1. Credit cards. Seen conflicting things about this. Some people say you should use a credit card for everything because paying off the debt each month builds your credit and then you will find it easier to get a mortgage. Is that true? I have a few nerves around getting one (I'm pretty frugal), but I will do if it's important.
2. Apparently you're meant to contribute half the age you started as a percentage of your income to your pension. My contributions have been too low this past year and I thought I was doing enough. Especially being self-employed, I also didn't actually know that employer contributions could be so good. My parents taught me literally nothing about money and careers; they just said "study hard and you can do anything" and that was where their advice ended. They never shared the knowledge that they obviously have with me. With my brother they have always been concerned about his career and finances, but apparently for me it doesn't matter.
Secondly, men talk about money with each other all the time and then they keep it to themselves away from women so all the better to manipulate us. I'm scared for my future, I feel like we have to think of everything on our own and there are people everywhere who would rather see us fail and be dependent.
Edit: thinking about it I wouldn't be surprised if my parents hoped to keep me and my sister poor so we would stick around and look after them. When I told my dad I wanted to buy a house on my own he looked horrified and tried to tell me I need a man.
If you like podcasts, I really enjoy the podcasts 1) Girls that Invest; and 2) The Financial Feminist. You don't have to listen to everything unless you want to, but especially the Financial Feminist, she has some really good tips and you can listen to the topics that interest you.
For the pension, I was told to submit 15% of my salary to my retirement accounts. Not sure where you are based, but in the US there are also limits to how much money you can put into your retirement accounts each year. I think for the 401k it was $18,000 per year max (maybe it's changed now), and I'll tell you that 15% of my salary got me nowhere near that $18,000 max per year lol. So I guess it depends on how much you make, and how much you are able to contribute. No point in starving yourself in order to save for retirement, but something is better than nothing. Most people I know contribute only 5-6%.
Credit cards build credit, yes, and it's great as long as you can pay off the total each month. There is absolutely no reason to pay interest on credit cards, ever. I hear people say that you should keep a balance on your credit card each month instead of paying it off in full and pay that little bit of interest and this helps your credit score more. THIS IS FALSE! FALSE!! FALSE!! DON'T believe that shit. Makes me furious when I hear this bullshit spouted.
I really like my Discover credit card (I'm not a spokesperson, just like the card and they have talk-to-a-live-person-immediately customer service) because it has revolving 5% cash back on categories that work for me, and 1% cash back on every purchase. So basically that means that every time I use my card in April, when the category is "grocery stores" for example, I'm just getting a 5% discount on every purchase. Some people like airline miles. There are different types of cards that do different things. Visa and Mastercard are accepted most places. Discover also has credit score tracking and tips on how to improve your score (although I think most if not all credit cards offer this nowadays).
Also, some cards charge a yearly fee for the privilege of having a card. I don't do that. For some people the perks outweigh the yearly fee, but if you're just starting out, you probably want just a simple no-fee credit card.
A downside to credit cards is that sometimes places will charge you more for using the card, so you need to make sure you're not paying more for the privilege of using your card. I see it mostly on online shops, like there were will be a 3% transaction fee for using a credit card instead of direct pay. Well, I'm only getting 1% cash back on that purchase with my Discover card, so that means I'm paying an extra 2% just to use the card. It's not worth it in that case.
I was really into learning about credit for a while so let me see what I can remember. Also I'm not a financial advisor, I'd recommend still doing some research, but I'm happy to share what I know:
You do typically need credit to take out any kind of loan, especially a mortgage loan. There might be other ways to build credit, but credit cards are the most straightforward way I know. The other way is loans, I guess, but don't take out a random loan you don't need for the sake of building credit. Credit cards would be the better option in that case.
Your credit score is a range from like 300 to 850. When I started paying attention to my score, it was like 650. I'm not sure where it starts out at for people. But 670+ is considered "good". 800+ is like, extra-amazing and can be difficult to get to, and takes several years of good credit habits, as well as maximizing the game. Below are some things to maximize the credit game.
You want your total credit at any point to be less than 30%. Maybe you spend about $1,000 per month on life--groceries, bills, etc--and you want to put it all on credit cards, your total credit would need to be about $3,300 across all your cards. But if you want to play the game, get a few more credit cards, and your total credit becomes $15,000. But you're still only spending $1,000 each month. You're only using 6% of your total credit. The Credit People will LOVE you for that.
The Credit People like to see more than one type of credit, so more than one credit card, or credit card and a loan for something. Again, don't take out a loan or a credit card you don't need, though. So I have my Discover Card for cash-back on everyday purchases, and then I got an Amazon Visa because they offer 3% cash-back on Amazon purchases, so I use that card only for Amazon purchases, which these days is just Prime Video. This means every two or three months I watch a movie and get a $3.99 charge to my card. And that's all I use it for. The Credit People don't care if you spend only $1 on credit card #2 every three months. All they see is "Wow, she has TWO credit cards and pays BOTH of them off IN FULL every month?! So responsible!" But, just so you know, what will happen is you have credit card #1 for a while, and then you open credit #2. The following numbers are completely made up, but just to give you an idea. Maybe your credit score is at 700 and you open credit card #2--when you open a new card, this is called an "inquiry". The Credit People will say "OMG she's opening a new credit card is something wrong?! Is she over spending?! Is she a risky investment?!" and then your score might drop to like 670, because that's just how it works, because the system is stupid. And then when you pay everything off still, in full, each month, they'll say "Whew! What a relief. In fact she's extra-responsible, check it out!" And then they'll raise your score to 715. Again, these numbers are made up, but in my experience, my credit score will periodically fluctuate like 20-30 points for something random like opening a new card, even though I'm great and responsible with credit.
Your credit score improves more after like 10+ years of credit. So it's better so start sooner than later so you have that length of time. The Credit People will say "Holy crap, she's been responsibly managing credit over more than one card for 10+ years and hasn't filed for bankruptcy?! Incredible!" And they will raise your score. Especially if you want a mortgage, they like to see that length of time, so if you take out a 30-year loan, they feel more confident that you can pay it off, because you've already been in the habit of doing that for a decade.
It really doesn't matter how little you spend on your cards, just that you're using them and paying them off. A good tip is if you have automatic payments already for like your phone bill, or utilities, or Netflix or something, just use your credit card for those. Then you can set up automatic payments from your bank account to the credit cards, and you won't know the difference, but you're building your credit and paying off your bills each month. Just make sure the total debt-to-credit ratio is less than 30%.
I hope that helps. You can also find more information on credit cards on the FICO website here: https://www.ficoscore.com/education
Parents (naively) think that a son will support them financially in their old age, they think it benefits them to teach son to become financially successful.
They think it's husband's job to support their daughter, so it's one less thing for them to worry about. Later they can use babysitting and money to manipulate their daughters.
If you work full-time and it's not a survival job situation, save a half of take home pay. People tend to spend way more on consumer goods, than they really should. The faster you save, the sooner you are free.
Unpopular opinion, but you don't need mortgage to buy housing.