People Are Now Financing Groceries IN RECORD NUMBERS

Apparently debt has become one of America's favorite pastimes because we just can't seem to get enough of it. In fact we just saw a huge year-over-year jump in the amount of people who are financing their groceries. We've been talking a long time about this recession and how the economy isn't doing so well and this one right here is the kicker guys. When you have this big of an uptick in the amount of people that are financing groceries using buy now pay later services because they just don't have the cash today. This is a huge huge warning sign on where things are headed. LendingTree just released some data this past Friday that shows just how much pressure people are under right now. They surveyed people of 18 to 79 years old throughout the United States and half of them reported using buy now pay later services. Of those numbers 25 percent of respondents said they were using buy now pay later loans to buy groceries up from 14 percent in 2024. So one year ago it was 14 percent of people using buy now pay later in order to buy groceries. Today it's 25 percent guys so it has gone up 11 percent in just one year. That is a massive massive uptick and not only are people using buy now pay later services more and more they are also falling behind on those payments as well. 41 percent of people said they made a late payment on a buy now pay later loan in the past year which is also up from 34 percent the year before. So all of these metrics are trending in a bad direction. So what this data shows you is that a lot of people are struggling and they are looking for ways to extend their budget. But all of these things like credit card loans and buy now pay later only take you so far. You can only take so many of those before you get denied the next one for making a late payment or have no more available credit on a credit card. It doesn't last forever and this situation is likely only to get worse throughout the rest of 2025 especially if we continue to have the tariff situation that's just going to make everything that everyday Americans buy more expensive. And just think about it like this what is going to be happening over the next 12 months let's say that's going to improve this situation. Are people going to get huge raises at their jobs? Are they going to see massive amounts of jobs hiring and employers competing for people again and needing to increase wages to the point that it makes sense to switch jobs? Probably not. More people are losing jobs right now than are gaining jobs. Are we going to see food prices and insurance costs and rent prices magically just go down in the next few months? Probably not. So what's going to fix this? And here's the kicker with buy now pay later loans. I've talked about this a few times on the channel but a lot of people use them instead of credit cards because you can basically use the buy now pay later loan and pay no interest if you make the payments on time like they'll let you split the payments into three or four payments something like that and if you make all those payments on time you won't pay any interest but the problem comes the moment you start paying late guys when you pay late they can have high fees attached to it just like paying interest on a credit card and it all ends up being the same thing in fact 60 percent of buy now pay later users say that they have had multiple loans at once and about a quarter of people have three or more at once is using buy now pay later better than using something like a payday loan yeah absolutely those guys are going to hit you with huge amounts of interest that's probably like the worst thing you can do so that's why so many people are probably turning to this because it is a smarter consumer choice but once you start paying late it kind of defeats the whole purpose in fact take a look at this this lending tree data discovered that 60 percent of general admission Coachella attendees funded their concert tickets with buy now pay later loans which just goes to show you how many people are using debt to keep their lifestyles afloat right now people are going to Coachella and putting it on debt guys we talked about how DoorDash is now accepting Klarna which is a buy now pay later service so you can literally get you know your tacos delivered to your door $25 worth of food buy now pay later you miss a payment you end up paying $45 for the food and debt has become such a problem especially with Americans that this is now something that you have to watch out for when you're going to date somebody because you don't really know what you're getting yourself into it's already hard enough to find somebody that you like and you're compatible with but then you got to worry and wonder about their financial situation too if you're going to get hooked up with them long term new research from Western and Southern Financial Group found that 27 percent of Americans waited until after marriage to discuss debt with their partner and 21 percent of married Americans have never talked about debt with their spouse before that is insane you're literally jumping off of a cliff together and have no idea if the other person has a parachute you're just trusting that they do and to make matters worse the modern dating culture you know puts people in a position where they feel like they have to spend all this money going on dates particularly young men in order to impress women a lot of women want men to spend money on them even if it's the first time they're meeting they talk to this one young guy who when he was in college had $45,000 in student loans and $5,500 in credit card debt not too good right off the bat and he actually would save money by asking women out on cheap dates like just going for pizza or grabbing coffee instead of dinners and drinks because that can obviously add up quite a bit and if he liked them then he would splurge but the problem is that splurging comes to an end just like I was talking about a minute ago this is what happens to people in 2017 he went on a sushi date and the bill was $96 not too crazy but still you know kind of expensive he went to go pay his credit card was declined he was confused he asked the person at