Specialized Consumer Strategies – Why Building Credit at a Young Age is Important

Specialized Consumer Strategies provides financial counseling and planning services to clients who want to build credit and get out of debt. There are many simple habits that can be used to improve your credit very quickly. Many young people do not think about their credit until it is too late, and then they have to work to fix bad credit instead of building good credit from scratch. Therefore, it is important for college students and early twenty-somethings to take steps to build their credit to avoid problems later in life.

The easiest way to build credit as a college student is to get a student credit card with a low limit and use it for one payment every month, such as your phone bill or your groceries. Make sure it is something that you know you can pay off every month consistently, and resist temptation to use your credit card to purchase things you cannot afford. The easiest way to obtain a credit card at a young age is to go through a bank that offers a student credit card specifically for this purpose. As your credit score improves, you can begin to use your credit card more often, but make sure you can always make your payments every month.

It is also important to pay your rent diligently every month, as this also can affect your credit rating. Making your rent payments on time every month is also a good way to build credit if you are really averse to the idea of getting a credit card. Specialized Consumer Strategies encourages all of their clients to take up good credit habits as soon as possible.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – How to Choose a Financial Planner

Specialized Consumer Strategies is a financial planning company that works with clients to help them reduce debt, improve credit, and budget for the future. Financial planning is a very useful and important service that anyone can use to get ahead monetarily. However, there are many important things to consider when choosing your financial planner.

First and foremost, your financial planner should be someone that cares about you and your needs, instead of just trying to make money for themselves. They should have a deep understanding of your goals as a consumer and be able to help you reach them by giving knowledgeable and unbiased advice. It is crucial to have a meeting with your future financial planner to make sure it will be a good fit before completely committing to using their services.

You should also consider your financial planner’s credentials and experience. What sort of education do they have? Where have they worked in the past? What have previous clients said about their services? Finding the answers to these questions is a good way to determine if a particular financial planner is worth spending your time and money on. This is especially important if you will be using their services to get out of debt, because you do not want to waste your time with someone who will not be able to help you solve your problems.

Specialized Consumer Strategies has a special focus on getting clients out of debt by creating a specific strategy to help them tackle the problem one step at a time.

Specialized Consumer Solutions – How to Check Your Credit Score

One of the things that Specialized Consumer Strategies Solutions focuses on with their clients is maintaining a good credit score. Many people do not understand what a credit score is or why it is important, but it can actually have a huge effect on your financial life. Simply put, a credit score is a numerical reflection of your history of debt and making payments. They higher the number, the easier it will be for you to take out a mortgage, buy a car, open a new credit card, and more. It is very important for everyone to be aware of what their credit score is, so they can work to maintain or improve it.

One of the most common misconceptions about credit cards is that looking up your own credit score will hurt it. This stems from a confusion between ‘hard inquiries’ and ‘soft inquiries’. A hard inquiry is when a lender, such as a mortgage or credit card company, checks your credit score in order to potentially approve you for a loan. These inquiries can hurt your credit score over time. However, a soft inquiry, which occurs when you check your own credit score, will not have any impact on it at all. Other kinds of soft inquiries include background checks.

It is very easy to check your credit score online. Many banks will allow you to check your credit score through their online banking system. You can also request a hard copy of your credit report through annualcreditreport.com. Specialized Consumer Strategies Solutions can help you improve your credit score through their financial advising.

Specialized Consumer Solutions – Reasons to Avoid Store Credit Cards

One of the biggest pieces of advice that Specialized Consumer Solutions gives to people looking to improve their credit is to avoid store credit cards. Many popular retail stores, like Target, Best Buy, Nordstrom, and many more offer a store credit card with perks like a sign-up discount, high amounts of store reward points, and more. At first, these perks seem very enticing, and you may be tempted to open a card at your favorite store. However, this is a very easy way to hurt your credit.

