Credit

The Mortgage Mess – A Few ‘No Credit Needed’ Thoughts

It’s strange.  Every day, I turn on the television and I see programs about the ‘sub-prime situation’.  Banks and mortgage companies, desperate to attract customers during the housing-boom, loaned money to folks who didn’t have the ‘best’ credit scores.  Many of the loans that were written were ‘adjustable’ – meaning that, over time, the interest rate associated with a particular…

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Credit, Debt Story

Store-Branded Credit Cards: A Shocking Look Back

In an effort to better organize my financial documents, I’ve been going through a box of old bills. I was somewhat surprised to see just how many of those bills were from store-branded credit cards. I found old bills from Belk, JC Penney, and Sears. The bills were dated January 2003 – December 2004. As I was flipping through the…

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