A_stockphoto // Shutterstock

The cost of living has risen sharply in recent years, and so have financial stress levels. Recent data shows that three of four Americans today are anxious about their financial situations, and among those concerned, debt is a big factor.

• 68% worry they won’t have enough money to retire
• 58% feel their finances control their lives
• 56% say they can’t keep up with the cost of living
• 45% struggle to manage debt on a weekly basis

With this data in hand, financial experts at Beyond Finance — who regularly speak with consumers in debt — unpack eight common signs that debt has become a problem.

Insights on when debt becomes a problem

Debt becomes unmanageable for the people they help when:

• They’re only making minimum payments because they can’t afford more
• Credit is being used to cover everyday necessities
• New debt is taken on to deal with existing balances
• Debt stress is so high, they ignore or avoid the problem
• Debt begins affecting mental health or everyday needs

These observations often signal that debt is no longer manageable without support and it may be time to take action and explore options.

The 8 Signs You May Have a Debt Problem

If you have debt and relate to three or more of the following, you might have a problem.

1. Overdrafting feels normal

When checking accounts regularly dip below zero before payday, it’s a sign expenses are exceeding income. That’s a moment to look closer at how much of your cash flow is being taken up by debt—and whether overdrafts are forcing you to rely on new credit to cover the gap.

2. You’re only making minimum payments

Minimum payments keep accounts current, but they reduce debt very slowly. Because most of the payment goes toward interest, balances often barely move — and when that’s all you can afford, it’s a common sign there’s little room in your budget to make real progress.

3. You borrow from family or friends

Turning to friends or family for financial help (especially more than once) is a sign that debt has eliminated your financial breathing room. When existing debt leaves you without other options, relying on loved ones can strain relationships and add emotional stress to an already difficult situation.

4. You avoid looking at your finances

Avoidance is rarely neutral. If you know your finances are in bad shape but avoid looking at how bad, it’s often a sign that debt has become emotionally overwhelming — not just financially stressful.

5. You don’t have a clear plan

Paying attention to debt isn’t the same as having a plan. Without a clear repayment strategy and timeline, debt can feel endless—and progress can be just as limited as if you weren’t looking at it at all.

6. Spending is impulsive or emotional

Emotiona

Barbara Barrett // Stateline

As many people struggle to afford housing and tenant populations grow in some regions, more cities are turning to official registries to answer questions about their rental housing market, Stateline reports.

Who owns this rental property? Are they up to date on code requirements, such as having working fire alarms? Are they keeping their building heated and habitable during the cold winter months?

Registries such as those in Denver, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and Oakland, California, aim to gather as much data as they can on rentals within their city limits. The way cities use that data differs, and the teeth of their policies vary. The data can help them understand rent conditions, track corporate ownership and manage assistance programs. And the cities said they are better for having a registry.

As more people are becoming renters — outnumbering homeowners in some areas — many cities lack registries to keep track of the number of rental properties and who owns them. There is also no centralized database tracking which cities or states have rental registries, and federal efforts to study or create a national registry have not advanced beyond proposals.

Rental registries are created locally, vary widely in design and purpose, and must be identified through city-by-city research, according to Reina Chano Murray, associate director at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy’s Center for Geospatial Solutions. Some registries might focus on short-term rentals, others on long-term housing, inspections or affordability. And they differ in how data is collected, verified and shared.

“That variability makes it challenging to aggregate or standardize registries at a national level, but it’s also what makes them most useful locally. The strongest rental registries are built to solve a clear problem,” said Chano Murray.

Issues might include identifying absentee or corporate landlords, supporting rental assistance programs, understanding local rent conditions, or improving enforcement of rental housing conditions, she said.

The National League of Cities provides model legislation for city ordinances on rental registries. The organization, a research and advocacy resource for municipal leaders, advises them to seek, at minimum, information on property owners, including whether they live in or out of city limits, and a contact who will address tenants or deal with other emergencies and legal services.

Landlord and real estate interests often oppose rental registries, arguing that tracking properties and increasing regulation will discourage business development and increase costs for tenants.

But the registries have b

Monkey Business Images // Shutterstock

Are you rich or broke for your age? CreditNinja dug into the data to find out what actually makes you rich or poor for your age, and chances are you’re way off about where you really stand with your financial plan.

Key Takeaways

• You are likely not “rich” or “poor” for your age unless your net worth and retirement savings are far above or below the median benchmarks for your decade.
• Median income and net worth are much lower than averages suggest, especially in your 20s and 30s, because high earners skew the data.
• Debt tends to rise through your 30s and 40s due to homes, cars, and family costs, then declines in later decades as mortgages are paid down.
• Starting to invest early and consistently, even with small amounts, has a much bigger impact on long-term wealth than trying to catch up later.

Average Wealth for Your 20s

The average annual income for a person in their 20s is about $43,500. The average net worth is $110,000. While that number is correct, the truth is the average is very, very misleading.

Averages are skewed by outliers. In this case, outliers are people in their 20s who are making much more than average. So, instead of their average income, using their median income is a more realistic representation of the population because it shows the middle point where half of the people earn more and half of the people earn less.

The median income for a person in their 20s drops to $35,300 per year. The net worth drops even further from over $110,000 to just $7,500.

CreditNinja

Net worth isn’t just income. It includes things like your home and retirement accounts, which you’re more likely to have by your late 20s. So hopefully you’re starting to feel better about yourself if you’re in this age group or if you’re thinking about where you were in your 20s.

But what about debt statistics? Debt.org calculates the average nonmortgage debt of an 18- to 29-year-old at $12,871. This includes things like student loans and car payments. As discussed, the average probably can’t be fully trusted, since it could be skewed by people who are paying more than what they can afford for their car.

