Your Good Credit Report is Your Life Line

Great credit is key to getting good loans. In this market where lending is tight and money isn’t freely flowing, the only way to get someone to lend you money is with good credit. Here are a few ways to achieve this.

Believe it or not, credit monitoring services are actually a good way to make sure your credit stays high. There is usually a charge for it, but these companies will check your credit, and if it changes, send you an email about it so you can deal with it if it’s not an authorized use.

Every year, you can get one credit report from each agency (there are three total). If you spread it out and get one from each company every couple of months, you can theoretically keep track of your scores and stay on top of it without much time in between.

You need to make sure you don’t use up all your credit all the time. This is because part of your credit score is dependent on your utilization rate, a measure of how much credit you have available versus how much you use.

When companies pull your credit report, that activity is recorded and affects your credit score. Therefore, it is advised not to apply for any other type of credit before you make a big loan. Especially many credit card applications in a short period of time. That’s a huge red flag for credit companies. Don’t do it.

Don’t let any credit card be inactive because credit card companies are starting to cancel them now. If your card is canceled, the utilization rate will automatically go down because your available credit will go down. Therefore, you should use your cards every once in a while even if you don’t need it.

Having more than one credit card will actually help your credit. Lenders will sometimes look at your credit report and deny you because you don’t have enough different forms of borrowing. They see a lack of information as a negative so even though you may have a ton of cash somewhere to pay off any loan, the absence of proof is a big drawback.

Having multiple types of debt (car, mortgage, credit card, student loans) among others is good because it shows that you are able to handle bills that come due every month. It also works the same as having multiple credit cards.

Tags: finance