted for. So the money is already there. I just use plastic for everyday expenses. I'm not a big shopper, and you can pretty much hear me whining all the way to the mall when I do have to break down and get some more work clothes or other exciting stuff.
The one exception is that I have a 0% / $0 BT on a Navy card. I have a HELOC for home improvements on the house that I still (ahem) own with DXH, and I'm knocking the balance down with 0% instead of the 2-point-something% on the actual HELOC. This really was a HELOC for home improvements and repairs, not for paying off old CC debt. If we had sold the house two years ago, as was supposed to happen, it would have been long gone.
People go though different periods in life. I used credit cards like that early in my career before I built up savings. Nothing at all wrong with using them for the occasional big ticket item then paying it off over a short time. CCs are perfect for that. The problem comes when running a balance almost all the time. It's expensive and doesn't leave much room for emergencies. It is very tempting though and some can't resist and get in over their heads.
My view is that there is nothing wrong with debt early in a career when your earning ramp is good but as you get older you need to accumulating savings and assets for retirement so pif becomes more and more the norm. Ideally anyway. By the time you are retired, unless you are one of the lucky ones with a really good pension income running a balance is rarely justified.
Also, a lot of people use CCs for biz expenses traveling and such. They get reimbursed by their employer. They often can pif really large amounts as a result.
I'm retired, have no pension (SS hardly counts), and live off income from assets I've accumulated over my lifetime so I pif. I can occasionally make really large purchases such as go on an overseas vacation or whatnot. When I do I pif from my savings. That's really the only prudent thing to do in my situation but others have different circumstances.
@ChesterPDexter wrote:The interesting thing about money is that it brings out strong emotions, probably because it's a resource closely tied to our livelihood and well-being. It's just natural that people get worked up over such a resource, and people get very opinionated and sometimes neurotic about certain points.
For example, some people miss the forest for the trees in certain ways. Have you ever heard of the kind of people who miss out on investment gains because they don't want to pay a $10 commission?
Well, when it comes to borrowing, I don't see what is so bad about paying a couple of dollars' worth of interest. After all, you are "renting" someone else's money! I don't see paying a reasonable price for the use of someone else's money as a bad thing. I see it as a reasonable service for which it is only right that I compensate the lender. There are circumstances in which it makes sense to gain possession of money, or a service, or an item sooner rather than gaining possession of it later, after having saved up or freed up a certain amount of money in order to pay cash for it. Oftentimes the interest charged can be a bargain, in my opinion. If your purchase is not high-dollar, and you're paying interest for, say, three months, you may end up spending something like $10 on interest. Considering what people do to go out of their way to locate sales and get the lowest price on everything, that $10 may just be negated by the sale price you could theoretically miss out on if you wait and buy the item later.
I'm saying that I can't believe the way people sometimes avoid paying "a penny of interest, ever!" (not quoting anyone, I just made that up) and give themselves a medal for it.
I would agree with this if CCC weren't making money off the transactional aspect of purchases. They also get money from AFs if applicable. Not to mention the poor folks who are in financial turmoil they are getting bombarded with late payments and interest in their dark times. In a world when they are making astronomical profits and are squeezing their profit margins by outsourcing jobs etc and paying less than stellar wages for CSRs stateside. I have to love for the big banks. But I get where you're coming from and respect that!
In the credit card world, never say never . The only cards that I dont pif (to create a history is hopes of CLI) is The Barclay apple. The rest, I dont spend much on them to begin with. I have a lot of my bills scattered on the other cards; that's why I pif. I'm not a big spender (cheap by nature).
Sometimes I even struggle to juggle the cards since I dont have that much to spend. I do hoever use my AMEX platinum sometimes for work very heavily but I get reimbursed very quick by my company.
