I think the idea is to keep the accounts open if you already have them but to cut up all but two. I'm not sure why they say two. We use to have a Visa and a Mastercard because some places only took one kind but now it seems that everybody takes both so we just kept our Mastercard, no fees, and points. It's so much easier to pay the bills every month when there is only one credit card bill coming in.

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I didn't see the show, i just wanted to say that the whole Screetch from Saved By The Bell story ticks me off. I got so sick of seeing him on talk shows and in magazines begging people to buy his tshirts to save his house. I keep thinking.......get a real job!! If being a comedian is not paying the bills, get a JOB! UGH, He had his moment of fame, and to be honest he's not even funny.It's not everyone else's fault he didn't spend his money wisely,so i think he should have sold the house if he couldn't afford it!!

I have to admit all the debt shows I have watched this week were such big disappointments! Especially that 1st family, did anyone notice the sourpuss face the wife got when the guy told them to sell their house and timeshares? It honestly made me sick to my stomach! I should of known when they started off the show with them that it would be a disappointment! ! I just know that Oprah will probably be better than all these episodes I saw this week!

Oh- I forgot the thing that made me the angriest was the woman who had other people pay off her debts and know she has a book out and there is talks of making a movie out of it- disgusting!

I missed it all (my son picks up on everything, so I can rarely watch news shows), but am curious: how did she get people to pay off her debts for her? It seems anyone can write a book, but who will buy it, and how on earth do they get moviemakers interested?

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To outsiders- I don't think they probably think we have that much money compared to other people who live in our area, actually they probably think we are white trash compared to some of the houses that start at $700,000 in the area that my dh builds.

Anyways, I think a lot of people think once you are at a certain income level you should have all these things, drive this vehicle and so on. A consumers disease! With my dh being in upper class housing developements, he sees a lot of people suffer from the Joneses (but he is as well- even though he denies it!), he sees a lot of repo's, rent a center trucks delivering furniture and notices posted on doors. I think a lot of people want to be percieved as rich so people think better of them and so on.

Edited to add: I was kind of disgusted by that family's debt. Now I can understand the year the husband was without work and his wife shutting done her business- but it irritated me when they bought the timeshare and had all the big vacations and like someone else said- acted as if it was nothing! They were struggling to pay the minimums on the cc's right- I can't remember, I was mainly disgusted by knowing they could downsize their house and pay off all the cc's!

It was interesting to see that couple oblivious to the fact that they were totally out of control! They had 2 time shares and it didn't even occur to them to sell them!!

I think part of the problem is that John Q public sees "everyone else" getting stuff and there's really little out there showing John Q Public that there are a lot of people that aren't "trying to keep up with the Jones".

I didn't see it. When I worked in a corporate office, everyone there had the mentality that they needed bigger houses, the most expensive designer cloths, expensive cars and most all of them went into debt to have the appearance of having it all. My bosses were millionairs, they could afford to have all of these things. I could never understand when I saw employees of theirs who I knew made next to nothing having all the same things that the bosses had and no way to pay for it. Who are they really fooling.

No one wants to save for anything. They have to have it all now. If you think about it, you don't really own anything until it's paid for. The bank can take your house and your car, if you file bankrupcy because of overwhelming credit card debt, you will not be using credit for 7 to 10 years in the future. Why bother to live the lie.

I live out in the country. Things are simpler here. We all live in modest houses and drive used vehicles. We grow have our own veggie gardens and don't go on vacations much. But, we are living a in an honest way and are happy. I'm not sure if it's because I'm not around it so much, but new cars and over priced suits don't do it for me anymore. I went to lunch with my boss a while back and he had just gotten a very expensive new car. All I could think about it was, I could almost pay off my house with that. To each their own.

I forget exactly the website she did, but she posted all she needed was $1 from 20,000 people and that would pay off her debts. She managed to get over $13,000- they showed a couple website where people kind of beg for money- I forget the sites they showed but that is how she did it. The interviewer- I forget his name asked her basically how she felt about not working to pay of her debts (she was and I think still is a shopaholic)- her answer after a little laugh was- I spent a lot of time maintaining the website. Then that is how they got onto Screech's thing about how he sold shirts in order to save his house. i totally misunderstood why he did it in the 1st place- I thought he basically did not pay his bills- but what he said happened was he bought his house and a few days later- the land owner came to him and said yo have 30 days to pay for this (I think it was $225,000) house or you will be evicted- which I think is illegal anywhere- but I guess he was able to pay for his house and have money to take some legal action (I guess his dad took advantage ofhim being a kid actor and he basically had no money in the 1st place!).

Dh and I just watched it back....I learned nothing from this show except that some people expect others to fix their probelm "Save Karyn".....that segment TICKED me off...even more o that she sees nothing wrong with it! ). I wouldn't spend a nickle on her book if I saw it at a garage sale, I'd probably shame the person selling it for buying it in the first place!
I didn't feel bad for the first couple...He smirked through the whole thing and she regrets nothing. They'll file for bankruptcy in a few months....they're not going to part with their home.
The frugal couple...I agree plug for the book....they do nothing we don't already do, or that hasn't been mentioned here.

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I know why! This happened to us. We regularly only use one card too, but a year and a half ago just two days before dh and I were supposed to leave on our trip to Iceland to visit his brother, we were victims of credit card fraud. Somebody had used our card number to charge up huge expenses: $4,000 in Japan, $3,000 somewhere else overseas, and another charge that was over $2,000.

As a result, we went over our credit limit. We had to freeze our account and dispute the charges. Since we were leaving to go overseas in a two days, we didn't even have time for them to send us our new card. Yes, we could have brought traveler's checks with us but we didn't like the idea of traveling without a credit card.

Luckily we had another card that we had somewhat forgotten about on reserve. We're SO glad we did! So, I would recommend having a back up card for emergencies like that. You never know what's going to happen!