In almost every financial transaction you undertake, your credit score matters. Even in other areas of life, such as employment, a credit score is looked at as a reflection of responsibility and having a less than stellar credit score can impact your financial future in a positive or negative way.
Below are a few of our favorite to improve your credit score or keeping it looking good if you already have an excellent credit score.
Check Your Credit Report Annually
Much like it is important to get an annual checkup at the doctor, it is important that you individually monitor and review your credit score at least once a year. This will allow you to make sure that erroneous information is not added to your report and that if something negative were to appear on your report, you could correct it right away.
In the current marketplace many companies offer credit monitoring services, but you can also annually receive a copy of your credit report from all three credit bureaus for free at: https://www.annualcreditreport.com
Credit Card Balance Percentages Matter
No one likes credit card debt and getting rid of credit card debt altogether is one of the best things you can do for your financial future, but if you are in the process of paying off credit cards, the percentages matter and I am not just referring to interest rates. Anytime you have a balance on a credit that is over 30% of the limit of the card’s available credit, it will negatively impact your credit.
If it’s not financially viable to pay down all of your cards to that point right away, then you can also ask for your credit card company to raise your limit on a card. If they do, then this puts you in better shape credit wise, as you pay off the card balance.
Pay The Credit Cards – Don’t Close Them
One of the factors that will affect your credit score, is the average age of your accounts and for that reason, if you have had an account open for a long time, you don’t want to close the account, even if you pay it off.
If you have a credit card you opened in the past year and no longer have a need for or perhaps a credit card with a high annual fee, then it may make sense to just close those accounts, but for any accounts you have had for a while, your credit will benefit, by keeping the card open.
These are just some of the many things you can do to improve your credit score, but there are many other common sense things as well, such as making your payments on time, not having your credit run too often and not accruing too much debt, that will all put you in a position to have an excellent credit score.
As always, if you are looking to be qualified for a new home loan for the purchase or refinance home loan, please speak with a licensed lender such as Strategic Mortgage, to fully and properly pre-qualify.
For more information on home purchase loan or refinance programs for existing and potential home owners, please contact Bill Kamboukos of Strategic Mortgage at (480) 219-3682 or by emailing: info@strategicmtgaz.com or online at www.strategicmtgaz.com
Strategic Mortgage, LLC - NMLS#158804 - Equal Housing Lender
Comments(0)