This is more of a post to share my thoughts rather than about credit cards.
We owe it to ourselves, and ourselves only, to be financial independent.
I was browsing through some financial information earlier on. And realised some of the information that were stored in my brains needed updating.
Yes, knowledge, like skill, has to be updated and constantly sharpened.
In this dynamic market that changes very fast. It is important we keep learning and upgrading.
The lucky thing, we can do so easily with the world’s information available at our fingertips. Just like how you are able to read my blog and access my knowledge easily.
For me, this knowledge is about financials. For some, it could be of a narrower scope, like stocks. For IT personnel, it would likely be the latest developed computing information. And for some others, it could be the latest fashion. Regardless of which field that interest you, be updated.
Take for example the credit card that we have been holding for the past 3 years. They may no longer be giving us the best rewards because the benefits changes, our own lifestyle and preference changes. But out of habits, we carried on using them (and the banks are usually very good at ensuring you carry on to carry their cards with you). If we don’t keep ourselves updated with the changes or new benefits or new cards, we are the ones who would be losing out ultimately.
Given the low interest rate situation currently, if you are still paying an average of 4-5% for your housing mortgage rate loan, you’d have lost out for a few years already because the interest rates now averages about 2% due to the Europe Crisis. If only you have the information, you could save yourself quite a tidy sum of money. This is because a housing loan is usually a huge sum of money in the hundreds of thousands range. And a 1% difference of interest payable? You can do the maths. Okay, if you don’t exactly understand what I’m talking about in this paragraph, I’d suggest you to contact a banker immediately. Of course, you are always welcome to leave a post in the comments should you need my help with a more detailed explanation. But a banker would be in a better position to be able to help you to act and rectify the situation.
So we need to be updated to react to changes in the market. Even our savings account deposit interest rates are very low. I remembered many years back when I was still very young, the rates were about 1%. Now? It’s at 0.05%. While we cannot stop inflation or low interest rates from eroding the value of our money but how then can we preserve as much of the value while we build up our savings chest?
The answer is knowledge, be updated and do what is necessary to maximise your benefits.
I have a godsister, who pays for her credit card annual fee. And out of habit, she still carried on paying because the bank automatically deducts her points to offset her annual fee. I’m not sure if she went ahead to request for a fee waiver after I told her. The card fee should be in the range of $50 to $100.
Ouch!
