When the person you're dating is a credit nightmare?

[MONM]

Thank you for your sensitive response Gunnar. You are so right - and I am so grateful - that the garden-variety deadbeat is unlikely to consider such an extreme solution to his/her problems!

[Anonymous]

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@Stralem wrote:

The problem isn't his credit.

The problem is that he's an irresponsible jackass.

...No offense.

If you marry him, all of his financial problems will become your financial problems, no differently than if you married a drug addict, an alcoholic, a chronic gambler, or an arsonist. And like you said, given his track record, good luck with buying a home or... much of anything, really. There's a reason finances are often cited as the reason for breakups and divorces.

You need to dump this guy unless he shapes up.

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Truer words have not been spoken. An addict is an addict. All the behavior is the same. Knowing what I know now that would be dead weight holding you back and down from all your goals in life.

[Anonymous]

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@Lightntheglass wrote:

Let me start off by saying I am not a credit elititst. I know what it is like to ruin one's credit and try to come back from it. As it stands, Nov 2014 all my bad credit will have fallen off, but I also had to do a lot of credit repair to get where I am, so I know the struggle. HOWEVER.....I learned from my bad mistakes of youth when it came to credit cards and not paying bills. I have a track record now of never missing a payment and knowing what I can afford. My boyfriend on the other hand...Is an idiot. 

-3 Capital One credit cards about to by CO in June
-student loans
- unpaid  tax Lien
-Late payments on Car with $530 a month payment....On a Dodge Avenger 2013...It is currently behind and even got repo'd but he got it back, but it's late again. Car is worth 26K
-Bill-Me-Later to be CO
-Delinquent Verizon phone, in collections
-Has no car insurance, which is in collection
-Unpaid medical bills (not on credit report....YET)

All in all he's about 50K in the hole. He lies about making the minimum payments on the CC and thinks I don't know, his credit score is like 471. When he has money he pays rent, utilities, his car (if he can afford it). The rest he just spends on nonsense, he knows I am very protective of my credit and I am hesitent to be with someone who is finanically irresponsible. Yet he keeps doing this! He would rather spend $100 to take me to dinner and make me happy in the meantime then pay his bills. I like the sweet gestures but they are short term, I am worried about long term. When it comes time to buy a house, if we ever get to that point he wouldn't be able to be on a loan ect ect. He also spends money on other crap for himself he doesn't need. I have been through the credit storm and no matter how much I warn him, he doesn't get it, even though he says he does. He cares about spending money to make me and himself happy in the short term, and thinks it doesn't matter how much it costs as long as we have fun in the moment, HIS EXACT WORDS. Am I wrong in not wanting to marry into this!? How long do you give someone a chance to get their financial act together before you call it quits??? Especially when it wasn't always like this? This has been the past 9 months or so.


It's not the fact that his credit is "bad" and he made mistakes or something happened outside his control, it's the fact that he is doing NOTHING to fix it and KEEPS making decisions to put himself further in the hole, like not paying them when he has extra money!!! 

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Why not refuse the nice things he does for you?  If he offers to take you out for nice dinners or buy you nice things and it makes you uncomfortable, stop allowing him to do it for you.  By going along with him to fancy dinners, proudly showing off your new gifts, etc. etc., you're reinforcing bad habits.  As long as he's still comfortable, he won't change his attitude. 

Financials aren't a petty thing, they're a sensible thing.  If you're worried about not being taken out to nice dinners or not being bought nice presents, you are being petty.  If you prefer that the dinners and presents stop so that you can have a comfortable home with food on the table while keeping the lights on, no creditors breathing down your neck, etc, that's being smart.

[Anonymous]

Don't walk away, run.  As someone here who made dumb decisions in my youth I experienced the difficulties it made in my life.  I had a job offer rescinded from my background check because it included a credit check.  Car insurance, premiums were higher due to bad credit.  Mortgage, denied unless I wanted to do a ridiculous subprime rate.  Buying a car?  Yup, here's your interest rate, just sign here. 

If my gf had agreed to marry me under those circumstances our life would have been miserable.  Thankfully I learned and looking back (this was MANY years ago) I realize if I had married I would have been the single biggest stress of our marriage because of what would have been tremendous financial strain and severe limitations.

Like any addict he has to want to clean up financially and get his life right.  I guess you could say I hit bottom so to speak and finally said, enough is enough and time to be a real adult and with that fiscal responsibility. 

I wish you the best of luck.

[Anonymous]

Until he realizes what state he is in financially nothing is going to change.  He has to have the committment to address these problems if they are ever to be corrected.  Prob thinks none of it will ever catch up to him.  You're right though he's only making the situation more difficult for himself by ignorning all these issues.

[Drash]

You need to seriously think about your future with this clown. Run for the hills before his debt tsunami hits when you guys get married.

[Anonymous]

My current girlfriend isn't a credit nightmare but she's more loose in her credit than I prefer, she's had credit for almost 10 years, and me, maybe 1, I've already shot past her, she's stuck at 600 with CC debt closer to 7k with only 10k TL and I'm floating around 660 with only 2.5k debt with around 15k TL, I make much higher payments than she does, etc.

A fun life it may be if we stick together lol.

[Anonymous]

Reminder to everyone before we appear "Better" Than thou...

someone that is irresponsible with money or credit today.. can become responsible
tomorrow.. like ME

just thinking...

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Reminder to everyone before we appear "Better" Than thou...

someone that is irresponsible with money or credit today.. can become responsible
tomorrow.. like ME

just thinking...

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This is very true. I'd wager that most of us are here not because we started at the top and want to look down, but because we need a helping hand getting to the top.

But, every one of us climbing up from the dregs poor credit health did it by acknowledging our issues, learning from them, and leveraging those mistakes into actionable good habits. I acknowledged for some time that I had horrible credit, but it didn't actually start to change until I made the commitment to myself to change my habits. Nobody's good credit just "happened" to them, it was the result of a series of well-considered actions over the course of time. 

I agree with others in this thread who have said that change is possible (many of us are living proof) but he has to want it (of which many of us are also living proof.)  

And although I tend to dislike ultimatums, I do think this is one of the few scenarios where it's warranted. He needs to understand that his financial choices aren't only affecting him, or his chances of obtaining new things. The consequences of his actions directly and indirectly affect various aspects of his life, including the trust his SO has in him, and the respect that he has for her. Those are two extremely important aspects of any relationship, finances aside.

I hope OP was able to get through to him, and assist in getting him on the right path. Barring that, if she was ble to lead the horse to water, but couldn't make him drink, then I hope that she did what she needed to secure her own financial future.  

[Drash]

It is not how you finish it is how you start  i hope they did not  put bills on their kids name ihave family members who do that, when the kid is of age their  credit is screwed up.