Friday, April 3, 2009

Payday Loans

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Payday loan offices offer small short term loans to people, often just until their next pay check. These are people who are desperate and often have no other source of credit. The rates of interest can be breathtakingly high. As the interesting article on the subject in Wikipedia states: [in a study of US payday loans] the most frequent rate was $25 per $100, or 650% annual interest rate (APR) if the loan is repaid in two weeks. Low income people can become entrapped.

The practice is banned for being unconscionable usury in a minority of US states. Rules vary greatly among other states. Is this practice permitted where you live?

WHAT'S A BUMMER:
a few readers suggested I take my messed up iPod to an Apple store to see if they could do something with it. I did that today. Their best guess is that the unit is okay but that there are corrupted files. They think the only way to fix it is to wipe the 40 GB of music on it and rebuild it from scratch. It's all from CDs, no downloads. Um. In my spare time.

TOMORROW: not sure. I'm thinking of going back to spring in Forest Park.

6 comments:

Sharon said...

Unfortunately, they are legal in Arizona however, citizen groups have been working hard to get them regulated which, of course would put them out of business. I was told one time that there are more payday loan stores in Arizona than there are McDonald's and Starbucks combined. Now that's a scary thought.

Sorry about the iPod news. Technology is a wonderful thing until....

Olivier said...

beau reflet de nuit.

reflection beautiful night.

Virginia said...

Sorry about your IPOD and you need it for your flight. It's all that kept me from jumping up and screaming like a banshee at times. In fact, I wore the battery down I used it so much.

Love the reflection today. Almost makes you forget the cheesy operation going on inside. I'm pretty sure we have them here. Quelle surprise!
V

Anonymous said...

I am always amazed that these places are allowed to exist.

In the Army in 1953, you could borrow $5.00 for $10.00 on payday and the person you owed the money to would be there on payday to collect.

We had thunderstorms last night and lots of rain and lightening.

Anonymous said...

What happened to us being responsible for ourselves? There was a time not too long ago that we borrowed $300 from cashloancity.com and had it paid back in a month without any problems. Heck, our credit cards charged us $40 for being a day late and charged us another $40 because that put us over our limit. Why isn't that being talked about?

Collin Roy said...

We all have little emergencies that crop up when we least expect it. They usually only require a minimal amount of cash to solve, but they generally require immediate attention. You may not have the cash readily available, but you will have it when you get your next paycheck. You obviously can’t go to a bank to borrow money because the process would take too long. So what do you do? You get a payday loan or cash advance.

A payday loan is typically a more expensive type of credit because it is for a short-term and there is a higher risk of default. It is not meant to be a solution to long-term money problems, but rather a quick fix for a particular situation. Payday loans are most effectively used by paying them back in full by the specified due date.