Are you finding yourself looking secured credit card applications because of your bad credit?  I’m sure by now you already know that the secured credit card route is the right way to go when looking to re-build and establish your credit once again.  Before you hit that apply button and sign up, there are a few things you need to keep in mind so that you can save yourself some trouble.

Look for the major logos – When you’re looking for a secured card, look for the major logos like Visa and MasterCard.  If these cards aren’t issued by a major company, steer clear because it can possibly be a scam.

Reporting to the bureaus – The whole point of applying for a secured credit card is to re-establish your credit.  If the card isn’t reporting to the bureaus, it’s pointless to even have the card because it won’t be doing anything for you.  Make sure that the card reports to all of the three major bureaus.  This way, you’ll be able to have your credit history on file.  The way you can find this out is simply by checking out the application itself.

Know your limits – Every credit card works in it’s own unique way.  Make sure that you know how much you’re going to have to put down as a deposit.  Just about every card is going to make you put money down.  The reason they do this is because if you don’t pay your bill off, they can simply dip into your fund and pay the bill with that money.  My tip to you is that you try and find a credit card company that will give you interest on the money they are keeping.

Know the annual fee- Every secured card has an annual fee.  It’s important that you know how much this is going to be because you’re going to be paying this fee annually regardless of how much you use the card.

Look for upgrades – Some credit card companies are nice enough to upgrade you if your credit starts to get better.  I highly recommend you look for companies like this.  That way, when your credit does get better, you won’t have to pay any fees or put down a deposit.  This will save you a lot of money alone.

Take your time and look around at the applications out there.  There are a ton of cards out there that can suit your needs.  Take your time and try to do everything I said in the points mentioned above.  If you can follow this easy process, finding the perfect card will be a breeze.

When in debt, most people will do just about anything when it comes to re-building credit.  Sometimes, being desperate can lead to scams which will just put you in a bigger hole.  Even though these scams can be avoided, many consumers just take the “I need something” now approach and don’t do research before they apply.  Secured credit cards are a great way to rebuild credit but only if you apply for the right one.

No matter what market you’re in, there’s always going to be a scam.  Scammers are in it for a reason, to get a quick buck.  When it comes down to applying for a secured credit card, there are some things that you should look out for before submitting  that application:

The easy application.  If the company says you’re going to get approved right away, it’s already sounding fishy.  Any major secured credit card company is going to make you wait while you go through their credit approval process.  If they guarantee instant approval, stay away!

“900″ numbers.  Anytime you see an ad to rebuild your credit with a credit card, make sure that you pay attention to the phone number.  If you find that the phone number is a “900″ number or it just seems foreign, avoid this.  If you call one of these numbers, you’ll see unwanted charges on your phone bill.

No major logo.  If you’re going to apply for a secured credit card, make sure you apply for a card with the major Visa or MasterCard logo.  This way, when you get your card, it’s going to be accepted at most retailers.  If you get a card with no credibility, you’re just wasting your time.

Bad reputation.  After all of this, you may find a compnay that you don’t know what to think about.  If you find yourself thinking that the company is legit, check with the BBB to see if they truly are a good company.  Visiting websites and the BBB will be a great way to see if a company have a good reputation.

Scammers are everywhere and if you follow these points, it should help you avoid the scams that are on the market.  You’ll find ads from these type of people everywhere.  From newspapers to the radio, you never know what you’re dealing with.  Just because they are advertising on a major platform, it doesn’t mean they are legit.  As long as you do your research, you’ll be fine.

Fixing credit isn’t the easiest task in the world and when you don’t have all of the right resources for your building efforts, it can be hard, especially when you have questions that can’t be answered in person.  This is where the Internet comes in handy.  The Internet has the answer to just about anything including your credit problems. 

It isn’t hard to find all of the answers you’re looking for on the Internet, you just need to know where to look, so that you can start your efforts in restoring your debt.  The best place to start getting advice are by credit repair forums.  With a credit repair forum, you’ll be able to ask questions to other people in you shoes.  By doing this, you’ll hopefully get all the answers you’ll need.  You can get everything from links to what you need to helpful advice from fellow board members.

Where do I start?  I did a little research and while some message boards seems a little spammy with no value, I found two boards you should look at if you want to get credit repair help.  Here are the two I picked out for my top two:

• CreditBoards.com – CreditBoards.com is a great place to interact with a ton of users.  Filled with a ton of helpful content, just by simply browsing old posts, you can hopefully find a lot of answers to your questions.
• InfiniteCredit.com – CreditBoards focuses more on just fixing credit but this board is focused more on repair credit.  From beginner advice to advanced credit repair, this is yet another board you should check out.

