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Financial regret is a real, but broad concept, meaning it can take different forms for different folks. There will be the active market participants that bemoan not buying Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) or Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) 20 years ago. Nearly every investor has regrets like that.
There are also plenty of people that express contrition about not buying a house in a certain location or display remorse about not planning for retirement sooner. Point is financial regret is common, personal, but rarely uniform.
If there is uniformity regarding financial compunction, it’s debt, but financial liabilities aren’t always bad. For example, mortgage debt is rarely viewed negatively and student loan obligations, though undoubtedly burdensome, are often seen as investments in the borrower’s future. But if there’s one form of debt is universally considered a blight, it’s consumer/credit card liabilities.
Put simply, there’s nothing positive about credit card debt. It’s an overt threat to other forms of financial fitness and one that creates financial stress. If there’s any silver lining when it comes to the burden of consumer debt, it’s that people are aware of the related negativity, implying they’re primed to deal with it.
Credit Cards Are Drags
Debt.com's 2025 Financial Regrets Survey underscores the extent to which Americans disdain credit card obligations. Seventy-eight of those surveyed have at least one financial regret with the biggest (almost 25%) being ongoing credit card bills.
Unfortunately, the debt levels carried by Americans aren’t small. Forty percent owe $5,000 to $15,000, according to Debt.com. At the high end of that range is territory where college and retirement savings can be derailed. A third have credit bills topping $15,000 and 10% owe between $30,000 and $50,000 – figures that can go a long way toward bolstering investment/retirement accounts or even be down payments for houses in some areas.
Perhaps not surprisingly, credit card debt is often a symptom of more not being merrier. In this case, more cards breed more debt.
“Carrying more credit card debt is increasingly linked to carrying more cards. In Debt.com's first Financial Regrets Survey conducted in 2024, just 10% of respondents reported having more than six credit cards, now that number is at 16%,” according to Debt.com.
Advisors Can Help
Advisors aren’t credit counselors, but there is value in making related offerings available to clients because, as noted above, consumer liabilities are detrimental to important financial goals, including retirement. In fact, there are arguably links between the two issues because the second-biggest financial regret after accrual of credit card debt is not getting on the ball with retirement planning earlier.
“Looking at retirement savings, 20% reveal that they have nothing saved, which is up from 18% last year. Among the typical starting age of those who are saving for retirement, 31% are 26-35 years old, 25% are 36-45 years old and 16% are between 45-55 years old,” notes Debt.com.
Bottom line: It doesn’t hurt for an advisor to gently ask a client about their credit card situation, particularly if the client in question is “slow playing” retirement planning. And it certainly isn’t a bad thing to discourage clients from frequently collecting new credit cards. After all, that’s a pinch to their credit scores. Clients just might thank you for these pearls of credit wisdom.
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