I cannot tell you enough how important it is to check your credit reports yearly for mistakes.  Mistakes are easily made and they can wreak your credit score.  If there are mistakes, you must work with the credit reporting agency to get them corrected.  Don't trust anyone else to do this for you.  Common mistakes that are easily identified are:

• Late payments - approximately 35% of your credit score is based on your timely payments of bills.
  
• Available Credit - make sure the credit limits reported on the credit reports match the actual limit you have on the credit card.
• Accounts you don't recognize - if there are any accounts showing open with balances on your credit report that you know you didn't open, call the account holder to notify it is a fraudulent account.

Make sure you are checking your credit report with all three of the major credit reporting agencies (Experion, TransUnion and Equifax).  If one is showing all information is correct, another could have an error.  In this tight credit market, it is nearly impossible to make a large purchase with a low credit score.  Take the time to clean your credit reports up and it will pay off in the long run.

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