How many people are being bought for versus how much total money do you have to spend?   Some people have little to no disposable income and yet run out the door Visa in hand regardless.  They will pay for that long after Christmas is over.  Be smart, if you have little money for Christmas, get creative.   Gift baskets, homemade items, family photos, all are great ideas which are fairly affordable.  We used to get home brewed beer, Kailua, and jam from my mom, boy my husband just loved the heck out of that.  Just goes to show you that the best gifts are not necessarily the most costly.

The biggest part of success is having reasonable expectations.  If you are facing foreclosure, don’t buy your wife diamond earrings.  That said, you can make a ton of money and still make terrible credit choices, and regardless you shouldn’t feel like you have to bust your wallet, after all that just isn’t what the holidays are all about.  Start early, be reasonable, and use no more credit than can be paid by March and you should survive the holidays with your credit intact.

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Getting Organized

The first step to creating a debt reduction plan is to get all financial records properly organized. People should place all of their monthly bills in a container with dividers. Unopened bills should be reviewed before going into the container. Organization is essential to financial success. All monthly bills, rental or mortgage statements, store receipts and any other financial information should be stored in the container. Once people have their financial papers in order it is time for them to create a detailed monthly budget plan. In order for people to pay off outstanding debts they need to know exactly how much money they earn each month and how much money they spend on monthly expenses such as food, transportation, clothing, etc. Those who do not know how to create a budget that balances can purchase an informative book on the subject or find free information online.

Creating a Budget

After creating a budget most people realize that they have enough money to make decent credit card payments if they cut expenses in other areas. For example, people who save $100 per month because they stop eating out at restaurants can use the money they save to pay down their credit cards at a faster rate. Those who do not earn enough money to make ends meet must consider getting a second job in order to get out of debt. It is not difficult to create a DIY debt reduction plan and once people with excessive credit card debt gain a greater awareness of their financial situation they will realize that it is possible to get out of debt quickly if they are willing to make a few lifestyle changes.

The author has spent a lot of time learning about diy debt reduction plan and other related topics. Read more about excessive credit card debt at the author’s website.

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Become aware of one’s income

Many people receive paychecks without realizing where they allocate their extra funds.  While utility bills and other necessities are paid, many individuals are unaware of how they spend their residual funds.  This can lead to foolish spending sprees on unnecessary or frivolous items.  In order to improve credit score ratings, an individual must be aware of how much money he or she has after bills have been paid.  A small amount of this money should be allocated towards paying off credit card debts and loans.  This is one of the best ways to improve credit score ratings.

Understand the concepts surrounding credit scores

Many people are unaware of what the national average credit score is and how to use it to their advantage.  No individual has to have perfect credit since this feat is almost impossible in this day and age.  People simply have to be aware of what the average is and they must ensure that they keep their scores above this average.  Individuals who wonder how to improve credit score ratings should always pay off their monthly credit card payments and they should keep up to date with their monthly bills.  Being aware of the national average is one of the best ways to improve credit score ratings.

People who wish to restore their financial histories do not necessarily have to alter their lifestyles.  Instead, they should educate themselves about their finances and start making wiser financial decisions.  This includes being more aware of their incomes and understanding credit score concepts.  This will ensure that a person is able to successfully improve credit score ratings.

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They claim on the card details page that this card “is available to only 1% of U.S. Residents to ensure the highest caliber of personal service is provided to every Cardmember”. It doesn’t really explain what credit score or annual household income you need to qualify, but I am assuming that if they are only issuing this card to 1% of the US it must be a very high number.

Some of the perks of the card include:

• Limited Membership
• 24-Hour Concierge Service
• Rewards Program – 1% cash back on all purchases
• Luxury Gifts
• Access to more than 500 airport lounges in over 90 countries worldwide

The concierge service, which looks pretty interesting, offers the following services:

• Entertainment Planning – information and reservations for restaurants, health clubs, sproting events and golf tee times
• Business Services – conference and translation services, message services and computer, A/V rentals
• Travel Information & Assistance – hotel, fliight mass transit, car rental info and reservations. ATM and weathe information
• Country & City Information – sights/entertainment, tourist and shopping info
• Gift Arrangements (The one I would use the most) -Gift baskets, Floral arrangements, Specific gifts (as requested), Special occasion gift recommendations
• Specialty Services – Assistance with location and purchase of specialty items.

