Question about credit cards and credit ratings for business

[Cal Carpenter]

4. Yeah, when we decided to do this, we committed to keeping it on a scale that

we could afford without getting loans or putting stuff on credit cards at the outset. We started on a shoe-string budget and I am forever grateful we had the foresight and ability to do that. It took a fair amount of sweat equity, and my spouse and I are doing almost all the work ourselves so it is exhausting, but if it does all go to shit or we decide we can't handle it anymore, the worst thing we'd have to deal with is breaking a lease. At this point our assets far outweigh our debts.

For the time being we're barely paying ourselves and the business is barely breaking even (in our industry, after 2.5 yrs that is considered a wild success, LOL), but the credit card balance isn't crucial. It is about the same as our revolving credit limit with our biggest supplier, for example. So I worry about it more than I need to, but better that than not worrying enough, I guess. And our rate is nowhere near 29.9%.

Interest tidbit about the reason for no more teaser rates - thanks for sharing. While we were researching the possibility of opening this business and working up a business plan, we talked to a couple who had opened a similar business a few cities away in 2003. They used personal credit cards for most of their start-up costs, and played the balance-transfer game to allow more time to pay it off. It worked for them, but that's because they kept getting new cards with temporary Zero interest rates. And now their business is doing very well.

I would have been very uncomfortable going that route so I'm glad we were able to scrape up the funds to get the doors open.