Creating a Budget to Improve Your Credit Score

You may not see how your budget, which focuses on cash, can help you improve your credit score which is all about credit. Everything in your financial life is built on money, either money you do have or money you promise to repay. All financial decisions and consequences have a single base,...
Creating a Budget to Improve Your Credit Score

Teaching Your Kids About Money Before They Leave for College

For many teenagers, college is a time when they enjoy the freedom of being on their own, making their own decisions. For parents, it is a time filled with worry over their child’s present and future. It is the first time they have not been able to keep an eye on their kids. While you...
Teaching Your Kids About Money Before They Leave for College

How to Pay Off Credit Card Debt and Improve Your Credit Score

Next to making on-time payments, the amount of debt you have is the biggest factor in your credit score. Not all debt is created equal either. Revolving credit, or credit card debt, has the biggest impact. Paying down these balances will have a significant influence on your credit score.
Why It...
How to Pay Off Credit Card Debt and Improve Your Credit Score

How to Know If an Employer Will Check Your Credit

You may have heard that employers check your credit when you apply for a job. Along with that news is a lot of misinformation that may give you cause for concern. You want to know if an employer is going to check your credit and how it will impact you.
Credit Report vs. Credit Scores
While...
How to Know If an Employer Will Check Your Credit

Choosing the Right Credit Monitoring Service

You can find numerous credit monitoring sites online. Many of them are free, while others may have a monthly fee attached to membership. Even the free sites often feature paid memberships that give more features and benefits.
How do you know which site is best for you? Should you select more...
Choosing the Right Credit Monitoring Service

What Keeps You Lost in Bad Credit

Having bad credit seems like a never-ending cycle. You can’t get credit to improve your credit, or you do get new credit that actually hurts your credit. It can feel as if you will never have a good credit score again. Why does this happen and how can you change things?
The Dangers of...
What Keeps You Lost in Bad Credit

How to Get a Car Loan with No Credit

Getting approved for a loan of any kind with no credit history is rather difficult. Lenders seldom want to be the one to take the chance and offer credit to an unknown. However, it is possible to be approved for a car loan even if you have limited credit. Since this kind of loan uses the car as...
How to Get a Car Loan with No Credit

How Your Smartphone Can Help You Improve Your Credit Score

Smartphones do much more than allow you to talk and text friends and family. They make it easier to check your email, surf the web, play games and even read or watch movies. What you may not think of using a smartphone for is to improve your credit.
If you wonder how it is even possible, just...
How Your Smartphone Can Help You Improve Your Credit Score

New FICO Scores Will Change Credit Opportunities for Many

Fair Isaac is the creator of the FICO score, used by many lenders to approve loan applications. It is changing the way credit scores are determined to give more people access to scores and to help improve others’ credit.
The new score will include non-traditional forms of credit, such as...
New FICO Scores Will Change Credit Opportunities for Many

Strategies to Avoid to Get Out of Debt Even If it Improves Your Credit Score

If you are trying to improve your credit score to qualify for a loan or new credit, you may be willing to try any strategy to get out of debt. While setting a goal to be debt-free is a good thing, not all strategies are sound choices. Here are a few things to avoid when trying to get out of...
Strategies to Avoid to Get Out of Debt Even If it Improves Your Credit Score

Should You Choose Cash Over Credit If You Have a Bad Credit Score?

For many people, the idea of paying cash for something seems archaic. They whip out their credit cards and never worry about having cash on hand. But for the person who has had issues with credit in the past, using credit may not be the best option even if he or she now has a credit card.
Too...
Should You Choose Cash Over Credit If You Have a Bad Credit Score?

Choosing Between Debt Consolidation or Bankruptcy

If you have fallen on hard times, you may be having difficulty paying your debts. As you fall further and further behind, you may wonder if you should file bankruptcy or if debt consolidation will help you at all. Which option is best for you now and in the future?
Debt Consolidation
If you have...
Choosing Between Debt Consolidation or Bankruptcy

Disputing Your Credit Report

Experts often tell you to check your credit report and dispute anything that isn’t true. But what happens when you file a dispute? Does it impact your credit score or ability to get credit? In many cases, the answer is “yes.”
Options for Disputing
You have two options to...
Disputing Your Credit Report

Dealing with a Collector or the Original Creditor

You get a collections notice in the mail from an agency for an account you had forgot about. The letter sounds formal and even downright intimidating. You wonder if it is possible to pay the original creditor and skip over the collections agency since you’ve heard they can be difficult to...
Dealing with a Collector or the Original Creditor

How You Can Damage Someone Else"s Credit

Your credit score is tied to so many things like getting approved for a car loan or mortgage, getting good rates on insurance and getting new credit. Many other people review your credit report such as potential landlords and employers. You want to keep it in the best shape possible. Damaging...
How You Can Damage Someone Else"s Credit

When Should You Get a Credit Report?

If you have heard that you get an annual credit report for free from each of the three major credit bureaus, you may wonder when you should you request them. Some people do it at the beginning of the year just like annual New Year’s resolutions. Others do it around their birthdays.
Some...
When Should You Get a Credit Report?

5 Ways You Can Save Money and Improve Your Credit

According to statistics, the American consumer has been spending less money on certain things. If you are trying to save money to pay down credit card debt and improve your credit score, you might want to pay attention to what those expenditures are.
As you pay down your credit card balance,...
5 Ways You Can Save Money and Improve Your Credit

Embarrassing and Frustrating Situations for People with Bad Credit Scores

There are a few common themes for many people with bad credit scores who want to make changes. They often find themselves in embarrassing or frustrating situations with no idea of what to do or where to turn.
When You Have More Debt than You Can Pay
This often happens when people take on too...
Embarrassing and Frustrating Situations for People with Bad Credit Scores

Understanding Dates on Your Credit Report

When you look at your credit report, you are going to see a lot of different dates. They may be confusing and difficult to understand. You don’t need to worry about all of them, but certain dates have a direct impact on your credit score.
Date an Account was Opened
Having a long credit...
Understanding Dates on Your Credit Report

The Wrong Way to Use Credit

If you want to use your credit card to build or rebuild your credit, you must know the right way to utilize it. When you do the wrong things, you set yourself up for more credit problems. Here are things to avoid when you get a credit card.
Buying Things You Don’t Have Cash For
You see...
The Wrong Way to Use Credit

How Much will a Credit Inquiry Hurt Your Credit Score?

When you are shopping around for a new car or buying a home, you may consult with multiple lenders. They will run your credit to see if you qualify. Those inquiries will impact your credit score. The question on many people’s minds is by how much.
A Single Inquiry
When you permit a lender...
How Much will a Credit Inquiry Hurt Your Credit Score?