Assorted facts: Those people who have credit card debt owe an average of $15,654. About 58 percent of them (about six in 10)have enough savings to pay off the debt, About 21 percent (about one out of every five) say they don’t have enough savings to pay off credit card debt. Total credit card debt […]

“The Technician’s usual experience is one of frustration and annoyance at being interrupted in the course of what needs to be done to try something new that probably doesn’t need to be done at all.” –Michael Gerber, The E-Myth Revisited   You didn’t sign up for this.  When you bought rental property it was to […]

Two credit scoring systems are most used by those who check credit for lending, renting and hiring.  The old “standby” is FICO.  That’s what people think of when they ask what someone’s score is.  It ranges from 300 (never pays anybody) to 850 (just-about-perfect).  Then there’s VantageScore.  They use the same numbers as FICO.  The […]

By Robert L. Cain   Pew Research and the US Census Bureau say “more U.S. households are headed by renters than at any point since 1965.”  In addition, vacancy rates in many parts of the country are almost non-existent, with under 4 percent in many cities on the West Coast. That information, when combined with […]

By Robert L. Cain   Most landlords and many employers check applicants’ credit before they rent to or hire them.  Making it more difficult, however, according to the Identity Theft Center, is that since January 1, 2005 there have been 7,954 security breaches with 1,054,627,432 (that’s right, over 1 billion) personal records hacked, including the […]

Elsie was covered by an employer-sponsored health plan with a $1,000 deductible per person. Then she had a baby. At birth, her son acquired additional $1,000 deductible. That meant, both Elsie and her son were liable for additional cost-sharing expenses up to an annual Out-of-Pocket (OOP) limit, Those cost-sharing charges could vary depending on the […]

They are out to get you. Well, maybe not you personally, just your credit card information. If they get you, that’s only because something you did made it possible for them to get all that information. What you did was most likely totally innocent and something that people do regularly, but this time those creative […]

A clerk at Home Depot offered us a Home Depot credit card.  We told her that we have credit cards we never even use so don’t need another one.  She said they made her offer them to everyone, but then told us that it had taken her and her husband five years to climb out […]

By Robert L. Cain   With the unemployment rate hovering around “no qualified employees” available, it is becoming more and more of a challenge to pick and choose the person who can do the job you want done.  Rental owners and managers have the opposite “problem,”  too many applicants.  Even so, the solution is the […]

How to ensure a judgment gets on a credit report As we discussed last month, beginning July 1 judgments will appear on credit reports only if they contain a minimum of a name, address, and Social Security number and/or date of birth so the debtor can be properly identified.  It is up to county court […]