It's my pleasure to welcome you here at the Clark Howard Show, our mission to serve and

empower you so you make better financial decisions in your life.

In today's episode, I'm going to tell you about some myths around money I want you to

be aware of.

Also extended warranties.

Are they ever worth it?

Well, we got to talk because there's something over the years that has puzzled me where

I've had, it's got to be in the hundreds of times.

I've had people say to me that they leave balances open on their credit cards because

they want to raise their credit score.

And it shows that there's a lack of some level of understanding about how credit reporting

works and credit scores so much so that a survey that lending tree did in January found

that just a whisker under half of people think that that's true, that you don't want

to, even if you can afford to pay a balance on a credit card in a month to zero, you don't

want to do it because, well, I'm going to buy a house or I'm going to do this or that

or the other and I got to raise my credit score.

And I don't know where this urban legend started, but the reality is there is zero benefit

to leaving a balance open on a credit card because you're paying to average credit card

somewhere around 18% interest.

And when you have an open balance, the charges you make going forward, the interest is accruing

right away, daily interest.

When you pay the balance in full on a card, you have a grace period and then you pay that

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