A couple weeks ago a friend of mine told me that she was declaring bankruptcy. I didn’t think too much about this since I knew her finances were messy since her divorce, and just shrugged it off, but it was foreshadowing, I assure you. The other day another good friend of mine told me that they were doing the same thing … and I got to thinking about my last blog about how yuppie scum were responsible for the banking crisis, and as I was hearing all these stories I was not surprised to learn that I was correct … I’m always right by the way, so get used to it.
I carry a small (not so small really) balance on one of my credit cards, like most of the country I assume. When I used the credit card I was careful to get the card with the best interest rate, and this one was around 8.9 percent. It was not a special card or a magic card. It wasn’t a special introductory bonus card … it was just a card with an 8.9 percent rate. I know it’s stupid to keep a balance on a card, but come on, lets face it, we’ve all done it, and I’m no exception. Would you be surprised to know that that 8.9 percent interest card is now at around 31.5 percent?! I shit you not! I opened my bill last month and I almost died. I did what anyone in my position would do, which is all the necessary steps one is suppose to take. I called the credit card company and asked them to lower the interest rates. They told me they couldn’t, and that it was raised because my credit score had been lowered. If anyone has called anyone for service lately you know that an answer that quickly isn’t one that the computer told them to give, it was an answer that they had prepared ahead of time. I told them that was impossible since I had been using a credit check service online ever since I re-did my mortgage, and I get monthly updates, and my credit score is actually higher than it used to be.
Now they didn’t lower the interest rate, and I’m working six days a week to pay it off, because I’m not letting those bastards get any more of my money than they already have, but it raises an interesting point though, doesn’t it? I mean here I was taking out a credit card for 8.9 percent, which was a very doable rate to pay back, and they raise it to 31 percent, which would guarantee that most people would never be able to pay it back. In fact I ran a some software on it, and plugged in what they were charging for their minimum monthly payment, and the amount I was paying over the amount, and would you be surprised to find out that it would take me over a thousand years to pay it off at that rate? It surprised me. They raised it without telling me, and they did it completely legally and above board. What kind of asshole would do that? And being that this is not a news story I can say that … people who do shit like that are assholes, plain and simple.
I was talking to one of my conservative friends about it … well she’s a Sean Sanity Conservative … in that she speaks in lists and talking points. I’m pretty sure she’s conservative because she wants Sean to be her dad or something deep like that. Anyways, she told me that people should have known what they were getting into when they took these loans. I call bullshit on that. When I took out this credit card it was for 8.9 percent, and no one told me that they could raise it THAT much. The disclaimer I signed said something about a couple points above prime. When I took my mortgage maybe I couldn’t afford it … but they gave me the loan, like they gave a million other people loans. I must say that when I got the loan I assumed that they knew what they were doing. I pay my mortgage every month, but I’m sure that everyone who took a loan they couldn’t afford thought the same thing; the experts that gave them the loan knew what they were doing.
Don’t forget my friends, this is all about greed. This is all about greedy bankers, and greedy investors who are out there STEALING your money. Make no mistake, that charging 31.5 percent interest is stealing. If you vote on issues, go to your candidate’s web and see where they stand on mortgage rape and credit card rape …
