Kieran needed a car and went to a Honda dealership. She found an Accord that she fell in love with. She was crush to learn that financing would not be approved. There were a couple of items on her credit report showing as defaulted and unpaid. By coincidence, she recently had gotten her credit report for something else; but she didn’t really understand what she was looking at. The accounts were paid and had a zero balance. She later contacted the credit bureau and had the report corrected and updated. But the Honda dealer said she to wait 90 days to re-apply. They later sold that Accord to someone else. This could have been completely avoided and Kieran would have gotten the car she wanted if she would have known what the credit report was saying. Then she would have corrected it, BEFORE she applied for the loan.
This is reason for this article. We will give the reader a basic overview of consumer credit reports. This article will be a quick guide on learning how to read and understand credit reports.
In the United States there are only 3 main credit bureaus. Trans Union, Equifax and Experian (use to be TRW). Any other bureau which may be in your area is somehow affiliated with one of these 3 main bureaus. Also any individual, or company, who pulls your credit report, is getting it indirectly or directly from one of these three main bureaus. They are the only credit bureaus that matter in the U.S.
So now the question… How do I read my credit report?
It is no surprise to learn that all 3 of the main bureaus do their reports different. However that is not an issue because all credit reports have four basic sections: Identity Info, Credit History, Public Records, and Inquiries.
1) Identifying Information: This section tells everyone who you are. Your social security number, your date of birth, and your name. Your name can be listed more than once to show each different way it has been spelled over the years. If some car dealership ran an inquiry on you 10 years ago and misspelled your name, it will be on your credit report forever. Of course for females it is going to list your maiden last name and your married last name, then if you got divorced and went back to the maiden name, if you remarried, etc. There can be a lot of variations of your name here. The important thing is to look at each one to make sure you recognize it.
Other information in this identity section may include your include your current address, your previous addresses, and telephone numbers. Also driver’s license numbers, your employer, previous employers, your spouse name, etc. Anything that contributes to indentifying who you are.
2) Credit History: It may also be called your trade lines, or your account list. The Credit History section will show all your current accounts and the credit that you have had previously reported to the credit bureau.
Generally, the Credit History section will list everything in the past 7 years. Many agree that the credit bureaus computers delete anything with a “date of last activity” over 7 years. For Example if you got a MasterCard in January 1996, then stopped making payments in March 2004. Then the March 2004 is the date of last activity and when the 7 years starts to count down. Later on, you decide to send in a payment in October 2007. The countdown now starts over from October 2007 which becomes the new date of last activity.
This Credit History section includes the name of the creditor and the account number. It will also include:
* Date you opened the account * If the account is in your name alone or is there a co-signer * The total of the loan, which is listed as the high credit limit, or highest balance on a credit card * Current balance * Fixed monthly payment for loans, or the minimum due monthly for credit cards * Current status as of date of the credit report (open, inactive, closed, paid, etc.) * How good, or bad, you have paid on the account
How good the payments have been made on these existing accounts is really the main thing that people checking your credits is looking for. This is indicated by a two part code.
The first part of the code is a letter that will either be an R or a I. The I stands for installment or fixed loan, these are set loans with a set payment amount, like car loans, mortgages, student loans, etc. And R stands for revolving which are mainly credit cards, department store cards, or line of credit, etc.
The second part of the code is a number that will be from 1 to 9. You can guess that 1 is the best which indicates no late payments and the account is current. And 9 would be the worse which indicates numerous late, partial or completely missed payments. So 1 is the best, and 9 is the worst, and then there are all the numbers in between. But in the credit world, anything other than a 1 means there was some sort of an issue with a payment.
When these codes are explained they are not that difficult to understand. People making credit decisions want to see I1 and R1. But, they still often caused questions. Some credit reports will insert plain language descriptions like typically 30 days late… never pays late… defaulted… etc.
3) Public Records: You definitely want this section to empty. Only negative actions that were the resort of court cases are listed in this section. Judgments, wage garnishments, bankruptcies, tax liens, etc. An item listed here will bring down your credit quicker that anything else.
4) Inquires: Like the name sounds, this section lists all of the companies that have requested your credit report.
Inquiries are divided into two types. Hard inquiries are the ones you initiate by applying for something like a loan, credit card, etc. Then Soft inquiries are from companies that want to send out promotional information to a pre-qualified group, it can also be your current creditors who are monitoring your account.
A lot of people are very concern about inquires making a negative impact on their credit. This can be true but it usually take a whole lot of inquires before it will affect you. Certain amounts are expected and considered normal in life. When you want to buy something like a house, or a car, you are expected to shop around, and two or more of these types inquires in a 14 day period counts as just one inquiry.
As stated earlier, there are many credit companies who all get information either directly, or indirectly, from one of the main 3 credit bureaus. Then they format their credit reports in many different ways, and list things in different order. However they all will contain these 4 basic sections.
It is extremely important to know how to read your credit report. And knowing exactly what is on it is very important.
Some in the consumer credit industry estimate that as many as 80 percent of all credit reports have some kind of mistake, misinformation, or contains something that has not been updated.
If you do see an error on your report. You then need to speak to each of the bureaus, Trans Union, Experian and Equifax. You can fax directly to them, if you have acceptable documentation like a receipt or invoice. If not the creditors will have to be contacted and will have 30 days to respond.
We hope this article has been a benefit to you. Our intent was to provide the basic information that would show anyone how to interpret and read a credit report. It is the only way to determine if it is correct, or if you need to take action to have it updated. If you are planning on buying a home, a car, or applying for any kind of credit in the near future, then you need to know what is on your credit report before it is reviewed. It is never considered as an inquiry when you request your own credit report.
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