The biggest reason not to open a store credit card is that the interest rates on them are usually extremely high. It is common for store credit cards to have interest rates ranging from 15 to 25 percent APR. Usually this is how they compensate for the original discount you received when you signed up for the card, so they still profit off of your credit purchases, even though it seems like a good deal. Also, while other types of credit cards usually offer an initial period before interest starts being charged, store credit cards will often charge you interest on your very first purchase, so you end up spending more money than you realize.

The only way to manage having a store credit card without hurting your credit or paying large amount of interest charges is to pay off the entire balance immediately. However, this is not realistic for many people. Therefore, Specialized Consumer Solutions highly recommends that you avoid store credit cards in order to save your money – and your credit score.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – Traits that Help You Live Debt Free

Whether you’ve made the decision to start working on eliminating debt or you’ve already started, it’s good to get some inspiration. Specialized Consumer Strategies works with clients who have made this resolution, and part of the process is having the right motivation to make the changes stick. It’s also good to look at the people who have cut debt from their lives. Whether they are colleagues or family members, they probably have one of the following characteristics.

Detail oriented
You’ll pay no notice to the recurring fee on your store credit card if you’ve stopped reviewing the statement. If you want to eliminate debt, pay attention to the details, especially on personal finances.

Research minded
People without debt do their homework. They might have finance professionals like Specialized Consumer Strategies helping, but they don’t sign any paperwork without reading through. If you want to control your finances, it helps to learn more about them. It may be a bit overwhelming in the beginning, but it will help you understand what’s happening.

Think long term
When your focus isn’t on finding immediate satisfaction, you make better decisions. Sure, it would be nice to get that new LED television on sale, but how does it fit in the big picture? It doesn’t mean you can’t buy a new television, it just means you have to include it in your plan and save for it. This gives you time to consider whether you even need the television.

Specialized Consumer Strategies helps people gain financial control by providing the tools and knowledge to succeed.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – Understanding Interest Rates

As a personal consulting firm that helps clients understand credit and how to manage finances wisely, Specialized Consumer Strategies knows that one of the commonly used terms in consumer finance is interest rate. There are several forms of interest rates, each based on some economic factors. While the technical details behind interest rates are sometimes trivial to consumers, lenders and retailers sometimes take advantage of the public’s ignorance of these details to make money. Those who make the effort to understand interest rates are taking major steps to making smarter financial decisions.

Nominal interest rate

This is the simplest type of interest rate and is the stated rate of a given loan. For fixed income investments, the nominal interest is actual monetary price that consumers pay lenders to use the borrowed amount. For example, if a loan is offered with a nominal rate of 6%, you can expect to pay $6 of interest for every $100 borrowed.

Real interest rate

The real interest rate is a bit more complex than the nominal rate. The big difference is that it takes inflation into account. The “real” part explains the actual rate the lender receives after accounting for inflation. For example, if a bond has an annual compounding rate of 8% and inflation is 3%, then the real interest rate is 5%.

As the experts at Specialized Consumer Strategies explain to clients, the major advantage in knowing the different types of interest rates is that it enables them make better decisions on investments and loans.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – Importance of Saving Early

When it comes to helping individuals gain control of their finances, Specialized Consumer Strategies likes to ensure that clients have all the information they need to make wise choices. Typically, a project will entail identifying areas where change is needed. Typically, once a client has gotten their finances back on track, it’s important to ensure they make saving a habit.

Planning for retirement is no longer an old man’s game. It is in the best interest of individuals regardless of their age, to start saving early in life. In fact, young people who save early can make a bigger impact on their retirement income than other age groups – and that’s because of one advantage older people don’t have on their side: time. When you start saving and investing early, your efforts will bear more fruit later in life.

The following are advantages you gain by saving early:
Emergencies
Money set aside for savings can be used to handle emergencies that arise. Emergencies take many forms, and it’s assuring to know you have the finances to handle any issue.

Retirement plan
As previously mentioned, young adults can have a larger impact on future retirement income if they start early. Your investments have more time to earn interest, plus you continue to make additional payments. Compounding power works in your favor in this case.

Financial discipline
Early saving habits shape how you handle finances, and you are better off in the long run knowing how to handle your income. It’s crucial to adopt good saving habits at an early stage.

