JERRY PETTEWAY

I spoke to a young couple today that were looking to purchase another home. They informed me that they own their current home free and clear of any mortgage liens, and that they have zero credit debt. I ask them how have they managed to not have any credit debt. They stated that when they heard about the recession was starting and people were losing their homes they decided to start paying off all of their $18,000. worth of credit debt to make sure that they had no debt if life was to become difficult due to possible job lost. This was over a period of four years and today they have over $50,000 in the bank. Hear is a listen I know a lot of us can use, we need to payoff the charge cards and live on cash like we used to do, because the charge card will destroy your credit and make your interest rate so high you can never pay it off. We need to get back to wise credit habits like using the credit card for emergencies only. We need to start saving so we are not hostage to the credit companies. If we are saving for the vacation, entertainment, sport event etc. we will start spending only the funds that we have put aside for that purpose and not over spending funds that we do not have by going to the credit card. As long as we keep allowing the credit companies to charge what ever rate they want we will never have a savings or have a financial future because we will need to keep working to payoff the cards. The other reason to put up the charge cards is identity fraud. Your ID is stolen from your charge card not from CASH. My new model is save more and spend less.