I lived in the US for 10 years, now I have moved back to Europe. Here is my story of some strange things that I experienced after moving to California (having won a greencard).
So, the first thing we did after moving to Orange County was to find an apartment, while staying at a motel. I had already found a temp job, so the job part was taken care of, and we had a few years worth of rent in the bank. But, I was dumbfounded to find out that they could not rent us an apartment because we did not have a credit history. Uh, so never having taken out a loan in your life and having a few years worth of rent in the bank is not better than even a super high credit score? Unbelievable. I even offered to prepay a year's worth of rent, for a slight discount - nope, we need credit.
And, of course, you actually need a credit card for a lot of crap, so I got one of those credit cards where you prepay the full credit limit to start a credit history. I never wanted a stupid credit card but it is impossible to get by without one. Later I got a Motley Fool one with a good cash rebate, and paid the entire balance by direct debit each month. I actually paid all the expenses I could via credit card after that, because of the rebate. Not a bad deal after all, a free loan each month, zero interest and a cash rebate too.
Then we got a car, and at the dealer's I picked one that was a few years old, and resisted the salesman's attempts to get us to buy something much more expensive, and gas guzzling. WTH do I need a small tank for. Then, I told him we would be paying cash. He told me he does not actually have any cash sale forms but only for paying in instalments. WTF? So I told him to get one of the instalment contracts and we would just be doing one single instalment. Also, some of the cars only had the monthly payment quoted, and no overall price...to try and reel in some credit suckers.
Later, after a few promotions at work (over 100k combined salary), we got an apartment closer to work. We asked for a studio, and the manager could not believe it. "But you could afford one of our nice and spacy 3-bedrooms, why would you want a studio?". Uh, nope. That seems to be the mainstream american way, always buy the biggest you can afford.
Then, in the mail, gazillions of offers for credit cards...why would I need more than one, and a credit limit higher than the most I would spend in a month. And no, I will not incur a balance and pay your ridiculous rates. And the offers to withdraw cash, and have it tacked onto your balance... no thanks.
And all these people who kept telling us (at the height of the real estate bubble) how much money they made with their house. Uh, no... unless you actually sell the house and pocket the difference, you have not made f*** all profit. Then people call themselves homeowners even when the bank actually owns the home, fully or partially. Unless you own the home outright or at least for the most part, you are not a home owner but a loan owner (serf).
Then, at the bank where I worked, we had a credit card called "on the house" which was a line of credit secured by the house (second mortgage). OMG. So a lot of people actually used this card to spend part of their house on consumer crap.
Any other anecdotes about mainstream America's wasteful ways?