this post was submitted on 11 Feb 2026
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Others have said it here better than I could, but I was the same way but for probably other reasons. My mother lost her home, not due to misfortune but because she couldn't manage her finances. Quick splurge items and random ideas too priority over long term stability. Anyway, so I thought mortgages and loans were scary too.
Then I got educated on them. They're not scary if you understand what you're doing. Loans are not scary, they are tools to achieve your goals. A tool can be extremely useful to accomplish your goal, but you also shouldn't reach for that tool every time either.
If your goal is to own your home, a mortgage is a great tool if you know what you're doing. Learning about interest rates, how they'll affect you, sitting down and looking at your long term finances and knowing what you can manage paying every month for the forseeable future is how you can calculate what works for you.
Where it gets scary is when people walk in, not knowing what they can afford and taking everything the bank will give them, not knowing how much they'll be paying over time. That's when things get predatory and scary. Knowledge is power as they say.
Now when I need a loan I go in, and I know what interest rate I want, what duration I want, and exactly how much I need, and the bank usually says yes. I've proven myself with my credit score to be a trustworthy person to lend to, and l can now usually get pretty decent terms.
Learn about finances, learn the math, and learn how you spend money. Once you get that knowledge it stops being so scary.
Well my main hurdle is, that I don't have any income right now. I've had 4 jobs in the last 10 years after finishing university, none of which lasted longer than 15 months, due to recurring health issues.
If also never lived in the same place for more than 4 years. (except my parent's house)
So even if a bank would give me a loan, my confidence that I could manage to pay that off is pretty low. Which is kind of a sad state to find yourself in, in your late 30s.
I learned some of the math in uni for my engineering degree, but that was focussed on enterprises, where it makes sense if you generate revenue and get a return of investment to pay off the loan for that investment. I probably need to switch perspective, to actually appreciate it as a tool for cutting expenses in my daily life. If the day comes, where that won't be purely hypothetical.
But still, I think that only applies to stuff like housing, where you have recurring cost, that could be lower (even if it's just in the long run) or maybe a car, that you need to get to a job, where it basically enables you to make more money. I don't see any other cases, where it really makes sense to pay interest on anything.
The other scary things with financing is people who struggle to live within their means and people using it for emergencies when they struggle to make ends meet.
Personally I follow the rule I was taught: only use financing for housing, vehicles, and education, each of which should be evaluated to be within your means and benefitting your life.
Debt is a chain, it can bring great advancement such as homeownership or a desired career, but it binds you for its duration and it's an awful experience. I hope someday to be debt free, but it's financially stupid to pay off my student loans right now when a mutual fund has more return on investment. I still like to put a big chunk in for special occasions when I can