Marcus Aurelius

Is Dubai's Default a Black Swan Event?

I wonder how many dumped cars will turn up at the DXB carpark in the next couple of weeks?

The Decline of Credit Cards

One of the things a personal finance talk show host I listen to always cautioned people against doing was to take out equity on the house and use that to pay off or down credit cards. It is silly & foolish to convert unsecured credit to secured credit. Back in the real estate boom days that was easy & tempting to do after all we would often hear about getting these loans up to 110% of the house value.

More often than not, according to this host, people would then re-run the cards up.

His typical advice was to cut them up or put them in a bag of water and store in the freezer and pay them off with the paycheck or checks.

Now, the later approach is the only one open to people.