Get Rich Slowly

If you’re new here, you may want to learn what this site is about. I encourage you to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!I don’t like credit cards. Many smart people — including my wife — use them wisely and never have problems. I’m not one of those people. Most of my [...]

I’ve been blown away by your responses to the new Ask the Readers feature, especially to yesterday’s question about what do do if you have no credit history. Here’s a story Derek e-mailed me about his first-hand experience safely building his credit score.
I am a college student, and I have a credit card. My parents [...]

I originally shared this piece on June 12th. I’m reposting it because many PBS stations are rebroadcasting this show tonight.
How did the United States become a nation of debtors? When did credit cards become popular? Did you know that many modern credit card policies are the creation of one man?
The Secret History of the Credit [...]

Nick writes with a common question:
I am a college student with $8,000 of debt. What is the first step in paying this off?
Debt elimination involves three steps:

Stop acquiring new debt.
Establish an emergency fund.
Implement a debt snowball.

Here’s how to approach each step. (I’ll use Nick’s situation as an example, but the principles apply to everyone.)
Stop acquiring [...]

A reader pointed me to at post a Violent Acres. “You Can Learn a Lot From a Rich Girl” [profanity] is a cautionary tale of how anyone — even the wealthy — can find themselves struggling with debt.
Driving home from the bar one evening, my friend Marilyn confided in me that she was afraid. In [...]

During my twenties, I accumulated nearly $25,000 in consumer debt. I had a spending problem. With time, I was able to get my spending under control (mostly), but I still owned overwhelming debt. How could I get rid of it?
The personal finance books all suggested the same approach:

Order your debts from highest interest rate [...]

I don’t like credit cards. They’re a dangerous trap, especially for the young. Many smart people disagree with me, though, and have learned to use credit cards to their advantage. This guide provides solid credit card information so that you can make smart choices.
I’ve structured this as a series of questions and answers. There’s [...]

Reader Russell Heimlich forwarded an excellent MSN Money piece on Escaping from Debt Hell.
It’s hard to escape the news that Americans are drowning in personal debt, but you hear less about the many people who…have been able to dig out of debt.
Ordinary people use a variety of methods to shake off their past credit mistakes. [...]

How many credit card applications do you receive in a year? One cockeyed.com reader decided to keep track. From April of 2005 to April 2006, he noted every credit card offer that came to him.
I received 141 applications with 100 of them containing the sample credit cards. I regret not keeping more complete records like [...]

Here’s an internet classic. John Hargrave at zug.com was frustrated that nobody ever checked his signature when he paid with a credit card. He wondered: how crazy could he make his signature before somebody actually called him on it. The answer? Pretty crazy.
Here’s his regular signature, which he describes as “that of a homeless clown”:

And [...]