One of the latest trends in cosmetic surgery has nothing to do with injectable fillers or mini face lifts. Instead using plastic for plastic surgery has become one of the biggest things to hit the cosmetic industry since BOTOX.
An increasing number of financial services are offering patients money to undergo plastic surgery procedures.
“It's exploding, everyone is jumping in,” said New York plastic surgeon Dr. Helen Colen. “It's a great business. You have millions of people around the world who want a procedure.”
Financing plastic surgery is growing at a rapid speed. According to experts, the lending market for cosmetic surgery was almost nonexistent five years ago, and is now estimated to be worth $500 million. Some lenders include Capital One, GE Consumer Finance's CareCredit, and Unicorn Financial.
“It could be an $8 billion to $10 billion (market) in five years,” Care-Credit president Mike Testa said. Testa guesses that 30 percent of plastic surgeons offer financing plans to their customers, a percentage that will surely grow in the coming years.
Lenders have hopped on the multibillion-dollar cosmetic surgery bandwagon. According to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS), Americans spent $9.4 billion on plastic surgery procedures in 2005, up 11 percent from the previous year.
However, statistics show that nip and tucks are not just for rich patients anymore. Most cosmetic surgery patients earn anywhere from $30,000 to $60,000 a year.
“Financing allows people who don't have access to cash to go ahead with the procedure,” said Dr. Malcolm Roth, a New York plastic surgeon and spokesman for the ASPS. “It's wonderful.”
Financing plastic surgery is easier than it sounds. If a patient opts to finance, the doctor makes a call to the lender. A patient can be approved within one hour if the credit check goes through okay.
The lender will pay the plastic surgeon up front and works out a payment plan with the patient. In almost all cases, there is no interest rate on the loan as long as payments are made on time. If the payment isn't made on time, interest rates can skyrocket to as high as 22 percent.
Patients most likely to choose financing are those who don't have credit cards or have low credit limits. However, even people with a lot of money are opt to finance.