Category: Finance

After the COVID-19 pandemic, many people were left cash-strapped. In 2022, 11.1% of Americans have bad credit scores, which makes it difficult to acquire loans. Loans are necessary to buy a house, further your education, or grow your business, but lenders are cautious in giving loans to people with bad credit, as they sometimes cannot pay it back. Even if you have low credit, you can still acquire loans. Here are a few ways you can get loans on bad credit.

1.   Find a Co-signer

One way of getting a loan with bad credit is by having a friend or family member co-sign the loan with you. Ensure the co-signer has a steady income and a strong credit report. The cosigner’s high credit will satisfy the lender. This method can also allow you to get loans with low-interest rates and easy installments, so you can quickly and comfortably pay back the loan.

Sometimes co-signers can be apprehensive about putting their names down because they will have to step in and help if you cannot repay the loan. Convince them by showing them your plan for repaying the loan.

2.   Peer-to-Peer Loans

Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending is a loan-acquiring process between two individuals, removing the financial institution as the middleman. P2P lending websites will directly connect you to a lender or an investor. The interest rate on these websites is decided upon your credit score. Your low credit will likely only get you high-interest loans. If you are willing to pay high-interest rates, you can find a loan option on P2P lending sites. Regardless of whether you obtain a loan, you will have to pay the website a fee to initiate the process.

3.   Payday Loans

If you want to achieve small loans, consider taking a payday loan. They only provide you with up to $500 in loans, and you need to repay it by the next time you receive your salary. Only consider getting payday loans for emergencies, as they have incredibly high fees. Their interest rate can be anywhere between 150% to 600%.

4.   Unsecured Personal Loan

You get loans on low credit through an unsecured personal loan, but you will have to use some of your belongings as collateral. Such as a property, vehicle, or certificate of deposit. Unsecured personal loans are also given at high-interest rates. Only consider this option if you can pay back the loan, or you will lose your collateral.

5.   Tradelines

Tradelines are accounts listed on your credit reports, such as credit cards, mortgages, and student loans. They contain information on each account and show your payment history. Even if you have bad credit, lenders can look at this tradeline’s good payment history to approve your loan. To further improve your chances of getting a loan, you can purchase more tradelines from companies like tradeline supply. Read the tradeline supply company review to determine if it is the right match for you.

Endnote

Loans are necessary to improve your financial situation as they help you start businesses, get higher education, and provide relief in emergencies. A bad credit score may prevent you from getting loans. Options like payday loans, personal loans, peer-to-peer loans, co-signers, and tradelines let you achieve loans even on low credit, but these loans come at high-interest rates. To ensure you repay the loans on time, you must devise a repayment strategy. Otherwise, your credit score can drop further.

Unemployment is one of the most devastating situations to be in. It affects your social, financial, psychological, professional, and emotional well-being. This is because most people attribute their sense of self-worth and identity to their careers and jobs. As scary as loss of employment is, you can get through it. If you were recently downsized, laid off, or resigned from your position, here are six tips to help you survive unemployment. 

1. Take time to grieve the job loss

Like other kinds of loss, such as death or breakup, you will likely experience grief due to the sudden loss of your source of income. Embrace the different stages of grief, including denial, anger, and bargaining. You should accept your situation and not be too hard on yourself. 

Consider unemployment as a temporary setback and stay positive. Exercise regularly, maintain a proper diet, get adequate sleep, and engage in other activities that make you feel good about yourself to keep despair, anxiety, and stress at bay. 

2. Update your budget

If you do not have a household budget, set one up. If you already have one, consider updating it to suit your current financial status. By revising your budget, you can identify unnecessary expenses you could eliminate or areas you could save cash. For instance, you could consider streaming your favorite shows instead of paying for cable, raising your car and home insurance deductibles to reduce premiums, and canceling some of your subscriptions.

