Comments on: Student Credit Cards– Great or Awful Idea?

By: MD

MD — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 07:22:41 +0000

Right on. It’s cool that you stopped by Tonei. I hope to see you around more because I could learn a lot from you.

By: Tonei

Tonei — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 05:39:26 +0000

I have two part-time jobs for my university – as a residence hall desk receptionist ($8.25×10hrs/wk) and as a research assistant ($10×8hrs/wk). I also do some online survey stuff (see frozenactivist.net/money), get paid to promote bigwords.com on campus, and manage to pick up random things here and there (usually through browsing craigslist’s “gigs” section in my RSS reader).

By: MD

MD — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 05:27:57 +0000

You have this completely figured out, congrats! Just curious, what’s your income situation like? You seem like the type of person that’s got the income aspect of personal finance figured out.

By: Carnival of Debt Reduction » Carnival of Debt Reduction: Happy Martin Luther King Day!

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:21:04 +0000

[...] Studenomics debates whether student credit cards are a good or bad idea. [...]

By: Tonei

Tonei — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 19:21:08 +0000

I use mint.com to automatically track my finances, and I keep the bulk of my money in dedicated savings accounts at Alliant Credit Union (with the significant exception of a Roth IRA and a “moderately conservative” 529 at Charles Schwab). I set aside a little over half of my paychecks in savings – 10% for travel, 20% for my general savings/emergency fund, 20% for college expenses, and 3% to my IRA (I put $1000 in it last year, so I’m focusing on college costs now). 2% gets set aside to give to charities, and the rest gets used for my monthly expenses.

When I’m shopping online, I use evreward.com to find cash back opportunities, and retailmenot.com to find coupons for discounts and free shipping.

By: Studenomist

Studenomist — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 07:09:14 +0000

Tonei where have you been this whole time? That’s really good to hear that your getting the most out of your credit cards.

Any other tips you willing to share with us?

By: Studenomist

Studenomist — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 07:04:33 +0000

I can’t disagree with you there. Parents should teach their children about credit cards.

The only problem is that not everyone is raised by both parents and some people’s parents are horrible at managing money.

I do like your thinking though!

By: Tonei

Tonei — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 18:35:36 +0000

I’m a sophomore in college, and I have four credit cards (though one of them I don’t really use anymore.) Two of them are specifically student cards, three don’t have an annual fee (the fourth I’m seriously considering getting rid of in April), and all of them earn reward points. I pay my balance off every month, and I’ve earned at least a couple of free plane tickets, a solid number of free train tickets, and a decent chunk of ThankYou points (which I just used to save $65 on a hotel room last month). I realize not everyone can do this, but my parents have always done the same thing – paying off their card every month and reaping the rewards – and following their excellent example works really well for me.

By: Credit Card Chaser

Credit Card Chaser — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 07:12:03 +0000

My belief is that it is a parent’s job to teach their kids about responsible credit card use even from a young age. Just like many parents will take their kids to open up a savings account and explain to them how to budget their money, how compound interest works, etc.

I think that it is also very important for parents to teach kids how credit cards work and how to use credit cards so that the card works for them and not against them.

I wrote an article over on Money Ning a while ago about why I will definitely give my kids each a credit card from their early teens and then teach them how to use it responsibly while they are still under my roof rather than have them try to figure it out on their own for the first time while they are in college: http://moneyning.com/kids-and-money/why-give-my-kids-a-student-credit-card/

By: Ken

Ken — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 01:42:41 +0000

I’m concerned about maturity level of 18 year olds. What SOME do is get way in debt…have to work more to pay for it and then lose track of priorities and time management. I guess it depends on the individual…are they responsible…have a good track record with money?