Our economy is floating on borrowed consumerism for the time being. People who save and refuse to borrow (thereby having little in their credit histories) should invest in real properties and someday coordinate a dump of certain stocks and savings. That is...if the Chinese investors don't do it sooner.
I paid cash for a car back in 2001. The credit agencies know about it. Although it didn't show up directly as a line item in any of my credit reports, they used it as a question when I logged on to get one of my free annual credit reports.