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FICO Scores: Briefly More Confusing And Then Much Clearer
If you’ve perused our educational materials on credit scoring you’ve surely seen reference to FICO scores. These measures of credit worthiness, generated by the company of the same name, are used by...
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What Debt Collectors Can’t Do
If you have a debt that has been transferred to a collections agency, that agency has the right to try to collect that money from you. But that doesn’t mean that they can do anything and everything to...
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Swipe Right: Credit Or Debit?
Do you ever go back and forth between your debit and credit cards in the checkout aisle because you’re not sure which is best to use for a particular purchase? Well, the decision doesn’t have to be...
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How To Detect Identity Theft On Your Credit Reports
If you’ve accessed your credit reports at any time in your life, odds are that you have seen some mistaken information in your credit file. After all, statistics show that the solid majority of people...
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VantageScore 3.0: What It Means For You
You may have been conditioned to expect the worst with credit scores. After all, it can seem like the more you learn, the more you have to worry about: “It can hurt my score if I don’t have a credit...
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Filing A Complaint With The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
In the past, if you had a problem with a financial product or service that you wanted to report to federal administrators, you contacted the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). That changed in 2011 after...
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Hard Inquiries vs. Soft Inquiries
If you are like most people, the inquiries section is one of the most mysterious and frustrating parts of your credit reports. There can be companies listed on your credit report in the inquiries...
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More Credit Access For Stay-At-Homers
Are your work contributions in your relationship/marriage primarily in the form of family care tasks performed at home? If so, you may feel at times like you are treated like a second-class citizen by...
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FICO Score Myths Debunked, Part I
To put it simply, we don’t know everything about the FICO score and we likely never will. This is because FICO, the company, makes money from selling their scoring calculations to lenders and...
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FICO Score Myths Debunked, Part II
We like to say that to the unfamiliar, reading credit reports is like trying to navigate in a foreign country with a map in a language you don’t know. If that’s true, figuring out credit scores for...
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How To Get An IRS Tax Lien Off Your Credit Report
One facet of credit reporting rules that probably causes more hand-wringing than any other is the removal of paid negative listings. Or rather, the lack of removal. If you’re like most people, you feel...
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Can No-Limit Credit Cards Limit Your Credit Score?
If you are familiar with the way credit scoring works, you probably know that avoiding being “maxed out” on your credit cards and other revolving accounts generally impacts your score in a positive...
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Innovis, The Fourth Credit Bureau
Much of the discussion of credit bureaus focuses on the three most commonly used agencies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. However, there is another bureau you may need to know about. The company...
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Frozen Out Of Your Security Freeze
Security freezes can be a wonderful safeguard. They let you “lock up” the information in your credit reports so that the details within can only be accessed if you give a PIN number. Many people who...
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Credit Bureau Dispute Contact Information
It can be very upsetting to find incorrect information on your credit reports. After all, this essentially means falsehoods are being broadcast about you that anyone with the right to look at credit...
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What to Prioritize on your Credit Reports
Being turned down for credit can be extremely frustrating. But remember that lenders want to lend money to you; that’s how they improve their bottom line. So the message of a denial shouldn’t be “No”...
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When Will That Collection Account Fall Off Your Credit Report?
In the arena of credit reporting, there probably isn’t any issue that causes more confusion, or generates more false information, than collection account listings. For example, you may have heard that...
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Statute of Limitations for Debt: What Does it Mean?
If you owe a company money, you owe them for life and that’s that. Right? Well, technically that’s not necessarily the case. That is because of what are generally known as statute of limitations laws....
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New ID Theft Scams to Watch Out For
As a part of our ongoing series, we take another look at some of the latest threats to your information security. The Scam: You are contacted via phone or email by a “new government agency” so you can...
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How Much Does a Credit Security Freeze Cost?
If you have been a victim of identity theft, or have reason to believe that your personal information is particularly at risk, a security freeze is a strong measure to help you “lock up” your credit...
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