Can we really trust college students to live within their means? Would you trust your teenager with a credit card? Well, no matter what your own ideas might be, students are increasingly being targeted by credit card companies. This is clearly the "catch 'em young" philosophy in action. There are many detractors to this policy of looking for increasingly younger credit cardholders. One of the most voiced opinions is that the credit card providers are simply only looking to make more and more profits by exploiting the financial inexperience of young people. Teenagers are not renowned for their budgetary skills. In fact, most of us learn to take care of our finances only after cash crises have proved that they exist.
However, perhaps it is time that we placed some trust in the teenagers of the world. With the kind of exposure that the young people of today get, it is easier to avoid getting entrapped in webs of debt. Moreover, the high school and college years are the easiest years to find out about the value of money. The experiences that we gain at this time teach us to be smart with our cash. So this is as good a time as ever to introduce your college-goer to the big bad world of credit cards.
Well, credit card companies are probably of the same opinion. As a result, college campuses have become the marketplace for many providers. Students are flooded by offers of all kinds from various credit card companies. Many of them offer freebies like t-shirts and caps to lure away students who are financially ignorant. At times the offers might sound too good to be true. At such times, students must ensure that they are not taken in by great sales pitches. Preferably, you should try to secure a credit card that seems affordable. For instance, there is no point in going in for a card that offers and initial interest-free period but whose interest rates might not exactly be cheap. Ideally, one must look out for cards offering lower rates of interest, say about 16 percent. A card that has a grace period for payment might be a good idea for those students who might have a tendency to default on the payments.
Ultimately, what matters is not how cheap the student credit card is. What matters is how well the student makes use of it. A student who is an able caretaker of his money would do well with credit card rewards. And one can always switch credit cards in between -- thanks to the rise of zero percent balance transfers.
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