Specialized Consumer Strategies provides financial assistance to clients, especially issues to do with credit and debt.When it comes to helping individuals gain control of their finances, Specialized Consumer Strategies likes to ensure that clients have all the information they need to make wise choices. Typically, a project will entail identifying areas where change is needed. Typically, once a client has gotten their finances back on track, it’s important to ensure they make saving a habit.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – The Importance of Financial Planning

Specialized Consumer Strategies works with clients who wish to gain knowledge on how to achieve financial control. Many of the firm’s clients are people struggling with bad debt. SCS comes in and provides the knowledge and tools necessary to help clients eliminate debt and become wiser at financial planning.

Having a financial plan enables you to set short and long term financial goals, which is very important in achieving financial success. When you have a plan in place, it’s easier to make decisions that help you stay on track. Some people can do this on their own. As Specialized Consumer Strategies has seen over the years, however, many people require a little help in securing their financial futures.

When you have a plan, you can manage your income effectively. You can understand how to allocate the income to various needs and still have enough left for savings. A financial plan enables you to see the areas that require less spending, so that you are left with more of your hard earned money. With an increase in cash, you can start considering investments that can multiply your financial resources.

A good financial plan also considers your financial objectives and risk appetite. Once you start considering various ways to save and invest, the financial plan helps you make the right decisions on which investment options to consider.

Lastly, a financial plan is what you require to provide financial security to your family. If you haven’t worked on a financial plan yet, Specialized Consumer Strategies knows it’s never too late to start.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – Three Common Improper Uses of Credit Cards

Specialized Consumer Strategies is a financial solutions firm located in Lake Mary, Florida. They were established eight years ago in response to banks increasing their interest rate charges. At the time the year founded, they consisted of a five-person team. Today they employ over 30 representatives and serve clients across the United States.

Many of Specialized Consumer Strategies clients are in debt and have poor credit. They offer them strategies to work their way out of financial trouble while also educating them on proper credit use. Here are three common ways that credit cards are improperly used.

Individuals should not open too many credit card accounts at once. High lines of credit can improve a person’s credit score, but opening too many accounts at once will have a negative effect. Having too many cards also makes it difficult to keep track of balances, increasing the likelihood that payments may be missed.

It is important to at the very least pay the minimum balance each month, however, this is not good enough. It is bad to carry a revolving balance and if possible individuals should pay off their balances as soon as they can. Minimum payments should only be made to avoid late penalties being assessed.

Finally, paying off cards with low interest rates first is another common mistake. It is best to pay off cards with higher interest rates first if an individual has multiple credit cards. In the long run, cards with higher interest rates will cost more and it is fiscally responsible for finishing paying off these balances first.

Specialized Consumer Strategies – Three Reasons Why a Store Credit Card is a Bad Deal

Specialized Consumer Solutions strategies is a financial solutions firm that helps individuals work their way out of debt and improve their credit scores. They analyze their clients’ financial history and provide different strategy options that the client can pursue to regain control of their finances. Specialized Consumer Solutions also designs budget plans that help their clients maintain their financial stability and live within their economic means.

Store credit cards are a notorious reason why people develop poor credit scores. Here are three reasons why a store credit card is a bad deal.

• When an individual applies to a store credit card, that store automatically does a credit check, which counts as applying for a credit card. Applying for a credit card hurts a person’s credit score. So even if an individual decides to not get a store credit card, simply inquiring about one will hurt that person’s score.
• Applying for and receiving store credit card requires the store to not only do a credit check but a hard credit check, which is extremely poor for a person’s credit score. Hard credit checks say on credit reports for a full year, meaning that a person’s credit report is affected by one check for the full year.
• Usually, store credit cards come with some sort of discount like $50 off the first purchase made with the card. However, because store cards negatively affect credit reports, when a person applies for a car or mortgage loan, the lender will see a negative score. The $50 saved looks a bit useless when a car or mortgage loan rate is high because of bad credit.