My wife and I have been searching for a dining room table set for several months. We have always wanted a dining room that was not too formal but a place where we could have family dinners away from the television and other distractions. Our new home has a dinning area which can easily hold a large table, several chairs, and a buffet. We had set aside a large chunk of money to purchase furniture for our new home, which I had been reimbursed for unused vacation days at a previous job. We decided when I left the position, we would tuck the money away in a certificate of deposit to earn some interest while we searched for furniture.
A few weeks ago, we were shopping at the local Cost Plus World Market and came across a table and chairs set that fit exactly what we wanted. It was a simple set made out of rubberwood that had a distressed look to it. We fell in love with it and decided we would wait until it went on sale to make the purchase. Well this week, Cost Plus World Market has all of their furniture on sale so we headed over to the store to check things out. When we got there, we noticed signs hanging everywhere for opening up a store credit card and receiving 10% off your first purchase. This concept of opening up a store credit card is nothing new to us or most people. By opening up this card, we had the potential to save over $135.00 on top of the sale price. That was a nice option for opening up a card, but what really caught my eye were two other benefits from opening up this card -
- No Interest 1 year - I love 0% interest! Anytime I can get no interest on a purchase, I begin to salivate. When I saw the sign the wheels immediately began to turn in my head thinking of how I can make this work. Instead of putting $1350.00 on one of our other credit cards, we could open up the new card, knock down the price to $1,215.00 (plus tax) and take that money and earn interest off of it.
- Rewards - In addition to the no interest for 1 year, the card will also give you $15.00 back on store gift card for every $300 you spend. So a $1,200+ purchase would bring back $60.00 is store gift cards.
The Plan
We ended up opening up the store credit card to receive the benefits mentioned above and made the purchase. Since we already have the money available for this purchase and we have the option of not paying this expense for 1 year without interest, I am considering this a passive income opportunity. My plan is to take $1,200+ and either put it into a CD or in my new ING account depending on where I can find the best interest rate. This will bring in an additional $30+ dollars over the next 12 months of true passive income. While it is not a lot of money, every little bit counts and adds up over time.
Do you use special rates, store credit cards, or other lines of credit to stretch your money out?
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Dawn 08.29.08 at 11:31 am
Hmmmm… this is really interesting to me. It is a whole new way of looking at credit cards. I am still paying down debt, so I am staying away from any sort of card but I find this fascinating. I love the idea of using credit cards to *earn* money rather than how most people (myself included) used them to end up in debt.
Tight Fisted Miser 08.29.08 at 5:05 pm
Not sure if this is a temporary glitch or what but you’re sidebars are all the way at the bottom under the content. This is in Firefox.
passivefamilyincome 09.08.08 at 7:59 am
Dawn - I love to use credit cards to get them at their own game. We always pay off the balance every month on our cards and try to earn as many points as possible.
Tight Fisted Miser - Thanks for the note. I was missing a closing tag in one of my posts and finally found it. Took me a couple of days to figure out where it was coming from. Thanks again!