There are many obvious actions that can cause a credit score to drop such as making late payments, maxing out a credit card, etc. But there is one seemingly innocent action that you’ve probably never thought of that could drop a credit score by 20 or 30 points. It may seem like a harmless thing … Read more
There have been a lot of questions cropping up surrounding the changes coming in June to credit reports. These changes are due to the settlement agreement from 2015 between the credit bureaus and state’s Attorney Generals. The last phase of this agreement is set to be in place as of June 8th, 2018. Due to … Read more
A “Rescore” is the updating of information on a credit report at the bureau level in an expedited manner. It is not credit repair and it is not a manipulation of the credit report. Eventually the changes that are made through a rescore would be reported at the bureau level by the creditor. A rescore … Read more
In this day and age everyone has been taught at least a few ways to protect their identities against theft. But what about your children’s identities? Social security numbers are issued at birth and since kids usually don’t use them until they are older, they are a prime target for identity theft. According to the … Read more
Revolving balances play an important role in your credit score calculation. The total of your revolving debt makes up about 30% of your credit score. Balances on installment loans don’t have any where near the impact on credit scores as revolving balances do. While having a revolving balance or two can help your credit scores, … Read more
Approximately one-third of the population doesn’t check their credit reports every year. Almost one-fourth have never checked them at all. Not checking your credit report on a periodic basis puts you at a lot of risk. The good news is that checking your credit reports is a very simple thing to do. A government study … Read more
As the result of discussions between a group of state Attorney Generals and the three major credit reporting agencies (Experian, Trans Union, Equifax) the National Consumer Assistance Plan (NCAP) was announced in 2015. The plan is designed to provide more transparency and accuracy in consumer credit reports. The major focus of this change will be … Read more
There are three kinds of public records that can appear on credit reports: Bankruptcy Chapter 13 and Chapter 7, state and federal tax liens and civil judgments. However unlike creditors who are data furnishers like credit cards, mortgage companies, etc., courts do not, in most cases, actually furnish the information directly to the credit bureaus. … Read more
How long do items stay on a credit report? A lot of people will answer that question with a simple: “seven years.” In some cases this is true. Overall though, it’s not that simple. Both positive and negative items have a “life span” and those are not all the same. Let’s start with something simple. … Read more
One of the most frequently asked questions we get regarding credit reports is: “When do creditors report to the bureaus?” There is a misconception that creditors report their information at the beginning of every month and that credit reports update at that time as well. But in the world of credit reporting that would make … Read more