the counter to try again got declined again and come to find out he figured out that his amazon prime subscription had only left him with $16 left in his bank account when he thought he had at least $112 so this guy is like really pushing it thin you know like you have $112 in your account and you're spending $96 on dinner guys not smart at all but this is how desperate a lot of men are to seek female approval and get validation and try to make them like you and then you go through all of this right you end up racking up all this debt you get your credit card declined and everything and you end up in a bunch of debt and now you're a loser that nobody wants to date go figure the irony there is hilarious so what ended up happening is his date actually ended up having to pay the bill because he didn't have the money and he said that he sent her venmo and i'm guessing that that chick probably never saw him again because now he looks like a deadbeat this guy can't even pay the hundred dollar dinner bill it's not the one for me in fact take a look at this there was a survey in 2024 saying that 64 percent of people said they would not want to date someone with a lot of debt well i would say 45,000 dollars in student loans and almost 6k in credit card debt is a lot of debt so what people are supposed to ask people about this on the first date are they supposed to put this on their dating profiles how much their net worth is or how negative their net worth is how much debt that they're in is this something that should be disclosed on the first date but this guy says he spent about four thousand dollars buying flowers ordering takeout doing trips other activities things like that and the way that it sounds is like he spent that just on one woman and i respect the hustle in the sense that you know he says i always think that the man should pay for the first date and you know i want the woman to view me as somebody who's financially responsible but the moment that your credit card is getting declined for the hundred dollar dinner well that doesn't make you look too good so overdoing it overextending yourself is also not good either but i'm happy to report that this guy is now debt-free fast forward to 2025 and he's disclosed here that he spent over 17,000 dollars including travel and accommodation on 57 dates last year so that is a pretty hefty sum trying to get some they talked to this woman who's 34 years old she has about 20,000 dollars in credit card debt and 69,000 dollars in student federal loan debt and it's to the point where she is now self-conscious about the debt and feels embarrassed to talk about it or disclose it when she's dating she says she's running the other direction from men who say that they're financially secure or own a house or seem like they have their you know what together because she thinks that men like that would find her unattractive because she has so much debt now i would say it's probably not important to bring up how much debt you're in on the first date but if you're going to start seeing somebody seriously and you're considering having a long-term relationship with somebody it is crucial to understand their financial situation guys and it's hard right because they can just lie to you especially you know if they have a lot to lose on their end and they see you as a catch especially if they think you're going to be the financial savior and be the one to pay off all their bills it's almost to the point where you got to run a credit report and background check on somebody before committing to them any further in order to figure out their financial situation but according to a relationship coach they say it's more important to understand what kind of debt a person has and how they're managing it so for example somebody who has 30,000 dollars in debt because they like shopping and gambling versus somebody who's 45,000 dollars in debt because they have student loans that's a little bit of a different scenario and sometimes people find themselves getting into debt because of income inequality i saw this other story about this woman who is with a boyfriend that makes significantly more money than her but yet he expects her to pay for half of everything that they do together including expensive trips expensive restaurants even renovations on the house like what i mean this guy sounds like he's really taking advantage of this woman and it's really sad they say that they've been together for several years they live together and he makes about triple what she does they opened up a joint account and bought a home five years ago and they used the joint account to pay their mortgage and utilities and they both contribute the same amount to it monthly which she said that she's fine with but because of the income disparity the boyfriend has a lot more money left over at the end of each month than she does and then when it comes time to going on these lavish vacations or expensive dinners he still expects her to pay half and i think that's just messed up guys i think whoever's doing better in the relationship at the moment can afford to take on a little bit of the extra responsibility if even if it's the other way around if you're a woman that makes twice as much as the man and you want to go out and do things all the time you shouldn't expect him to pay for half of everything if he just doesn't have the cash it's not right just like it's not right for this person to be doing this she says that she often finds herself in situations where she owes the boyfriend money and has a hard time paying and she's now at a point where she's looking at turning over her full annual bonuses for several years in a row just to keep up and pay for her half of the lifestyle that they have together which i think is pathetic i think for a man to take that money from the woman especially when he makes that much more and expects her to pay for half of everything is is just messed up in so many different ways i know it's 2025 but on some level men are still providers and women still view a lot of men as providers and if you're doing that much better and you can easily afford to pay more for things then there's absolutely no reason in my book why you wouldn't and she