2022 Stoozing?

[jockblue]

Martin Lewis has an article about it in his latest newsletter. He’s a bit sniffy about our Stooz…. and repeats his claim to have invented the process.

Anyway, gone are the days when I had £80k balanced against a mortgage….

[pje16]

He’s a bit sniffy about our Stooz…. and repeats his claim to have invented the process.

Oh dear, ML is so in love with himself, it detracts from the often useful information he is trying to share.

[swill453]

Martin Lewis has an article about it in his latest newsletter. He’s a bit sniffy about our Stooz…. and repeats his claim to have invented the process.

Pity we didn't have the TMF archives to browse the history. Lewis himself posted there originally, but not after he started his own discussion boards.

From my records it was the first half of 2000 I started stoozing, though the term didn't exist then. I've no doubt it was as a result of discussion on the TMF Credit Cards board.

I think I stoozed up to about £90,000 at one time. Those were the days when you could get a First Direct Black card with a £25K credit limit etc.

Scott.

[kempiejon]

Martin Lewis has an article about it in his latest newsletter. He’s a bit sniffy about our Stooz…. and repeats his claim to have invented the process.

Pity we didn't have the TMF archives to browse the history. Lewis himself posted there originally, but not after he started his own discussion boards.

From my records it was the first half of 2000 I started stoozing, though the term didn't exist then. I've no doubt it was as a result of discussion on the TMF Credit Cards board.

I think I stoozed up to about £90,000 at one time. Those were the days when you could get a First Direct Black card with a £25K credit limit etc.

Scott.

I discovered independantly that I could move interest free credit from my Egg card to my current account and then on to high interest savings accountS and profit. I told a few people about it and they thought I was going to come unstuck. I don't have the records but 2000 feels about right.

[Alaric]

I discovered independantly that I could move interest free credit from my Egg card to my current account and then on to high interest savings accountS and profit.

The Egg card had very high credit limits. The year 2000 is about when Egg started as a venture by the Prudential. They use offered an internet based easy access account and a facility to invest both directly and through an ISA into OEICs. It didn't really last that long before being transferred. I forget who got the credit card business. but I do recall Egg unilaterally shut down unused or little used card accounts.Yorkshire Building Society got the savings accounts and Fidelity the fund supermarket

Presumably Prudential made a loss on the whole exercise.

[pje16]

I forget who got the credit card business.

Barclays snaffled up the Egg Credit card

[kempiejon]

Martin Lewis has an article about it in his latest newsletter. He’s a bit sniffy about our Stooz…. and repeats his claim to have invented the process.

Anyway, gone are the days when I had £80k balanced against a mortgage….

Technically I think Lewis is suggesting a slow stooze, get a long dated 0% purchase card, use it for all your spending and salt away the money that would pay off the outstanding amount into a savings account to settle at the end of the interest free period. He does then add rolling the balance.

Some can keep the stooze going by taking out a 0% FEE-FREE balance transfer card (though don't lock money away for longer even if you plan to do this, just in case you're rejected).

[moneymentor]

In 2004 or 2005 I wrote the first ever Stoozing FAQ on the Internet which was on The Motley Fool's credit card board. Stooz bought the domain name stoozing.com and things developed from there until we ended up with this place.

It would have been 2004, I got the idea from TMF....

In Aug/Sept 2004 we bought a house with a very large offset mortgage (5 x joint salaries) with monthly interest greater than my takehome, effectively a mortgage with a Bridging loan added as the sale of the old house had fallen through.

Thanks to the Egg credit card we managed to Stooz £38k over 2 weekends before we got a rejection applying for a card, for 9-12 months. This made a huge difference to us as the other house took another 8 months to sell and the rate was 7% so we saved a couple of hundred qui a month.

As an aside, it also lead us to realising how much we could save if we wanted to as previously we'd barely been filling our £3k/annum ISA allowances, which was a major factor in managing to reitre early and comfortably.

These days we buy everything pretty much on an M&S MBNA card, limit is probably circa £8k. They are doing interest free on "shopping" and the best easy access looks about 2.5%, so probably make £150 over a year running the debt up.

What this has raised though, is that the cash we'd sat aside with Marcus for the house works next year could now make us an extra £1k/year by moving it, which with intrest rates quietly sneaking up is definitely worth looking at.

Paul

Hi Paul,
I'm writing a piece on stoozing for The Times' Money Mentor - found this particularly interesting, would love to include it as a case study. If you're keen please could you send me an email at josh.kirby@thetimes.co.uk?
Cheers!