Standard and Poor’s released a new survey on how the economy is affecting credit card payments. Thanks to Bill Hardekopf at lowcards.com for bringing it to my attention. The findings:

• One in five of those surveyed indicated that they are sometimes (14%) or always (6%) unable to pay their credit card and/or loan balances each month. 8% make only their minimum payment and 8% always or sometimes pay less than the minimum payment.

• One in ten Americans are taking out more cash advances on their credit cards.

• One in four consumers that carry a balance are at or near the limit with their primary card. One in five are at or near the limit with their secondary card.

Here’s a stat that confirms a trend I wrote about earlier this year– the number of consumers who value the use of a credit card over keeping a house out of foreclosure:

• Roughly one-third said their mortgage was the bill they would pay first while one-quarter said their credit card is the bill they would pay before all others. My answer today is that I’d pay the house first, although if I knew the only way to put food on the table was a credit card, I might behave differently. How about you?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 21st, 2008 at 4:50 pm and is filed under credit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.