even brought up to him that hey maybe we should stop splitting all the expenses except for you know our housing expenses and she said that he was very opposed to the idea because we are equal partners well apparently you're not equal if you're making triple dude so imagine if you're somebody like this woman who's kind of tied to this guy they even bought a house together they're not married but it's almost like they're pretty much there they're almost married and they have a life together they're tied to each other but you find yourself in a situation where literally can't afford to keep up with the lifestyle choices of your boyfriend and maybe even have to start going into debt for this you can see how things can easily spiral out of control and then for whatever reason say things don't work out and you split up you end up spending all of your hard-earned money on these lavish dates and vacations and everything that you could have been saving some of that for your own retirement or even just a rainy day and then things don't work out you break up what are you left with yeah sure you get half the house because half it's yours but what else you have nothing else to show for it meanwhile he's still got the high income and you got nothing and it works the other way around too guys i'm not just saying this for you know men that earn triple what women earn if you're a man dating a high maintenance woman that makes a lot of money a lot more than you and she's pressuring you to be 50 50 on the budget of things you should be questioning that really second guessing that scenario my wife and i ever since we started living together we shared all of our expenses down the middle but we didn't have a lavish lifestyle and neither one of us was like making way more money than the other one either so it was pretty fair for us to split things down the middle and then there was a period of time when my wife actually made more money than i did probably for a good like five years there and sometimes she would pay for things that i couldn't afford to pay for half for and now the tables are reversed now i make more money than she does and i cover a lot of our expenses almost all of it it's definitely not 50 50 anymore and i don't ask her for anything like i feel like that's the healthy dynamic you have to be able to give and take that's what a relationship is you know you're there to help each other out you know in times of need and i understand it's different with dating you have to go out you have to set a precedent you have to impress a woman especially as a man but you also need to question you know a woman's motives especially if they're looking for a sugar daddy or somebody to just take care of them so they say you know you have to wonder if that's the kind of woman that you want because in a situation like that you could end up going broke over a woman and have nothing to show for it and as soon as you're broke she's going to move on to the next one with money and you're going to be left with nothing i feel like men particular need to be very cautious about this situation you don't see that too much the other way around like men taking advantage of women and sucking them dry and till they have no money and then moving on to the next one i suppose it happens but just not to the same extent anyways going down that rabbit hole the moral of the story here is you need to be careful guys you need to be careful when it to getting into debt i've seen so many of you write me emails and comments talking about how you are no longer in debt or you are well on your way of being out of debt because of my videos and i'm so happy to read that and i'm proud of each and every one of you who are doing that and one last thing i need to cover here is the latest consumer sentiment survey consumer sentiment fell for the fourth straight month in a row going down an additional eight percent from march to april american expectations about the economy right now have fallen 32 percent just since january of this year which is the steepest three-month percentage decline that we have seen since the 1990 recession think about that people's number one concerns right now are inflation and the tariffs labor market expectations also remain very bleak because you have so many layoffs and so many companies that just aren't hiring right now and a lot of consumers are anticipating weaker income growth for themselves in the year ahead and without strong income you're likely not going to have a strong economy or strong spending let's face it our entire economy is based on spending and this is very worrying right here inflation expectations surge from five percent in march to six and a half percent in april which is the highest reading since 1981 guys and i want to bring all this up because this gives you the real-time data of what everyday americans are feeling about the economy right now and going back to our stories about taking on buy now pay later loans to go to coachella or spending 17k a year on dating this is a very dangerous thing to be doing right now for your own personal finances especially if you can't afford it i mean if you got the money and it's no thing to spend this kind of money then who cares right it doesn't matter but you're not going to be doing buy now pay later to go to coachella if you have the money that's how you know people who are using these services and using buy now pay later to get their food delivered and groceries delivered and whatever they don't have the money and to overextend yourself right now to go on dates is just probably one of the worst things you can be doing right now and i'm not telling you what to do with your cash it's it's your life guys you can do whatever you want make your own mistakes sometimes people need to do that in order to figure things out knock yourself out i'm just giving you the real state of affairs right now showing you what's really going on you can take that information and make whatever decision you want with it so if you enjoyed this video make sure you subscribe to the channel and if you don't want to wait for my next video to come out check out this one on the screen right over here and 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