This is unsurprising given how often the average American moves in comparison to residents of other countries.
Its estimated that most Europeans only moveFOUR timesin their lives.
Well, American job security is far more tenuous and tilted in employers favor for one.
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We also dont get the same social safety nets that help foster stronger levels of housing security.
Enter the furniture industry and its twisty tentacles of predatory lending for this often-unavoidable need.
What Drives the Need for Borrowing to Get Furniture?
That suburbanization boomhas the industry poised to achieve another $8 billion in growth by 2024.
But lets get real.
And I hate to tell you that it wasnt any rosier before that fateful day in March 2020.
Nerfed incomes across generations and egregious housing costs gobble up any disposable income pretty quickly.
If your neighboring area is populous and transient enough, curb-shopping can produce some treasures if youre handy.
Even a cheap new mattress can get expensive.
How Did the Furniture Industry Become Intertwined with Predatory Lending Practices?
The first major culprit for this is store cards, compounded with the pressure for your immediate need.
ITS SUCH A RAW DEAL.
Why is it so freaking hard?!?
Hope you dont get an unexpected hospital bill from having to take it inside!
Financing it just makes more sense.
The concept of the store credit card was actually around before Visa, MasterCard, and American Express.
Even if you move frequently, youre probably not buying new sets from the ground up every time!
A 24% APR on $3,000 to outfit a 1-bedroom apartment is Usury City thats somehow legal.
Pier 1 was a thing of its own.
Then they saw an offer they couldnt refuse for theultratransient among us.
The Rent-to-Own Racket
So lets say that due to devastating circumstances, youve had to move often.
But buying furniture is not only expensive, you only need it for two or three months.
Renting it and bringing it back sounds feasible, right?
It wasnt long before the concept made it across the pond and with different applications.
Doesnt sound too bad, right?
This is an industry with pretty much nonexistent oversight, unlike the numerous checks placed on the financial industry.
WHAT.Lets be real, there is nothing earth-shattering about returning a bed or TV to Rent-a-Center a little late.
Rather than laws that would protect consumers from usurious rent-to-own arrangements, they protect the companies renting them out.
So why would someone choose this?
Why is it such a big industry if the furniture cant be sold?
