How much do you owe?
TV ads always focus on revolving consumer debt. "Do you owe two, three, even as much as five thousand dollars on your credit cards?"
That pales in comparison to the hundreds of thousands of dollars many people owe on their houses. (Or, in certain areas, their tiny condos.) I wonder how many people actually consider that when they think about debt.
I know that I typically think of myself as being debt-free. And I am free from much of the debt that typically plagues people my age -- no student loans, no car payments, no credit card debt. No alimony! That's a nice side benefit of being best friends with my wife. :o) But I still have a monthly payment that could kill me (figuratively speaking only -- I think we've revised those sections of the penal code since the Middle Ages) and I can't easily get out of it.
So there are companies that address the plight of the indebted consumer. The sponsor of this post, UK Personal Loan Store, offers services such as IVA and debt consolidation, which can help people get started on the path to debt-freedom. They also want me to include this link: Bad debt mortgages. I have never heard of a 'bad debt mortgage,' per se, but it sounds awful and it's probably a good thing to get rid of.
Are programs like these the best way to go? Hard for me to say, since I've managed to live inexpensively and never run into serious problems. And I strongly suspect that's the best answer overall -- don't let yourself get into a situation where you need a third party to help!
I'd like to see a little Flash game about the dangers of consumerism and revolving credit. Maybe you're in a store, and you have to dodge the end-caps and premium brands, to get everything you need at the lowest price and avoid impulse buys. And if your character's field-of-vision passes anything, your inherent resistance to temptation is the only thing that can keep you from buying it. Harder levels could be like Best Buy, where everything is a giant, flat-panel TV. Mmm...
Flat panel TV. Only $90 per month for the next eighty years! I can't afford NOT to buy it!