85% of Americans Admit to Making Mistakes with Their Finances Over the Past Decade

NEW YORK, Feb. 13, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- A new survey from DepositAccounts.com, a LendingTree company, has found that an overwhelming 85% of Americans admit to having made mistakes with their finances over the past decade. However, one financial fumble was more prevalent than others: accumulating credit card debt. Here are other key findings from the survey:

• Worst Financial Mistakes of the Last Decade: Racking up credit card debt (23%), not saving enough for retirement (16%), spending beyond their means (16%), and paying bills late (8%) were American's biggest financial mistakes of the past decade.
• Baby Boomers in Particular Regretted This:  25% of Baby boomers said their biggest financial mistake and regret of the past decade was not saving enough for retirement. Meanwhile, Millennials' second-most polled financial mistake of the decade was spending beyond their means.
• Americans' Biggest Financial Wins: Americans' biggest financial accomplishments from the last decade were paying off credit card debt (15%), followed by buying a car (13%), paying off other debt (11%), buying a house (10%), getting a raise or promotion at work (10%) and increasing retirement savings (10%). Millennials in particular saw buying a car as their biggest financial accomplishment of the decade. For Gen Xers and boomers, it was paying off credit card debt.
• How Americans' Finances Have Changed in 10 years: Overall, 49% of respondents said they are better financially now than 10 years ago, including 60% of younger millennials, 54% of older millennials, 45% of Gen Xers and 41% of baby boomers. Among genders, 54% of men said they are better off now than 10 years ago, compared to 44% of women.
• Optimism Isn't Dead! Nearly 49% of Americans say the new decade brings a better financial situation than the last. The top three reasons consumers feel better off financially, were increased income (52%), more savings (42%) and less debt (37%). Those who said they were worse off financially, 35% said it's because they make less money, and 21% because they have more debt.

Methodology

DepositAccounts.com commissioned Qualtrics to conduct an online survey of 1,069 Americans with the sample base proportioned to represent the overall U.S. population. The survey was fielded Dec. 10-16, 2019. For the purposes of our survey, we defined generations as: younger millennials are ages 23-30, older millennials are 31-38, Gen Xers are 39-53, and baby boomers are 54-73. To view the full report, visit: https://www.depositaccounts.com/blog/survey-worst-financial-mistake-decade-racking-credit-card-debt.html

About DepositAccounts.com  
DepositAccounts.com is the largest and most comprehensive online publication in the U.S. dedicated to banking and deposits product information for consumers. It covers every federally insured bank and credit union and utilizes its patented technology to track approximately 275,000 consumer deposit rates, each updated nightly. The site features more than 11,000 editorial articles detailing depository strategies and highlighting current bank rates and offers. It is also home to one of the largest communities of depositors on the Web, hosting more than 100,000 comments, customer reviews, and forum threads.

Media Contact:
Divya Sangam (Ms.)
646 693 8445
[email protected]

SOURCE DepositAccounts.com

Related Links

http://DepositAccounts.com