How You Can Profit from Credit Cards: Using Credit to Improve Your Financial Life and Bottom Line

Chapter 7. Start Out on the Right Foot: Credit Cards for Students and Saving for College

College campuses have become a key stomping ground for credit card issuers. Through the Internet, mail, and on-campus promotions, they offer freebies, food, low introductory rates, preapproved credit card applications, bonus airline miles, and all sorts of other incentives to entice students to sign up for their cards. Unfortunately, far too many students carry a lot more plastic in their wallets than they can handle. In the process, they rack up thousands of dollars in debt.

Sure, cards offer many benefits to students, but young people who don’t understand credit basics are in no position to make the most of their cards. Instead, lenders are making the most ...