But even if the median is a lot lower, what makes up this age bracket’s debt? As you can imagine, a lot of it is student loans. The median amount of debt is around $15,000 of student loan debt for those under 25. Credit card debt is also pretty common. It hovers a

By Kristen Holmes, Priscilla Alvarez, CNN

(CNN) — Stephen Miller has sought this week to distance himself from the recent fatal shootings in Minneapolis and the administration’s miscalculated response. But more than anyone, Miller has been the overall architect of Trump’s aggressive deportation push, encouraging heavy-handed operations in blue cities and urging agencies to cast a wide net to meet hefty arrest quotas.

Miller is one of multiple Trump administration officials who have sought to cast blame on each other in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minnesota as they have faced bipartisan criticism for the increasingly chaotic scenes there and for their seeming rush to blame Pretti for the confrontation.

On Tuesday, Miller — who has long been reticent to admit to failure or weakness — took the rare step of acknowledging a possible mistake in the administration’s immigration effort, a sign of how much the Pretti shooting has shaken the White House.

Miller said that Customs and Border Protection may not have followed protocols during the shooting, and he noted that the White House based its preliminary response on initial reports from CBP on the ground.

Miller originally called Pretti a “would-be assassin” — and his comment was amplified by other Trump-linked accounts. His description of Pretti was quickly contradicted by video that showed him only filming officers and helping a woman who had been knocked down.

Miller, Trump’s deputy chief of staff, is widely seen in the administration as the mastermind of the president’s immigration policy, relentlessly pushing officials to meet goals that he designates on behalf of the president.

His power is evident in his daily 10 a.m. conference calls, including Saturdays, where he demands updates from agencies and exerts pressure on senior officials who deliver less-than-satisfactory results, according to a source familiar.

The call, which a White House official described as a “policy call to ensure interagency coordination,” includes senior leadership of agencies across the administration who are responsible for various aspects of national security and public safety.

And while the call can cover a host of topics, it largely focuses on Trump’s immigration push, a core part of the president’s second-term agenda.

Miller is militant, according to administration sources, in his belief that he must strictly enforce that push. He has been keenly focused on numbers, including how many immigration arrests are being conducted on a given day and how quickly deportations are happening. Last year, he directed ICE officials to meet daily quotas of 3,000 immigration arrests — an unprecedented number that hasn’t yet been met.

The intense White House pressure is felt downstream among agents and officers conducting immigration enforcement operations, resulting in their casting a wide net as to whom they arrest, including those who do not have criminal records.

Officials will often breathe a sigh of relief when Miller is directing his ire to an agency that’s not their own during the calls. Miller is also known to call Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem— who has taken significant heat for her handling of Minnesota — multiple times a day, according to sources, to provide guidance and direction on how Trump’s immigration agenda is being executed.

“Stephen is laser-focused on implementing the president’s agenda and the high success of the Hom

By Betsy Klein, CNN

(CNN) — For decades, the unwritten rule of the East Wing was that an American first lady’s private life was a gift to the National Archives, eventually traded for a post-presidency memoir and maybe a library wing.

But as Melania Trump prepares to walk the red carpet at the newly rebranded Kennedy Center on Thursday evening, she is proving that a peek behind the curtain of her life isn’t just a historical record, but a multi-million-dollar commodity.

With the “Melania” documentary, which captures the 20 days around her return to the White House, the first lady cast aside the privacy she’s long sought to instead become a paid executive producer of her own narrative — one that turns the presidential transition into an unprecedented cinematic event.

“I’m very private person and a very selective person – what I do, what I don’t do, when I talk, when I don’t talk. And that’s my choice, and nobody is in charge of me,” Trump said during a Wednesday evening appearance on Fox News’ “The Five,” underscoring the calculation she’s making to tell her story.

“Melania” premieres Thursday evening to a who’s who of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet and minor celebrities, including the Chrisley family of reality TV fame, rapper Waka Flocka Flame and the financial criminal “Wolf of Wall Street” Jordan Belfort. The film will have concurrent, invitation-only premiere screenings in 21 cities.

The business of being first lady, it turns out, is quite lucrative.

Melania Trump and her team, led by agent and senior adviser Marc Beckman, secured a $40 million deal with Amazon MGM Studios, plus a blockbuster $35 million marketing budget, according to a source familiar with the matter.

It all culminates Friday with a theatrical release across the globe that will test whether the significant public curiosity about the first lady can drive her fans – and even foes – to movie theaters at a time of slumping ticket sales.

What to expect

The substance of the one hour, 44-minute film has been kept closely under wraps. Reporters have not received advance screeners, though Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo and Newsmax’s Greta Van Susteren are among the expected red carpet attendees at the Kennedy Center, whose facade now also bears Donald Trump’s name.

A synopsis of the documentary promises “exclusive footage capturing critical meetings, private conversations, and never-before-seen environments.”

And it was made with Melania Trump’s full participation and editorial control. She was deeply involved in the production, post production and promotional aspects of the film, Beckman said in an interview with One America News.

Directed by Brett Ratner, the film marks his first major project since 2017, when he was accused of sexual misconduct by numerous women. (Ratner has denied the allegations.)

When choosing a director for the project, Trump told Fox News, the most important thing was “that he puts out my idea, what I have, and cinematic film that I want to achieve. So he was the best one, and he was great to work with.”

The film’s trailer offered more questions than answers about the dynamic between the president and first lady. But while it’s expected to address their relationship, don’t expect the first lady to drop any major bombs – the president called it a “MUST WATCH” on Truth Social as he posted a link to buy tickets.

Some of the other broad themes can be gleaned from Read more