Genuienly, if you have ADHD and don't think you could manage the regular payments, it probably is the smart move to just not have another thing you need to remember.

There are various ways that you could go for some kind of 'credit repair' type thing that would just automatically make payments out of your checking or savings account, or something like that... but that is only really important if your credit scores are like, way, way below 720.

I also think this whole system is assbackwards insane, but as you say with the apartments and such.... it just is our social credit score, there are downsides to just not doing anything with it, you do have to 'play the game' to some extent, there is no opting out.

I was homeless for 2 years, and its now been about 2 years I'm not homeless.

I ran up some cards to avoid going to jail for stealing food, freezing to death in a blizzard or dying of exposure in a heatwave... and some of my cards (and ids) got stolen, more than once.

I'm still either paying off legit collections or arguing against illegitimate ones, to this day... But I managed to improve from ~530 to ~700 in the last 2 years time, as well as set aside an emergency fund (currently just shy of 3 months of my ongoing CoL), and a bit of investments, and get some actual basic useful home type stuff, and a bit of a shelf stable food pantry, after losing literally everything.

I've never gone bankrupt. I've never had to go to court or jail over a summary judgement on debt collections.

That'll be what happens to more and more Americans who have so much debt they either result to fraud or some other crime, or just think they can ignore it.

You can and will get arrested and jailed for not showing up at a court summons that results from debt collection, a lot of Americans don't seem to understand that.

The other alternative is basically... well you'd have an armed force of your own to stop you from getting picked up by the cops, lets put it that way.