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Most people will get a mortgage to buy a house. Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase.

by u801e 9y ago

mcphage 9y ago
> Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase. At 0% interest, why wouldn't you?
- u801e 9y ago
  Depending on what credit card one uses for the purchase, one could get anywhere from 1.5% to 5% cash back (assuming they pay the balance in full before the credit card statement due date).
  - sokoloff 9y ago
    I pay my cell phone bill with a credit card anyway, so I still get the points, independent of how I bought the device. (I also use Ting and have bought the phones outright, but even previously on Sprint and AT&T with subsidized phones, I still got the points every month in addition to the device subsidy.)
- philsnow 9y ago
  A 2 year loan for $500 is 24 chances for me to forget to make a payment, for a glitch to cause my bank / cc to not pay them on time, for them to somehow not notice that I have paid them when I actually did, etc etc etc, any of which will either result in me eating some costs (completely eliminating the benefit of the 0% loan) or burning 1-10 hours on the phone with some clowns. What am I losing, whatever I would have made by investing that $500 over the same time period ? We're talking less than $50. I'm very lucky to be at a point in my life where I'd gladly give away "$50, 2 years from now" in exchange for "don't have to think about it, ever again".
  - Chaebixi 9y ago
    > A 2 year loan for $500 is 24 chances for me to forget to make a payment Are the payments for those "loans" included in the buyers cell phone bill? So no extra payment to remember.
drewmol 9y ago
True. For a variety of reasons, cell phones in the US don't follow typical economic patterns of similarly priced items. Most people still lease and/or finance them, and insure them. Concerning insurance, using a shared risk pool to insure against an easily coverable expense (replacement cost) and fairly common event(damage/loss) is a bit of an anomoly. A combination of convienience and unfamiliarity with the technology have created(or allowed carriers to create/promote) this phenomenon
Chaebixi 9y ago
> Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase. To be pedantic, that's wrong. Most people make $300 to $500 purchases with a credit card, which is a type of loan.
- u801e 9y ago
  That is true, but at least using a right type of credit card will actually result in you paying less than the principal amount of the loan (which can't be matched by a 0% loan in terms of the amount you end up paying).

Most people will get a mortgage to buy a house. Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase.

by u801e 9y ago

Most people will get a mortgage to buy a house. Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase.

mcphage 9y ago

> Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase. At 0% interest, why wouldn't you?

u801e 9y ago
Depending on what credit card one uses for the purchase, one could get anywhere from 1.5% to 5% cash back (assuming they pay the balance in full before the credit card statement due date).
- sokoloff 9y ago
  I pay my cell phone bill with a credit card anyway, so I still get the points, independent of how I bought the device. (I also use Ting and have bought the phones outright, but even previously on Sprint and AT&T with subsidized phones, I still got the points every month in addition to the device subsidy.)
philsnow 9y ago
A 2 year loan for $500 is 24 chances for me to forget to make a payment, for a glitch to cause my bank / cc to not pay them on time, for them to somehow not notice that I have paid them when I actually did, etc etc etc, any of which will either result in me eating some costs (completely eliminating the benefit of the 0% loan) or burning 1-10 hours on the phone with some clowns. What am I losing, whatever I would have made by investing that $500 over the same time period ? We're talking less than $50. I'm very lucky to be at a point in my life where I'd gladly give away "$50, 2 years from now" in exchange for "don't have to think about it, ever again".
- Chaebixi 9y ago
  > A 2 year loan for $500 is 24 chances for me to forget to make a payment Are the payments for those "loans" included in the buyers cell phone bill? So no extra payment to remember.

drewmol 9y ago

True. For a variety of reasons, cell phones in the US don't follow typical economic patterns of similarly priced items. Most people still lease and/or finance them, and insure them. Concerning insurance, using a shared risk pool to insure against an easily coverable expense (replacement cost) and fairly common event(damage/loss) is a bit of an anomoly. A combination of convienience and unfamiliarity with the technology have created(or allowed carriers to create/promote) this phenomenon

Chaebixi 9y ago

> Most people aren't going to get a loan to make a $300 to $500 purchase. To be pedantic, that's wrong. Most people make $300 to $500 purchases with a credit card, which is a type of loan.

u801e 9y ago
That is true, but at least using a right type of credit card will actually result in you paying less than the principal amount of the loan (which can't be matched by a 0% loan in terms of the amount you end up paying).