Absolutely.
We got offered pre-approval of almost twice what we needed. And I was in the midst of changing jobs, so thy didn’t count my salary for the pre-approval.
The more they lend, the more interest they get back…
Thanks mate, there’s honestly no need for a ridiculous loan size like that. I don’t live in Melbourne/Sydney thankfully.
When was that? The are really tightening up now
6 ish years ago, maybe 6.5
Plus there’s 5 & 7 year warranties now which are worth taking into account
I think there’s two valid moves
Go cheap (and recognise it might not last)
Buy new (or ex-demo/fleet with 4-5 years left of warranty)
Either way, run it until it doesn’t run anymore, and don’t budget on getting anything back in resale.
try even at the start of this year. Needed 300k, got offered 700.
i was flabbergasted to be honest.
Yup.
Funny you say that, I have a 7 year warranty on the car I have the loan for, and was a demo with very low k’s when I got it. I could have just bought the car outright but as I mentioned previously I want to keep the majority of my savings for a house deposit. I still save the money I said previously in the thread with making the car repayments, quite easily. I definitely don’t budget to get anything back on it, just want it to last me as long as it can.
Haha I’ve had a Falcon and our other current car now (the one I haven’t got a loan for) is a Commodore, so I’ve had them both. Falcon was sh*te and the old man has it now, he likes to fix things so he doesn’t mind it breaking down once a month on him. Mr Mrs had an astra when I met her and that was one of the biggest steaming piles of crap cars I’ve ever know, every month was a warning light somewhere, battery, high temp…
I drive a turbo diesel Hyundai Santa Fe. Absolutely love it. Not gonna get one for peanuts though.
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Cheers for the advice everyone. I’m now a 0 pc virgin.
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Plastic cards are NOT real money.
If you budget and know where you are at and pay off the card each month then CCs are OK but you have to be vigilant.
I use YNAB
And it’s great.
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Not sure of the credit card options back home, but my cc here has a mileage bank. All our bills including monthly direct debits, etc are attached to our cc. We pay it off in full every month, so there are no interest charges & we accumulate huge amounts of miles. These miles translate into one travel adventure per year for my fam - including flights, hotels & car rental.
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Yep. We have several CC’s that we earn and burn. Some of the CC bonuses are just unreal. 100k in FF points or more if you meet the minimum spend.
We pretty much pay everything on the CC and then pay it off in full every week. Once the points hit my account I cancel the card and move on to the next one. Very easy for us to hit 600k worth of points in a year which is 2x RTW business class airfares.
Unfortunately the days of earning big points by paying ATO bills by CC are slowly dying.
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It’s not a bad idea although the growing number of credit applications doesn’t look good on your credit record.
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That is definitely something to consider and it’s not for everyone.
Touch wood, I still am yet to be denied a CC but perhaps if a need a home loan again it might be an issue
Not sure it would, TBH. They care about strikes on credit checks, and if you keep getting approved you might be right.
Have you had to negotiate/re-negotiate a home loan recently?
An acquaintance in the credit business told me that excessive credit applications, even if successful can be seen as a negative by some of the more cautious lenders as it looks like you could be financing credit with more credit. And the stain on your record should you be declined on an application, even if you haven’t defaulted previously is a real disadvantage going forward.
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Re-negotiated one about 7 years ago and then paid it out January when we sold.
Renting now and own a couple of apartments in town so another home loan isn’t on the radar currently but times may change.