The End of Free Money

Today, November 13th, is a milestone for me. Today I am officially debt free! Again. Sort of...
The last time I had zero dollars in revolving credit card debt was June 2004. That was back in the days when free credit was rampant and I, like many Americans, got a bazillion offers in the mail for transferring my debt to zero interest credit cards… So being a red-blooded American when I was told that I could have free-money – well yeah, hell yeah I took it.

Since that was three PCSs ago, the extra cash came in handy and I floated the monthly balances for a while instead of paying it off – taking special care never to get saddled with interest charges. Since both my credit history and the economy could float that type of banking, I always thought it was win-win.

Now I do think I got the best end of the deal. Instead of paying off that debt (approx eight grand at its peak) I rolled the debt over to new credit cards and used my free cash to roll into my TSP, make sure I paid all my other balances in full, paid cash for a car along the way… and I spent what was left over on magic beans.

I must have taken up that last zero-percent offer November last year because the offers have stopped coming. Much to my ego’s relief, it’s not because of a down-turn in my credit history, it’s across the board in the banking industry.

Now over the last several years I’ve been planning for this day and today that last payment to that last credit card is easily absorbed in the family's budget. If it would be a problem though – would there be another chance? There are a few companies that are still giving out zero-percent offers but they are few and far between and only for six months at a time – and the vast majority are now charging a lot of balance transfer fees. So all in all, that ship seems to have sailed.