You could also identify and plan for core essentials such as medication, transportation, food, and utilities like water, electricity, and gas. If you are struggling to pay for basic expenses, check Ontario Works eligibility to determine whether you qualify for financial relief to help you manage bills before you get another job. 

3. Create an emergency fund

Do not waste or misuse any penny you trim from your expenses when updating your budget. Instead, place the money in a high-yield savings account to build an emergency fund. An emergency fund can help you cater to your family’s needs until you secure another position.

4. Look for temporary employment

Securing your dream job could take some time. Instead of staying idle while your bills pile up, consider applying for temporary work to generate a little income. You could apply for seasonal employment, work online, or start a side job.

5. Connect with your network

Contact friends, family, acquaintances, and former colleagues, and let everyone know you are hunting for a new job. While you do not have to divulge the details of your current unemployment status, allowing your network to know you are on the market will increase the chances of landing another position quickly. You could also update your resume and post it on the internet to enable potential employers to find and contact you. 

6. Register for unemployment benefits

Some states often provide financial relief for a specific period to individuals who lose their employment. For this reason, if your loss of a job is not our fault, consider applying for employment benefits. Check your state’s guidance on unemployment registration to determine the eligibility criteria, the application process, the expected amount, and the required documentation.

Endnote

Unemployment may be scary, but you can survive it. Take time to grieve the job loss, update your budget, build an emergency fund, secure temporary employment, connect with your network, and apply for unemployment benefits to get through your current financial situation.

There is no doubt that debt may make people feel like they are being swept away by a tide of unfavorable money, but there are ways they can change their experience with debt and, more specifically, with loans. Individuals can  take control of their obligations and move toward a stronger financial future by considering alternatives, such as refinancing a vehicle loan through a trusted platform like RateGenius. However, people should ask themselves, “Should they refinance their car?” and then they must examine more closely what refinancing entails in actuality and its benefits for a vehicle credit.

Read on to know if restructuring your vehicle loan is an intelligent choice for you.

What Does an Auto Loan Refinance Mean?

When a lender agrees to issue new credits to a customer with conditions that are ideally advantageous to the customer, whether that be a lower interest rate, lower repayments, or some other incentive as a consequence of new positive development in the customer’s finances, that is referred to as refinancing. Refinances often occur when interest rates have changed or when a consumer’s credit has improved and they are now eligible for better lending terms.

Benefits:

A person’s specific scenario will determine how a refinanced vehicle loan affects them. Hence, as they go through the advantages of refinancing a vehicle credit, they should be mindful of keeping their budget and way of life in order.

• Avoid Paying Additional Interest: Refinancing any form of loan is frequently done by customers to benefit from cheaper interest rates. You might be able to acquire lending with a lower interest rate if your creditworthiness has improved or if national interest rates have decreased. As a result, you save money and should be able to pay off your debt more quickly.
• Debt Consolidation: The option to combine debt is another benefit borrowers enjoy when refinancing an auto loan. In essence, debt consolidation implies that you would have one obligation to worry about in place of several monthly lending installments. Some people find that this structure’s simplicity makes it easier to make monthly installments and maintain their finances.
• Reduced Loan Terms: You could consider repaying your credit quickly if you want to close the debt. Depending on your lending arrangement, you might make additional payments to reduce your obligation with refinancing, but ensure there are no early repayment charges.
• Easier to Manage Installments: Refinancing could help folks decrease their monthly installments if they’re having trouble with their vehicle lending payments.

Remember that your credit’s term will extend if you reduce your monthly repayments.

Final Thoughts:

Should your car be refinanced? It depends. Before deciding if refinancing is worthwhile, you should consider how the possible benefits and drawbacks will affect your financial profile.

Use platforms like RateGenius to evaluate your refinancing possibilities and the lenders who would offer the lowest rate or repayment.

These platforms incorporate your credit score, loan information, and other pertinent elements of your financial history to assist you in making wise and sound financial decisions and strengthen your connection with money management.