All of these features come at a price, however, in the form of a $495 annual fee. The card design is pleasing to the eye especially when compared to my current cards that are in my wallet. If I had $495 a year to drop on this for the annual fee I would definetly sign up for this as some of the concierge services would come in handy since I travel quite a bit for my job. These elite cards are not for everyone, but if you have the cash, the VISA Black Card is definetly worth a look.

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Advanta has come out with an interesting new Net 90 Mastercard which defers the interest for 90 days on charges. This is not an introductory offer and applies to all purchases.

To put this in perspective most cards give you 30 days from the beginning of the statement until you need to pay for the charges you make. Having 60 more days with no interest makes things interesting since you can float all those charges and earn interest on that money by putting it in a high yield savings account rather than having to pay the bill each month.

If you get on a cycle of paying for your charges 90 days later, each month you are floating 2 months worth of charges. You could potentially save quite a bit of money in interest by doing that. Just to make sure you track your purchase and when they need to be paid off! You don’t want to get caught in a rut of paying interest every month.

Some other benefits other than the 90 days no interest are a cash back rewards program as well as no annual fee.

This is a business card, but you can apply as an individual. See the application page for more details.

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We are all told to keep those old credit accounts open so your average is higher. You will receive better interest rates if your average credit account is 10 years old, for example, versus a new account you just opened. Previously you could just cut the card up and leave that account dormant forever. However these days, due to the current economic conditions, banks are going through their accounts and closing ones that have been dormant. There is no formula to how they are doing this, but I have heard reports of banks closing credit cards for accounts that haven’t been used for over a year. Some others have reported that banks where they have 2 or more cards are closing one of the cards. Credit card companies have every right to close your account, but they usually do so without any warning to you. By the time you find out what happened, it is too late.

If you want to avoid an account closure for those cards that are extending the length of your credit history, I would reccommend using the card at least once every 6 months. Just use it at the store for something small or buy a tank of gas then pay it off right away. Some people might say once a year is good enough, but these days banks are scrambling to get an accurate picture of their bottom lines, so closing rarely used accounts is one way to put their arms around their total liability.

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Fidelity Investments Rewards Visa Signature Card with WorldPoints Rewards. The Fidelity Visa card earns a flat 1.5% cash back on all purchases.

How it works is that the card earns points based on purchases. You get one point per dollar. But when you redeeem the points to your Fidelity Account, you get $75 for 5000 points which equates to a 1.5% cash back return.

Don’t have a Fidelity account, Here is a way to get $100 when opening one. The basic Fidelity account is free and there are no fees. When you have accumulated 5000 points in your account, you can select the “Investment Rewards” option, enter your Fidelity Account number, and then in 5 days the $75 will be transfered into your account. At this point you can either transfer it to your bank account, invest it, or put it wherever you want. You can use the money immediately.

If you don’t want a Fidleity account then you can redeem the points for other rewards based on the World Perks rewards program. The rewards are unlimited, unlike other cards that cap your rewards at a certain amount per year.

I currently use my American Express Blue Cash Card for all my purchases, but when they don’t take American Express I use the Fidelity Visa card. They have a easy to use online interface to pay bills and review charges. Another cool feature that they have is that they show you pending charges as soon as your card it swiped. So you can see up to the minute activity on your card. Most credit cards only show posted charges which can ususally appear 2-3 days after you used the card.

This card, like most today, has no annual fee or random charges. If you are looking for a constant decent cash back rate and no limits, Apply for the Fidelity Rewards Visa!

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A new popluar tool that credit card companies are using to get your business is to offer something called a Balance Transfer For Life. A Balance Transfer For Life is simply what it sounds like, a credit card transfer at a particular rate for the life of that balance. Sounds like a great idea right? Well lets drill into the details before we make that assumption.

