Homestead mailing list

["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT dtnspeed.net>]

James wrote:

> We have a couple of actual local banks here, I know
>everyone hasn't.  I don't use credit but shady deals would get around and
>ruin the bank so by all accounts they don't engage in them.

We have several locally owned banks here (but we also have old-line banks
that change hands about as often as the moon changes phases). My personal
bank is locally owned (as I write), and I know most of the board members.

>If you need money, get a loan from the bank.  If you can't get a
>loan from the bank, examine why you can't and remedy it.  If you need to
>travel or buy things over the internet, use the bank card which operates
>just like the credit card only you have to have the money already before
>you can buy anything (not a bad practice at any rate).

I used to have a large credit line at the bank (and I still can have one
should I want it), but I've got a debit card that covers most of my needs
for buying stuff over the Internet or traveling (when you can't reserve a
room without a credit card). I'll never have a credit card again.


>They [credit cards] aren't [a legitimate offer], they are a blatant scam.
>No one in their
>right mind would look over the provisions that they DO state and ever sign
>the thing.

Credit cards are okay if you pay them on time every month. Human frailty
being what it is (and months seemingly spinning past faster than they ever
used to :)) it seems excessive in the extreme for a credit card company to
ask for $40 as a late fee. Good grief, Chase Manhattan only wants $10 for a
late fee on my car payment, and they don't assess it unless I'm more than 30
days late.

>It is, thinks I, much like the decrying WalMart because it has helped put
>the small Mon&Pop hardware store out of business.  

In this community at least, I think Wal-Mart has goosed the local groceries
into offering more and better stuff. I used to have to ask our monthly
visitor from Chicago (who traveled to this area on state business on a
regular basis) to bring corn masa. Now I can get it at Wal-Mart (along with
other Mexican food specialties) *and* recently it's available at two other
groceries.

>Would you not say it is so that if the credit card industry were tightly
>regulated, all the fraud and usury squeezed out of it, that a good portion
>of the people decrying how badly they are ripped off by same would find
>that they couldn't get a credit card at all?

No doubt many of them shouldn't have credit. If you're not going to pay off
your credit card debt in your lifetime, you shouldn't be getting more
credit.

Marie