Credit Simple NZ
Do you like baked beans? Unless you want to be eating student grub for the next few years it’s a good idea to figure out how much house you can really afford. Don’t be fooled by what the banks tell you that you can borrow. It’s not the same question. Can you really afford the repayments? Really? The banks’ calculators don’t always take into account all the other things you have to pay for when you’re a home owner. What…
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Christmas is coming and by now you’ll be inundated with tinsel music, shops full of tat you don’t really want to buy, neighbours telling you to put up more decorations or take down more decorations and of course, The List. We all have a The List. Who we have to buy presents for. If you’re organised, The List will be a spreadsheet with last year’s gifts both to and from said recipients and estimated value of same. There might even…
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If you’re a married non-smoker with two or three kids and a tertiary degree, pat yourself on the back – you’re probably also a high credit scorer to go with it. We’ve had a look in our data (it was dusty and dark in there, but we survived) and it shows that financially responsible Kiwis are likely to be married, have two or three kids, are university educated, and probably don’t smoke. Our research of more than 2.2 million people…
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Aries Earthquakes! Political turmoil! Unsightly hair in those hard to reach places! If it feels like there’s nothing the universe hasn’t thrown at you lately, Aries, then you’re not alone. Oscillations in the moon’s orbit, coupled with a particularly long run of dry weather around Dannevirke, mean your business and personal lives are unlikely to bring you much happiness this month. On the other hand, Lindauer is often on special in the lead up to Christmas, so there’s always that.…
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Vitaliy is our Systems Developer and he’s a total dev ninja. Vitaliy enjoys DIY, reading, and top-notch snacks, but draws the line at eating one of his team members. (Thanks, Vitaliy.) What does a day in the life of you at Credit Simple look like? Wake up at 6.15am. Catch a train at 7.05am. Arrive at 8am, have a coffee and a biscuit. Programme until lunch, have a lunch and a bit of walk. Programme till finish work at 5pm. What do…
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Mortgages in Auckland are not small. The average one is $393,000 and a quarter of them are at least $500,000. When you owe that much money you want to know things are going to be okay: that your property values will stay up, that your interest rates will stay down. But the truth we come to know quickly in the credit rating business is that unhappy surprises have a habit of turning up. These post-GFC times have given us some…
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Do we have decent competition in the mortgage market here? Are the banks as ready to sharpen their pencil as they across the Tasman? Looking at the numbers, you might wonder if we’re being taken for a bit of ride. New Zealand’s banking base rate – the official cash rate – is 1.75% and until recently was 2%. Australia’s is 1.5%. So yes, you might expect the mortgage rates in Australia to be a little bit better than New Zealand.…
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When the time comes to re-fix your mortgage rate, it pays to shop around, says TV presenter, documentary producer and man with a Twitter account, Damian Christie. “I’ve always thought the banks are pretty hopeless at retaining their customers,” Damian says. “They offer a lot of enticements to new customers: free TVs, free money, low interest rates.” But that seems to be where the batteries run out. “It seems like they just assume people can’t be bothered moving once they’re…
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It can be a dry old topic, personal finance, and it can sometimes inspire feelings of sadness due to one’s lack of savings, which is why I used to imagine it might be more fun to work in in banking pocketing ludicrous bonuses for throwing around other people’s money while sustaining a truly ludicrous social life possibly due to illicit substances. Unfortunately, I have since worked for a bank and I didn’t once get to roll around in piles of dosh…
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So you got your credit score, but you can’t understand why you got the score you did. Maybe it’s quite high (yay!) or maybe it’s low (or even zero). Here’s a rule of thumb guide to understanding your credit score. Two big things to keep in mind are: Credit scores of over 800 are really, really rare. So in a way, you can think of your score as out of 800, more than out of 1,000. Even here at Credit Simple,…
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