First lets talk about the popular Discover 0% balance transfer for life offer. This one seems good enough, transfer over a balance and have 0% on it until it is paid off. But one you dive into the fine print you see that you need to make a minimum of 2 purchases using the card each month to keep the 0% rate on that balance transfer. Here is how Discover will make money on this balance transfer. Once you start using this card for charges, those charges will earn interest at the normal card rate, which usually is somewhere in the 10% – 18% APR range. So when you make payments to the card each month, those payments go toward the balance transfer first, so those purchase will keep accruing interest until you pay of the balance transfer. So over time if you use the card for a lot of high dollar purchases, the interest will keep accruing to your account. This may or may not be a good deal for you based on the amount of money to be balance transfered.

Next lets take a look at the Balance Transfer For Life offer from Advanta Mastercard. Advanta is offering a rate of 2.99% for the life of the balance. When you drill down into the Terms and Conditions there are no added requirements to keep the 2.99% for the life of the balance. Sure 2.99% is higher than the 0% offered by discover, but without the added pressure of having purchases stacked up behind the balance transfer you will save more money in the long run.

If you are trying to consolidate or reduce some debt, a balance transfer for life can be a great tool to help you. You do need to pay attention to the terms to make sure that the deal doesn’t actually end up costing you more money. If you decide to do a balance transfer for life, I would reccomend the Advanta Life-of-Balance Platinum Card with its 2.99% balance transfer for life option.

If anyone has come across any other balance transfer for life offers, please leave a comment here so that I can review them and add them to this post.

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For just under $12 a month you get unlimited access to your credit scores and reports from all 3 bureaus. They also montior changes to your credit file daily. There is also a $100,000 fraud expense reimbursement if you ever become a victim of identity fraud. If that does happen you receive access to a personal fraud specialist to work with to solve any issues.

What is important to me is the real time monitoring of my credit data. Don’t get me wrong, free credit reports are great, but by the time you check a report the damage could already have been done. With Chase, they sent me an email the day I opened a new credit card account letting me know that a new account was opened in my name. What was cool was that I could dispute the alert right there if I had not opened the account that I received the alert for. Most other identity protection sites tell you to call the credit bureau and don’t want to help you out.

I was able to pull my credit reports multiple times without issue. The site also does a very good job of explaining to you how your credit score is compiled and what things you can do over time to improve it. Obviously I wasn’t a victim of fraud within the first 30 days I tried it so I can’t comment on the persoal fraud assistant, but overall I was happy with the service that they provide. I decided to keep the Chase Identity Protection and cancel the service I had from Experian. For the money Chase offers me more features and fraud services, should I need them.

If you currently don’t have any fraud protection offering, I would suggest that check out Chase’s Identity Protection. Or at least just try it free for 30 days to see if it is something you may find useful.

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Many credit companies claim that you are not held liable for unauthorized charges to your account so many people don’t bother using Virtual Account Numbers. But if your card number was lost or stolen and you are issued a new number then you have to update that new number with every merchant that may have it stored. Using Virtual Account Numbers you can only give out your real credit card number to trusted merchants and give other not so trusted merchants a virtual account number. This way you have the security of knowing that even if someone did get that virtual account number they couldn’t do anything with it.

Some banks like Bank Of America have sophisticated virtual account number programs where you can get numbers that can be used multiple times for recurring purchases. Other banks like Citibank have a more basic program where you can get a number for a one time use.

I use a virtual account number for all my online purchases. With the way credit departments are getting hacked into, I think this provides me a little more security to not having my main credit card number exposed to possible fraud.

Here are the banks that I know of that have some type of Virtual Account Number feature:
Bank of America / FIA Card Services – ShopSafe Numbers
Citibank – Virtual Account Numbers
Discover – Secure Online Account Numbers

Banks I know that do not have some type of Virtual Account Number feature:
America Express (They used to have one but stopped it 2 years ago)
Chase
HSBC

Please leave a comment if you know of other banks that provide this valuable service.

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