How To Improve Your Credit Bureau Scores
Your credit score is something that can affect you in many different ways. Your credit can affect you if you are searching to make a major purchase like a house or a car. It can also affect you if you are trying to get a loan for your children’s education. Making major purchases like these are not decisions to be made lightly. There is a lot of money involved on both your side and the lenders. Lenders take many things into consideration when approving or declining your application for a sum of money.
Lenders weigh in many different things, in their decisions on whether or not to lend you money. They typically take a look at your length of employment history along with your annual income. The biggest weighed factor they use is your FICO score. Your credit score is based upon your credit worthiness on how well you have paid your financial obligations in the past. With these three main factors, the lenders will typically give you a yes or no answer. However, since your FICO score is usually the most weighed having the highest score possible is in your best interest. I’ll show you several steps that you can take before you apply for a loan, to ensure you have the highest score possible.
The first thing to do is to get your credit report from the three major bureaus so that you can get an idea as to what is exactly on your credit report. There is usually a small fee associated to check credit score
The three major credit bureau
TransUnion
P.O. Box 1000 Chester, PA 19022
1-800-888-4213
www.transunion.com
Experian Equifax
P.O Box 200 Allen, TX 750132
1-888-397-3742
www.experian.com
P.O. Box Atlanta, GA 30374
1800-685-1111
www.equifax.com
Do you check your Credit score Every Year
Once you have received your credit report you can then take a good look and see if there are any inaccuracies on it. Check your social security number and make sure it is correctly stated on each of them. Check your addresses on your report for accuracy, because each will have reported addresses that you have lived. Also, check your negative and positive credit history to make sure that each is reporting balances, amounts, and payments made on time correctly.
Once you have determined if there are any inaccuracies on your credit reports the next step is to write to the credit bureaus. Write to each of the credit bureaus about every single inaccuracy that is being reported. The credit companies will then initiate what they call a dispute inquiry with the credit company that you say is reporting inaccurately and then will send you the results usually within 30-45 detailing you their findings.
There are several things that you can benefit from here with the credit bureaus doing the investigation. Many individuals have at least one negative account on their credit bureau report. A lot of the time these negative reports, have been there for years.. With all the recent turmoil in the financial industry and all the new mergers and acquisitions companies are being bought up left and right. Since, it is mandated by federal law that the credit bureaus report back within that 30-45 day window about their findings. If, the company they are asking to verify the information with is no longer viable have no records of you or are not responding to the credit bureaus request at all then they must delete that record off your credit history. This benefits you, so inquire about all of your negative items that you find. You may get lucky and have them removed if they are unable to verify the information. This usually works for a good 20 % of the negatives you have on your report. So it can only help you rebuild credit that much quicker.
Also, when checking your credit report from the credit bureaus you want to take a look at your inquiries. Each inquiry that you have on your credit report stays on there for up to two years. If, you have some on there that you do not recognize or ones that are about to come off when you write your letter to the credit bureau you can ask them to remove those. You can also ask them to remove older or inaccurate inquiry’s from your report, which will also lift up your credit score.
One thing that credit card companies and banks like to report is the credit limit that they extended to you. I have found on my own that some of these credit card companies also report if you have ever gone over your balance. So, let’s say my credit limit is 100 dollars, and I had forgotten about a recent gas purchase that I had. On there is a charge for 20 dollars, and I went and bought something I really didn’t need for 90 dollars. When that credit charge for my gas finally comes through ill be above my credit limit by 10 dollars. The credit companies like this of course because then they tack on another 20 dollars or more because I went over my limit. So now my credit card bill comes, and I’m at 130 dollars when they report it to the credit bureau it will show that my high credit is now 130, but my limit is 100 this can have a big negative effect on my credit score. My FICO will go down because those numbers do not match. Now you can ask the credit Bureaus to dispute this and sometimes it comes back to match your limit other times you may have to call the credit card companies directly to have them resend it to them. I do find though if you call and ask most credit companies they are willing to work with you. Then the next time you pull your credit score you will find that it has gone up.
If, you take my advice and do some of these things prior to any major purchases you will be in a better negotiating position for yourself. In turn, you can save hundreds or thousands of dollars in interest because of it. It does take some time, and you have to take the initiative to bring these things to the credit bureaus attention. They will not go away for a long time if you don’t so get your reports and check them on a regular basis because it can only help you in the end.
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