Credit & Debt
Credit scores, credit reports, debt payoff strategies, student loans, credit card debt, collections, and rebuilding credit. Practical advice for managing and reducing what you owe.
Latest in Credit & Debt
A goodwill letter to your card issuer can erase a single late payment from your credit report — banks routinely remove first-time slips for long-tenured customers who ask
In May 2026, a billing address change can send a cardholder’s statement to the wrong mailbox. By the time the mistake surfaces, the payment is...
The average personal loan rate just hit 12.27% — but a 0% balance-transfer card freezes interest on $10,000 of credit-card debt for up to 21 months
If you owe $10,000 on a credit card charging 22% APR and make only slightly-above-minimum payments, roughly $1,830 of what you send in over the...
Paying a credit card down to about 9% utilization beats paying it to zero for your FICO score — lenders want to see active but controlled use
Average credit card interest rates remain above 20 percent as of the most recent Federal Reserve consumer credit data, which means even a modest FICO...
One late payment dents your score for years — but a short “goodwill letter” asking the lender to delete it often works if your history is otherwise clean
A single credit card payment that arrives 31 days late can shave roughly 60 to 110 points off a FICO score, depending on where the...
About one in five credit reports contains an error serious enough to raise your loan rate — and disputing it online is free and often works within weeks
Picture this: you apply for a mortgage, get approved, and then learn your interest rate is a quarter-point higher than expected because a bank reported...
Paid medical bills and balances under $500 no longer show up on your credit report — a quiet change that has lifted credit scores for millions of Americans
Not long ago, a $200 lab bill that fell through the cracks of insurance could land on your credit report, knock 30 or 40 points...
Your “pay in 4” purchases now show up on your credit score — FICO started counting buy-now-pay-later loans, and more than half of Americans have used them
That $120 pair of sneakers you split into four payments at checkout? It may already be sitting on your credit report. FICO has started incorporating...
Carrying the average $6,600 card balance now costs $1,462 a year in interest alone — and rates aren’t expected to dip below 19% before 2026 ends
Open your latest credit card statement, find the line that says “interest charged,” and multiply it by 12. If you carry a balance anywhere near...
55% of cardholders say they’re carrying balances just to cover essentials — credit card debt hit $1.33 trillion at a 21.52% average APR
A family of four in Phoenix charges $400 in groceries to a Visa card, not because they overspent on steak, but because the paycheck ran...
Credit card balances fell $25 billion last quarter — but 90-day delinquencies hit 13.1%, a 15-year high, because people aren’t borrowing less by choice
A $25 billion drop in credit card debt sounds like Americans are finally getting ahead. That’s the top-line figure from the Federal Reserve’s G.19 consumer...
Credit card debt crossed $1.33 trillion — and 42% of Americans say they expect to carry that balance until they die
Forty-two percent of Americans carrying credit card balances say they expect to stay in debt for the rest of their lives or for years to...
42% of Americans say they’ll carry credit card debt until they die — the average balance hit $6,580 at an APR above 22%
Imagine writing a check for $6,580, lighting a match, and watching $10,000 more burn on top of it. That is roughly what happens when a...
42% of Americans say they’ll have credit card debt until they die — total card balances just crossed $1.33 trillion at an average APR of 22.3%
Forty-two percent of Americans who carry a credit card balance believe they will be in credit card debt for the rest of their lives. That...
Class of 2026 graduates expect to earn $80,000 — their actual average starting salary is $56,153
Ask a college senior what they expect to earn at their first full-time job, and the answer, on average, is $80,004. Ask the labor market...
Credit card debt hit $1.28 trillion and the average APR is 22.3% — one of the highest rates in 30 years
When Maria Torres, a home health aide in Dallas, checked her Chase Visa statement last spring, the number that stopped her was not the balance....
Credit card debt just crossed $1.33 trillion — and the average APR is 21.52% for anyone carrying a balance
Carry a $5,000 credit card balance for a year at today’s rates and you will hand your bank more than $1,000 just in interest. Not...
Credit card debt hit $1.33 trillion — and 55% of cardholders say they’re carrying balances just to cover gas and groceries
Somewhere between the egg aisle and the gas pump, millions of Americans quietly crossed a line: they stopped paying off their credit cards each month...
75% of millennials have put off building an emergency fund because of credit card debt — and the average balance just hit $6,580 at 21.52% APR
Roughly three out of four millennials say credit card debt has delayed or derailed their efforts to build an emergency fund, according to Bankrate’s annual...
Credit card debt crossed $1.33 trillion while the savings rate hit 3.6% — both numbers haven’t been this bad since 2008
The last time Americans were saving this little and borrowing this much on credit cards, Lehman Brothers still had a stock ticker. Federal Reserve G.19...
Credit card debt crossed $1.33 trillion while the savings rate hit 3.6% — both numbers haven’t been this bad since 2008
The last time Americans owed this much on their credit cards and saved this little of their paychecks, Lehman Brothers was still a going concern....