I find this commercial fascinating:
Fascinating, I mean, in the same way that I find it fascinating to contemplate obscenely large rare tumors preserved in formaldehyde. You know, I care about good credit and all, but I am not under the illusion that if my credit suffers, I will have to move into my parents' basement; presumably I will still have income. And I'm pretty repulsed by the notion that the proper response to finding out that your betrothed has bad credit is obviously to break up with them. "I was preparing to go with that richer/poorer, better/worse thing, but I didn't realize that meant paying higher interest rates on my auto loan!"
I mean, yes, you should be very wary of getting into a relationship with someone who is financially irresponsible. But those sorts of things usually manifest themselves in ways other than a shoddy credit report. The first time you go over to their place and notice that they have no electricity in the middle of a fine, sunny day--that is probably the time to start asking questions, not three weeks before the wedding.
Gotta give credit where it's due, you're right. This is a truly repugnant commercial.
The pirate version of this commercial (same actor/singer) is much better.
How about the raw, naked sexism in the ad: his life is ruined because that lying, scheming woman hid her financial status from him, so instead of living in a nice house with a dog and a yard, he's living in his parents' basement.
Of course we all know rock band singers are SO financially savvy.
Ah, who cares, it's a stupid commercial anyway.
Not even that - it doesn't make any logical sense. If they couldn't afford to rent a decent place, then they sure as hell can't afford to buy a decent place. And if they are living at mom's to save up for a down payment, maybe they should have done that anyway - reguardless of her credit situation.
Well there is some merit buried in there:
He should have bought a house before they got married, then her credit rating wouldn't have been an issue. If he needed her income to get the house as well as a good credit score, then he's SOL either way and should shut up. They could be living in the basement because they need a substantially larger downpayment.
But yeah, the commercial is pretty horrible. The pirate waiter gig was far superior.
People can laugh, but marrying someone with serious financial problems is a real problem. A friend of mine who is quite well to do recently became engaged to a woman with six-figure credit card debts. He asked me for advice and I told him to have her declare bankruptcy--and soon. I felt a little guilty about it since he can pay off her debts if he has to. He worried that marrying someone who has declared bankruptcy might affect his own credit. I told him I didn't think so, but I am not 100% sure about that.
I agree it's awful. Megan's last sentence is right, too. I was on a 2nd date with someone when I discovered they had a problem with an Old Navy store card. That was the peak moment of our very, very short relationship. Thank goodness.
Learning about your spouse's seriously bad credit history after the wedding is much like learning about their chronic infidelity during previous relationships. They go hand in hand; the lack of character in bad debt is the same as the lack of character in infidelity.
It's a red flag, to be ignored at one's peril.
I'm shocked that a company with a repugnant business model - advertising a "free" credit report that is contingent on billing you for an overpriced credit monitoring service, when the government requires the credit agencies to give you a free, no-strings attached report on request once a year - would be equally tasteless in their commercials.
Craig's point is well-taken. I honestly get a little sick every time I see the freecreditreport.com commercial air. Not just because it may say something about my demographic, but because they're selling something folks have a right to for free.
I'm not arguing the government or anyone else should step in and stop them. But that doesn't mean their business model doesn't make me want to vomit.
Graeme:
You are right. The credit agencies obviously want to screw people(they are doing it anyway). You can go to annualcreditreport.com and get your report for free. It's the once a year(or is it 6 months?) service mandated by the government.
Learning about your spouse's seriously bad credit history after the wedding is much like learning about their chronic infidelity during previous relationships. They go hand in hand; the lack of character in bad debt is the same as the lack of character in infidelity.
Not quite the same. People can end up with bad credit due to things beyond their control, especially job losses.
This certainly begs the question. You only have two choices. Would you rather marry a women who is going to spend all of the money you have, or spend all of the money you DON'T have?
i see whatever one's saying but given money probolmes are the biggest factor people give on divorcing it actually strikes me as a very very salient point.
Peter, job losses are a fact of life. I myself got laid off in 2001, like many people. A responsibile person handles hir life in such a manner that job losses result in a temporary living standard reduction, but no credit problems.
-dk
I think the federal free report doesn't tell you your FICO score (I doubt the freecreditreport.com) does either. The FICO is what drives what type of credit you get. Without that, you know if there are deliquent accounts, etc, but you don't know how bad the score is.
Nora, they do give you your score on their service, so it's not a bad deal for the free month, just to see what it looks like.. But worth paying the $15 or whatever it is per month after that for their monitoring service.. not so much in my opinion.
The commercials are condescenting; The company is condescending
Maybe he should take his wannabe rockstar butt out and find a job rather than coming up with lame toons and excuses for his living in his in-laws basement at their expense.. Action speaks louder than words or lyrics in this case.
it's a stupid commercial anyway
There's some other kind?