The class “Personal Finance for Young Adults” usually isn’t part of a high school curriculum – an unfortunate oversight that leaves many young people clueless about how to manage their money, apply for credit, and stay out of debt. Now that you’re in college, it’s likely that you’re in charge of your financial affairs more so than when you lived at home and mainly functioned in the realm of your parents’ economic universe. Indeed, you have more freedom to decide where and how to spend money.

But with that freedom comes the responsibility to spend money wisely. That’s what it’s like when you’re on your own – you get to decide. And you also get to experience the consequences of your choices, both good and bad. Soaring tuition costs coupled with financial unpreparedness spell a recipe for financial setbacks. Accordingly, it is crucial to understand basic financial tips for students and other core lessons about money.

9 Practical Financial Literacy Tips for College Students

While you may be forgiven for being nose-deep in your books, it’s time to reflect on how you manage your money. Do you have a budget? Or are you spending it on the go? Remember that the younger you are, the more time your savings and investments will grow – the sooner you start, the better. Here are some practical, real-world financial tips for college students you can take advantage of to reinforce your saving and spending habits.

Create A Budget

Carefree high school students frequently spend whatever is in their bank account, living off their parents’ generosity or the spoils of a part-time job. Once that student moves to college, a budget becomes indispensable. Making a monthly or semester budget is the first step toward staying on top of your finances. Budgeting gives you a big-picture view of your money, so you can make informed spending and saving decisions. Start by identifying your income for the semester or year, including paychecks if you have a job, loans, grants, and family contributions. Accounting for your inflows gives you an idea of how much to spend each month. Thereafter, plan for essential needs like transport and food. In whatever is left, you can save a fixed percentage and spend on other expenses like trips or simple pleasures. Remember to stick to your budget because straying from your financial blueprint defeats its purpose and risks pushing you into debt.

Practice Self-control

One simple but effective financial tip for college students is always paying with cash, not credit. You’re lucky if your parents taught you self-control. If not, understand that the sooner you learn the essential life skill of delaying gratification, the sooner you’ll keep your personal finances in order and as a habit. Put your money for everyday purchases on a debit card instead of a credit card. A debit card attracts no additional fees when making transactions, unlike a credit card with a high-interest charge. Use credit cards only for emergencies.

Track Your Spending

Write down every purchase you make or use a budget app. Create a routine that includes a regular accounting of your finances. Simply tracking what you spend can help you notice patterns and understand where your money is going. It also enables you to identify if you need to make a change. This financial self-knowledge will make your life calmer and allow you to focus on more important matters like your grades.

Exploit Student Discounts

College students should become masters in exploring ways their educational status can save them money. Restaurants, local venues, vendors, and services near college campuses often offer student discounts that can save you big money. What’s more, you should learn the value of hunting down great deals by looking for bargains. Being discount-obsessed is also an excellent financial tip for high school students since many companies offer discounts in the form of student memberships.

Use Cheap Essay Writing Services

It’s essential to make time for fun and relaxation even as you juggle academic work, family obligations, and social life. Sometimes students feel zapped from energy because they have too much on their plate and end up buying expensive college essays online. Luckily, you can use cheap but reliable and trustable professional essay writing help without breaking the bank. Custom Writings is a college paper writing service that offers affordable academic writing help from scratch for students in the USA and worldwide. Their writers deliver subject-savvy, content-rich custom college essays and research papers that help students fulfill their educational goals without blowing holes in their budgets. More free time, better grades, and financial wellness are three key benefits you get from using their services.

Set Financial Limits

Imposing financial limits for necessary items is another way to curb impulse buying. Setting a spending limit doesn’t necessarily prevent you from making impulse purchases but helps you pause and assess whether the new iPhone is necessary. By setting a relatively low limit, say $100 per month, you get a wiggle room without having carte blanche when it comes to spending power. Add the non-essential money into your student’s proposed budget, separate from basic expenditures on food and gas.

