Getting a personal loan online has grown into a multi-billion-dollar industry, with lenders ranging from individuals in peer-to-peer programs to big banks.
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5 Credit Tips for Recent College Grads
Congratulations to the class of 2018. We have a graduation present for you: five credit tips for recent college grads. One of your first post-graduate lessons should be on the proper use of credit. Poor early decisions regarding credit can have adverse effects for years. Here comes some credit tips for college grads. In the words of millennial money expert Stefanie O’Connell, “It’s really important
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Americans’ Biggest Money Mistakes: Survey
You’ve made some life decisions that you’ve regretted, and some of those decisions surely involve money. What sort of money mistakes have you made? Don’t be shy about admitting your financial mistakes. According to the latest version of Finder.com’s annual “America’s Biggest Money Mistakes” survey, you have 192 million fellow Americans to keep you company. More than three-quarters (78.3 percent) of respondents claimed to have
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Free Credit Freezes and Other Legal Changes You Should Know
Although big banks stole most of the spotlight in the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, the new law includes improved fraud alerts and credit freezes for consumers. The law President Trump signed late last week had attempted to dismantle the post-credit crisis legislation known as Dodd-Frank. While it achieves some of that for big banks, it also gives consumers some additional tools
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How to Get Money Back from Western Union Scams
Act Before May 31 to Get Your Money Back Although Western Union has served as a reliable method for rapidly sending money over long distances since the late 1800s, the service is also used by scammers with increasing frequency. This has resulted the settlement of Federal Trade Commission (FTC) charges that Western Union had not been doing enough to protect consumers from these scammers. The
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10 Best States to Live in with a Bad Credit Score
Where You Can Make the Best of a Bad Credit Situation It’s no fun having a bad credit score. You pay higher interest rates for your credit – if you can get credit at all. You have little room for financial error. A small, unexpected bill can cause big problems. At least your hardships may not be as bad if you live in certain states.
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Why Your State Taxes Might Go Up
What goes up must come down – when considering the effects of gravity. That principle doesn’t typically apply to federal or state taxes. In the rare cases where taxes do go down, other taxes tend to go up to compensate government coffers. Because state taxes are often linked to the federal tax code in different ways, changes in the federal tax law have ripple effects
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Higher Credit Scores Needed For Home Purchases
Average Homebuyer Score Rose from 700 in 2005 to 732 in 2016 Welcome to the 2018 home-buying market: Rising demand and an extremely tight supply of homes, especially in the critical starter-home market, make it difficult to realize your goal of home ownership. In this market, you’ll need two important things to land your dream home – more money and a higher credit score. Data
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More Homebuyers Stretch Toward Excessive Debt
It’s difficult to purchase a home in today’s market. Pent-up demand and an extreme shortage of homes have led to a rapid increase in prices that outpaces recent wage gains. The problem is acute in the market for starter homes and critical in high-value markets like San Jose, Seattle, and Austin. Desperate homeowners are stretching their finances to buy a home, and lenders and mortgage
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Retirees Would Return to Work Under the Right Conditions
Are you planning to work in retirement? If so, is it because you need money? The recent American Working Conditions Survey (AWCS) from the Rand Corporation think tank suggests another reason – you want to be there. A Rand brief on the AWCS survey compared working conditions and expectations of older workers (age 50 and up) to those of workers in their prime working years
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