How to build credit

spex x · #1 11-28-2007, 02:53 PM

A lot of attention has been paid to the possibility of 'free' money doing this app-o-rama. I can't really see how the money is free. If you have to spend time and energy to sign up, keep track of, pay off, etc. all these credit cards, thats not free.

Now, having said that, I will say that I know several high net worth investors that got started by investing money that they borrowed from credit cards. A good friend of mine did a similar thing to the app-o-rama and built about $200,000 in available credit for which he has to pay 4-6%.

He used some of that money to buy two fast food franchises. He used some more to buy some discounted notes. He used even more of that money to buy some real estate. Now he's rich, so I guess he got the last laugh.

I'm not really in a position to judge whether this is sketchy or unethical. I don't really care about those judgements. I think that this could be a great way to get started investing.

sublime · #2 11-28-2007, 06:55 PM

i have seen a small amount of research put into this 'app-o-rama' thing and it seems to not hurt your credit in the medium to long term. if you plan on buying a house soon, you should probably not do it as even a few credit points can be expensive.

the 'self respect' argument is beyond retarded.

the only way i can see this being -EV is if you have a habit of missing CC payments. even then that is solved by just setting up automatic payments thru your banks bill pay, which also massively cuts down on your time invested.