Avoid Full-price Textbooks

Ah, the textbook – the budget breaker for college students everywhere. While it’s true that some professors change and update texts practically every year, the vast majority use the same textbooks each academic year. Students shouldn’t have to shell out hundreds to shop for books before class. As a student, you can exploit many ways to save money on college textbooks, such as shopping for second-hand books from Amazon. You can also rent a book online or borrow local libraries. This financial wellness tip helps you recoup some of the cash spent on buying books.

Get A Job

Of course, college should be fun. The freedom of being on your own is something to be savored, and the social aspects of college are nearly as vital as classes. But if you can, adding a part-time job to the equation can significantly boost your income. Many college jobs have flexible schedules built to accommodate students. So, find a job that fits your workload without spreading yourself too thin. That extra cash can make a huge difference in managing a budget.

Collaborate with Roommates

Having roommates in college is pretty much a necessity. So, if you’re doing college solo, you have set yourself up for a much more expensive ride. Undoubtedly, living with roommates can be a challenge, but saving on housing can make it worthwhile. It’s crucial to go beyond having roommates to cut down on housing costs.

The Bottom Line

Your financial decisions during college have a lifelong impact, which is why it’s important to have financial literacy. You don’t need an MBA in Finance or even specialized training to become an expert at managing your personal finances. Following these basic financial tips for students can lead you to financial security, which forms the cradle for building the rest of your dreams. Remember, these ideas are not just for college students but also practical financial tips for high school students.

Your financial future depends entirely on several habits that may not seem to have anything to do with money or finances. Getting the right information from online tools like Velocity trader reviews is one way but are there other ways? The answer is yes. The journey to financial freedom can be shorter and less arduous if you adapt these six habits.

1. Remain Poised

Like many aspects of life, it is important to remain agile and poised through all aspects of financial situations, good or bad. Losing composure often leads people down a financial rabbit hole chasing high-profit, low-risk investment ghosts that leave them financially drained. Practice keeping a level head through tough times by learning and experimenting with low-cost situations.

2. Consistency

No habit will significantly impact your life unless you consciously and consistently implement it. It takes about a month to get acclimated to a new habit and start enjoying yourself. The first few days are always the hardest. Encourage yourself to stick to new habits, make bad habits hard to physically achieve, and implement visual reminders to keep yourself on track. In time, your efforts will pay off by being reflected in your bank account.

3. Use the Best Trading Tools

Trading tools are especially useful if you are looking to invest, which is a crucial habit to initiate in search of a brighter financial future. Tools like Velocity trader reviews give you an upper hand in making crucial financial decisions. Numerous financial tracking tools on the internet help you make the right financial decision for future gain. Make use of these free tools and any other that may require regular subscription fees but add actual value to your life.

4. Knowledge is Power

If you are determined to make a true difference in your financial journey, you will take measures to increase your knowledge base about money. It is common knowledge that schools do not teach us about money management, so it is important to enlighten yourself using free data littered across the internet. So instead of spending your lunch break scrolling through a social media app, grab a pen and paper and get learning.

5. Plan for Everything

Monthly or annual budgets and goals will save you a lot of financial chaos and turmoil. Making shopping lists is also a great way to plan for each aspect of your spending. The key to planning is using measurable and timed goals to create plans, so everything falls perfectly in place when the time comes. Planning may also involve identifying areas where the opportunity to save arises.

6. Discipline

Setting financial goals and making budgets are useless if you have difficulty sticking to the plan. Discipline is a habit that will put you in the top 5% of any crowd. Most people find it difficult to stay disciplined because of external forces, so it is important to forge your focus skills. Always keep your focus fixed on what needs to get done at the moment. One small at a time is the way to go.

The Takeaway

Your financial freedom is entirely in your hands, affecting you and your future generations. Don’t get left behind; take matters into your hands, start practicing these habits, and give yourself a financial leg up.