Simply by viewing a credit repair forum, you’ll be able to get a lot of the answers you need.  If a forum doesn’t work for you, Google can also do the trick.  Simply pop in the question you have and you will more than likely find someone else with the same exact problem

Getting out of debt is easy if you have money flowing in but there are a few things you need to do in order to attack that debt.  You’ll have to take action, which one most debt attackers don’t do and you’ll want to work your butt off.  It takes money to make money.  Here’s a simple debt reduction plan that you can take in order to pay off your unwanted credit card bills.

Step 1:  Learn your lesson.  As dumb as this sounds, it’s true.  If you’re in bad debt right now, I don’t even want you to use a credit card.  Instead, I want you to use cash and cash only.  Using cash is the best way to avoid debt.  If you find yourself spending way too much in a store, simply bring in what you want to spend.  So, if you only want to spend $20, bring that amount into the store.  Don’t bring a credit card, nothing.  Just bring $20!

Step 2:  Write down every credit card bill.  The next step you want to take is grab every bill that is forcing you to be in debt.  Whether it’s school loans or credit card bills, we are going to write down the interest rate and how much each bill is total.  Here’s an example you can follow:

• Credit Card #1 – $7,500 – 11.99% APY
• Credit Card #2 – $3,000 – 14.99% APY
• Student Loans – $15,000 – 6% APY
• Our Total:  $25,500

Step 3:  Balance Transfer.  If at all possible, try and get a balance transfer with as many cards as possible.  It’s probably going to be hard to get a card with a $25,000 limit but if you can find a 0% for 12 months, do this ASAP.  This way you can pay no interest for the 12 months, this is when we will attack the debt.

Step 4:  Backup Plan.  If you can’t find that balance transfer card, you’ll want to attack the highest interest card first and put as much as possible toward that card.  So, in our example, we will want to throw as much money as possible toward the student loan, while paying the minimum on the other credit cards.  NEVER miss a payment on any of your cards, you won’t want to make your credit worse.  Here’s our example to show you:

• Monthly money coming in:  $3,000
• Monthly expenses:  $1,800
• Leftover Cash:  $1,200

*pay the minimum on the 2 credit cards and put the remaining toward the loans (remember to leave a little for yourself)

Step 5: Bring in the money.  Working a full-time job stinks, I know but if you’re not working more than 60 hours a week, get at it.  If you’re serious about this debt, you’ll want to attack it hard.  Start delivering pizzas, working retail, anything to bring that extra $200 in a week.  It all helps!  The more you make, the less you’ll have in debt.

There you have it, that’s our simple reduction plan.  If you follow these steps closely, it shouldn’t be hard to attack your debt.  Living debt free is great and make money for your retirement instead of spending it.

When people tend to have bad credit, they find that they can’t get approved for things such as a credit card.  Since most people don’t focus on what they should, which should be rebuilding their credit and paying it off, they tend to want to keep up with the Jones’ and buy all the fancy things when they can’t afford it.  This is where “rent to own” comes into place.

Rent to own is generally a rip off.  Sure, you can get that big widescreen TV for $20 a month but after you rent it for 4 years, you can only pay $500 to keep it!! It sounds like a great deal, doesn’t it?  What most people don’t think about is the future and how much money they are dumping into these stupid schemes.  Let’s use an example below.

I looked online and found a major retailer that offers “rent to own” everything from TVs to Furniture, I’m sure you know who I’m talking about.  Anyways, I called them up and acted like I wanted to purchase a 37″ LCD HDTV.  Here’s what they told me and made it sound like a great deal!

For $36.35 a week, I could rent the TV.  I could rent the TV up to 142 weeks, which would be about $5,000-ish.  Now, if I wanted to buy the TV at any time, I could get it at a steal @ $2,400.  Wow! After doing some research online, this same TV retails at $1,200. 

People tend to look at the $36/week and think it’s a steal for a “$2400″ TV that really costs $1,200 at a cheaper online retailer.  Rent to own is never good.  These companies are in it for a reason, they are looking to make a profit like any other business.

The main thing to remember here is that when you’re in debt, don’t worry about items in your house.  Instead, care about your own financial needs.  Go out there and get more than one job and attack your debt like there’s no tomorrow.  Once you get your finanical needs in place, go out there and buy things in cash.  There’s no reason to rent that TV when you can own it for the actual retail price in the future!