Pay day loans... Know your station in life

Pay Day loans and title loans are harmful instruments that the poor more often than not reach out to as a quick solution to their financial woes.  These types of loans are like a savage cancer - a metastatic tumor that just eats into your earnings (present and future - and way into the future).

Procrastination is the biggest enemy because it sets us up for failure.   One is fully aware of when payments are due but seldom do people pay on time or simply acknowledge that they do not have the necessary amount to make the payment.  Thinking ahead affords one the opportunity to reassess one's spending and in turn avails alternatives payments around - staggered or delays offered by the creditor.  People often make the wrong choices of what really needs to get paid, like that young mother in New York who spent $2,500 at Barneys on a purse.  A purse she had no business buying and using her tax refund (bulk of it being earned income credit of course) only goes further to confirm bad or misguided choices.  A few weeks down the road purse put to the side and she will be looking for money to feed the children.  Yet government programs had put in your pocket money as assistance purely because of the income bracket as a single mom.  

A few years ago Prince Charles enraged people by his comments: "What is wrong with people nowadays? Why do they all seem to think they are qualified to do things far above their capabilities?"  Yes MAYBE he should not have voiced out or in his case written such a statement.  But this is not to say that the context of his statement was wrong - there is plenty of truth in that statement - people need to know their station in life - live within your means!

Through sheer desperation people search for quick fixes to their problems without a second thought to the ramifications. It is important to understand what the $100 you are borrowing is going to cost you.  Interest rates for payday loans range from 300% - 750% - the question would then be - 'Is the item that I am borrowing the money for going to give me a return that surpasses the 750%  it has cost me to borrow?' 

In money issues one needs to learn how to make their money work for them and not the other way round especially if you are spiraling into an unending debit cycle.