Credit score

Freeze Your Credit To Protect Your Identity

Two years ago, my online identity was compromised; I have an eBay account, and someone hacked into it and bought $1,000 worth of electronics. Luckily I caught the theft the very next day, and eBay was wonderful and took care of the charges. However, that spooked me and my husband, so we decided to take the radical step of freezing our credit to protect our identity, in part because we plan to buy a home in the next few years and do not want anything to compromise our credit score.

Benefits of Freezing Your Credit

When you use a security freeze, you essentially lock down your credit. If your information is stolen and thieves try to open up an account, they will be thwarted. Ultimately, this is the best way to protect your identity. Credit monitoring may help you recognize theft has occurred, but a freeze keeps the theft from ever occurring.
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Building Credit From Scratch – Are Young Adults Doomed for Financial Failure?

Written by Glen Craig 11 Comments

Young Adults: Doomed for financial failure?

Young adults are faced with a unique set of challenges that cause many to struggle with credit. Inexperience, school loans, social pressures, and financial optimism all lead down the path of least resistance – a really bad credit score. However, it’s important to remember that there are long-term consequences of bad credit, and restraint today can pay off big time down the road.
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Ways To Increase and Improve Your Credit Score Without a Credit Card

Written by Glen Craig 11 Comments

When we think of improving a credit score, we often think of using credit cards.

Indeed, one of the fastest ways to build credit is to open a credit card account, and use it regularly, paying down the balance on time.

However, many people are wary of credit cards, and would prefer not to use them. Unfortunately, some sort of credit history is needed in order to qualify for some loans, especially home loans and many auto loans.

The good news is that it is possible to establish and build up your credit score, even without credit cards!

Improving Your Credit Score without Credit Cards

Guaranteed Ways To Lower Your Credit Score – 5 Steps

Written by Glen Craig 19 Comments

We know how important a credit score is these days, don’t we? Yet many people still insist on doing what they can to destroy their score. Since some want to have a train wreck of a credit score here are five guaranteed ways to lower your score:

1) Pay your bills late. Here’s a good one to lower your score. Pay your bills late, especially loans and credit cards. And I’m not talking a few days late, I’m talking 90-plus days late. Wait until you get a collection notice, why dontcha? (According to Credit.com, accounts 90-days late can damage your score up to 7 years. Bingo!)
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How Can I Improve My Credit Score? 8 Ways to Increase and Raise Your Credit Rating

Written by Contributor 59 Comments

Maybe you’re sitting at home looking at your credit card statements, realizing that your APR’s [Editor: Annual Percentage Rates] aren’t quite as low as you’d like, or you’ve recently checked your FICO score and notice it’s low.

You want your credit score in that Excellent check box up there!

Perhaps you want to refinance your home, and want to get the best rates possible before looking into loans. Or maybe you have a very low credit score, getting deeper in debt and need to do some real work to improve your credit score.
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How An Excellent Credit Score Has Helped Us Save Money

Written by Glen Craig 17 Comments

Having excellent credit scores has helped my wife and I save in many ways over the years. We didn’t always have great credit scores. Both my wife and I had our periods of credit card debt. Along with that came the occasional late payment and the regular stealing from Peter to pay Paul lifestyle. But we both wised up and, over time, eliminated our credit card debts. With that came better and better credit scores. We’ve discovered that having a good, or great, credit score has its benefits.
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The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, And Disclosure (CARD) Act Of 2009- Effect On Credit Card Holders

Written by Glen Craig 30 Comments

In the last year or more, credit cards and the laws that govern the industry have come under serious scrutiny due to the large amounts of individuals and families facing serious debt problems involving credit cards. Card holders have been subjected to stiff fees and increasing interest rates for seemingly no reason, leaving many so far behind in payments, they had no where to turn. As the credit card industry began to spiral seriously out of control, Congress finally began to take action on behalf of the affected consumers.

Credit card practices have been unfair and deceptive for quite some time and changes need to be made to continue a healthy economy. In May 2009, President Obama signed into law the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure (CARD) Act of 2009. The action was meant to create more protection for consumers and halt unfair and hidden fees they were being charged for being a credit card holder.
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Another Case For Emergency Savings – Credit Score

Written by Glen Craig 9 Comments

You know you need emergency savings right?

Should something come up where you need money quick you want to have emergency savings handy to help take care of the situation. Well here’s another aspect to think about:

You need emergency savings to protect your credit score!
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My Experience With myFICO – Review

Written by Glen Craig 26 Comments

We were real close to closing on the sale of our co-op.

As result we needed a place to move to. These days landlords and realtors tend to ask for a recent credit reports and scores in order to rent from them. Rather than pay each time we find an apartment we liked, we decided to check our credit reports and scores ourselves to have on hand if needed. We were also curious to see our credit scores and of course we wanted to make sure our credit reports were accurate.
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Credit Scores Matter More Than You Think

Written by Glen Craig 20 Comments

Credit scores are important when you want to borrow money or get a new credit card. They’re important when you want to rent an apartment or a house, since the landlord will usually run a credit and background check on you before they’ll hand over the keys. If you thought all those people checking their free FICO credit score were wasting their time, you might be surprised to hear that it affects more than loans.

If you thought the importance of your credit stopped there, unfortunately, you’re wrong. There are several places where your credit score and your credit history can have an affect, even though it has nothing to do with you borrowing money.