best credit cards for young adults

To find the best credit cards for young adults has become a lot more difficult than it used to be (it can almost be as difficult as finding the best airline credit card!). Of course, there are many good reasons for this. The economy is down. Personal debt has never been higher. College graduates are finishing college with higher debt levels than ever before. And of course, there is major backlash in the whole credit and lending sectors due to the economic meltdown of the housing market due to the bad debt and loans that were issued.

To make matters worse, young adults have been heavily targetted by credit companies, trying to get a credit card in their hands as early as possible. (Which resulted in the CARD act where nobody under 21 is allowed to have a credit card without a co-signer.) This was done in order to try and stop young adults from being completely overwhelmed in debt before they could even get started in life.

Of course, there are advantages and disadvantages of it being more difficult to get credit. It makes it a little more secure as now, you have to have some sort of proof of income to show that you can make your credit card payments. If you don't have a job or source of income, then your only option may be to go with the whole co-signer route. (This way, if you miss your payments or default on the loan, the credit card companies can go after the co-signer to get payment.) As another option, you may be able to get a second card to one of your parents' existing cards

One quick note about getting a co-signer though: a lot of companies don't really like this option as neither party is 100% liable for the debts - it's split amongst both people listed on the account. So even if you have a co-signer, it's not necessarily a slam-dunk in terms of getting accepted.

A drawback to using a card on your parents account, though, is that you won't be able to build your own credit rating (as nothing is really in your name) - which can defeat the purpose of getting a credit card early on in life in order to build your credit history and rating to help you in the future.

Of course, it goes without saying that if you do get a co-signer on your card - they must have good credit themselves in order to help you get approved for the card. If you do get a second card on your parents card, make sure it gets reported to the credit agency, or you won't be able to build your own credit rating at all.

Finding the best credit cards for young adults can be extremely difficult when starting out, so you need to be aware of the various pitfalls and problems you may encounter first. But there are a lot of good cards out there for young adults (so don't always just opt for the cheapest credit cards right off the bat), you just have to qualify for them.

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