Use of Credit

[Dr. Shane]

What do you believe are good uses of personal credit for a Christian household?

[Bravus]

Appreciating assets (real estate and education only): our present financial predicament, where we make serious money but always feel broke, is due almost entirely to using credit to buy depreciating assets like cars and computers.

Ideally society would pay for education, but that seems to have become a dream now, though it was the case when I went to school and uni.

[Bravus]

Much better to save up and buy an old car than to borrow for one - because the loan tends to last longer than the car!

[Dr. Shane]

I didn't put food on the list so if someone thinks buying groceries or prepared meals is good they can feel free to beat me up for forgetting that.

If we save money as we should so that we have an emergency fund, than I agree that credit should only be used for housing and education. However in an emergency situation, like when someone's car dies or the furnace quits, if they don't have the savings built up to replace it, they shouldn't refuse to borrow money based on the principle of not borrowing. However having said that, I think they should borrow as little as possible and pay it off as fast as possible.

[Bravus]

Agreed, yep.

[Woody]

Yes. I use credit cards for my food. I just pay it off without interest. I just love all the gift cards I can get from points.

[Gail]

Ideally society would pay for education, but that seems to have become a dream now, though it was the case when I went to school and uni.

It used to be that in Sweden education was paid through taxes all the way to university. Seems to me the result of that would be a whole nation of educated people.

[Stan]

Seems to me Cuba is the highest average educated country in the world...