The big thing today in furniture sale ads is offering years-long interest free financing. It’s common to see sale ads with 48, 60, and even 72 month 0% or free financing offers. Those offers come with big fees to the dealer and a lot of requirements, stipulations, and risks for you.
First, let’s deal with the fact that offering long-term interest free financing is NOT free to the dealer! Why should you care? Because reason dictates that if the dealer has to pay a big fee, it’s going to be absorbed in the price you pay! Case in point: A popular nationwide furniture retailer routinely offers years-long 0% financing. But if you opt not to use the offer, the price is 30% OFF! Does that sound free to you?
Now let’s consider the requirements. Most interest free offers require the purchase to be made on the store’s credit card. It’s obvious why. Its wild how many people fall prey to 0% credit card offers and end up paying ridiculous interest for years! For many, the interest free offer becomes a trap ensnaring them in high interest payments for years to come! Why else do you think the offers are made?
Then there are always some stipulations like a required deposit and minimum purchase amount. But the biggest stipulation is that you must be credit worthy. For some, that’s no problem. For others it’s iffy. And for more than a few, it’s impossible! And, unfortunately, a 0% interest offer can cause some in the “no problem” bunch to slip to “iffy”, and “iffy” buyers to slip into the “impossible” category if they’re not careful!
The impact on your credit rating is only part of the risk. Another big risk comes if over those long years you miss just one payment or just one payment arrives late because “life happened”. Either of those situations will automatically trigger an exorbitant interest rate to be applied to your account retroactively! Now, the amount you owe jumps significantly!
So, even if you join the few who successfully make the monthly payments on time for years, you’ve still paid too much for what is now old furniture you’ve been paying on for all those years!
At Speedy Furniture, we don’t offer costly years-long interest free financing. We can’t and still offer genuine everyday low prices! But we do on occasion offer 12-month interest free financing when cost effective enough for us to keep our sale-beating prices on every item every day intact—then it really is free!
