35-44 - who's in debt?

I read an article from Callcredit looking at how different age groups manage their debts in different ways. According to the research, it looks like the 35-44 age range is one that could really work on improving their debt management skills. They performed worse than the 'average' borrower across quite a few categories. For example, 13% of the people in that age range said they'd 'overestimated their income' when they applied for credit, while just 9% of borrowers in general said they'd done that. I can see why someone would do that (to get a bigger credit limit) but that doesn't make it a good idea - it may sound obvious, but a pound of debt isn't the same to everyone, since someone with a big salary could easily handle a debt that someone who's working part-time would really struggle with. So 'overestimating' your income might sound like a good idea to start with if you're looking for credit, but the consequences can be serious - take on more debt than you can realistically handle and you're playing with fire. Another (related) fact: 6% of people said they'd applied for credit even though they knew they might not be able to make the repayments. Among the 35-44 year olds, that number was 10%! And 35% of borrowers said they clear their credit card bills in full every month - but just 27% of the 35-44 year olds said they did that. Plus, only 5% of people said they'd actually stopped paying off their credit card bill in full (although they used to do that) and had started paying off just the minimum instead. Again, people aged between 35 and 44 did worse, as 7% of them said they'd started doing this. If 2% doesn't sound like much of a difference, don't forget that 7% isn't 2% bigger than 5% - it's 40% bigger! I'm 33 this year, so this article really caught my eye! It's not that I'm expecting to run into any serious problems in the next couple of years, but it's always a good idea to be aware of the kinds of financial issues - kids, college, mortgage and so on - that I'm statistically likely to run into over the next decade or so.