ryan

tjarratt is right; nothing free, but there might be some trial services out there you can join. Credit Karma advertises a TrueCredit service that checks all 3 bureau scores, and I believe they offer free trials

What's your score? :)

Losing $7k of debt is great, so that will help. The closure might hurt if it's your oldest account, and because the credit limit on that card will no longer be part of your overall reported credit limit. I wouldn't stress too much about it if you have other cards with reasonably high limits and keep your utilization down

Pay your bills on time, make sure your credit card utilization is good, and everything else will come naturally. If you don't have a credit card, at least get a secured one to build credit and just throw a couple of dollars every month on there to show responsible payment.

As long as you pay on time, this will probably help your credit. More debt in general is a bad thing, so I'd never encourage you to take out loans you don't need, but if you need them then I wouldn't worry about the impact to your score. Your score will be fine as long as you pay on time.

You can always appeal the denial, but there are lots of other credit cards with great rewards that will be available to you at that score. Can you give more detail on their response? Are they saying that your credit utilization is too high? With that kind of score, if you have other cards, you should request credit limit increases to improve your utilization (you're not carrying a balance, right? :)

I think you're confusing a hard and a soft pull. SOFT pulls are OK - those are the kind that happen when you check your own credit and they do not hurt your credit score.

HARD pulls are when you actually *apply* for something, like a new credit card or a mortgage. Anytime you're looking for credit, you're considered to be a slightly higher risk

Credit Karma has a credit report card at /report that will give you a general overview. You can also get a free report from each bureau once yearly (government mandated) at annualcreditreport.com

I've asked Chase to forgive me late fees in the past, and they've done so based on my good history with them. Can't hurt to ask

It really depends on your report, but the important things are to pay your bills consistently and on time, and keep your credit card utilization low if it is high already.

If you don't have any credit cards, you can pick up a guaranteed approval secured card and charge a small amount to it each month ($50 in gas or something like that), so you can demonstrate a history of responsible payment.

I don't think there's much benefit from closing it, unless you're paying an annual fee or are worried you will eventually be charged one. If it reports a limit, then closing it will bring down your credit card utilization, since your limit will go down. That's not a desirable outcome, but it probably won't make a big difference either way unless it's a card with a really high limit or your other cards have low limits.

Kudos on paying off your furniture quickly!

browno is right on. You need to go for a guaranteed approval secured card. With a low credit score, interest rates aren't going to come into play.

I'd also ask - why do you want a low interest rate? Low interest rates are only good if you can't pay your card in full every month, which is a situation you should avoid as much as you can. When you have used a secured card for a while and can someday graduate to a better card with rewards, your goal should always be to pay that card off in full every month.

You should look at guaranteed approval cards

You should know what the inquiries on your report are for. If your score is going down because companies are checking your credit, and you don't recognize the companies inquiring nor have you applied for anything recently, then you need to contact those companies on your report. Ask them what the inquiries are regarding. It could be someone else is trying to open up lines of credit under your name.

Employer is probably one of the least accurate bits of information on the report. Generally there's just no reason for your employer to be reported to the credit bureaus, which is why they tend to be out of date.

Can I ask why you want to update it? I'm not aware of any adverse circumstances that can result from having an out of date employment record on your report. Anyone who requires proof of employment will be checking something other than your credit report for that information (most likely a pay stub)

Typically this is considered over all of your accounts, not per card, but I wouldn't be surprised if some scoring models also penalized for having individual cards with very high utilization. When most places talk about utilization, though, they are referring to the overall number (total debt / total limit)

Paying off your cards is great, but as a student, make sure you aren't cancelling any cards (unless those cards have annual fees that you want to get rid of). Since you're young, it's key to start building a long credit history, which starts by keeping your oldest cards open.

Loans do affect your score, and it's definitely good to pay off debt in general from a financial perspective. I'd never tell you NOT to pay off debt :) However, loans can actually be a good thing for your score as long as you pay on time consistently. Just *don't miss payments*!

Once you establish a steady schedule of on time loan payments, you should see your score start climbing.

Closing any credit card is not a decision to wander aimlessly into. There are several factors to consider and several things it will affect:

* closing a credit card will reduce the overall credit available to you

* if you carry any balance at all on it, it will increase your overall credit utilization

* and depending on the age of the card and number of cards you have total, it may affect your average length of credit history.

Credit utilization and age of credit history are both factors in your credit report and thus have an impact on your credit score, so if you close any credit card account, be prepared for a drop in your credit score. If you close your oldest credit card, be prepared for a significant drop in your credit score.

With that said, if you have several cards of similar age AND the reduction in credit line won't significantly impact your credit utilization, closing a credit card may be the right decision for you.

First, if you have the means, then definitely pay them off in full each month. Retail or department credit cards often have some of the highest interest rates in the market. Also I'd never encourage anyone to pay interest in the hopes of improving their credit score. Using the cards is enough keep them active in the eyes of the credit bureaus and credit score models.

The question of closing is tricky. Closing old accounts can lower your credit score since they help establish the length of your credit history. On the other hand, department credit cards are generally more expensive and less versatile than traditional credit cards. Here is what I would do:

If you have other traditional credit cards and your department credit cards are relatively new, you can close one every 45 days (Start with the most recent card first). Track your credit score before you close every one to make sure the last closure didn't have a material impact on your credit score. If there is a big credit score drop on the first closure, you probably have a thin file (little to no credit history) and you should keep them all open.

If you only have the department store cards or if your credit score is low, you should probably keep them open to help your credit score. When your score is high enough (650+), apply for a more versatile card and follow the methodology above.

Overall, department credit cards are not bad for building credit history but they will often cost you more and encourage you to overspend. Graduate to traditional credit cards when the opportunities arise.

Co-signing for a loan should show up as an entry on your son’s credit report, so double-check whether it has been accurately reported to the credit bureaus by looking at his Credit Report Card and also by requesting a free credit report at www.annualcreditreport.com.

Credit Karma uses TransUnion for its credit data and credit scores. The credit score model is one developed by TransUnion. This score is the same score used by several other sites for credit monitoring.

Banks have been trimming their accounts and tightening credit access in the past few months much to the chagrin of cardholders like yourself, and now you find yourself in need of fresh credit. Unfortunately, you can't avoid a hit to your credit score while applying for a new credit card. Issuers do a hard credit pull whenever you apply for a credit card, which will have a small negative impact on your credit score. While you can't avoid the impact on your credit score, excessive hard inquiries due to applying to many credit cards over a period of time will hurt your credit score even more and reflects badly to potential lenders. Protect yourself as much as possible by shopping around and applying selectively to just a few choice credit cards that are right for you.

Many creditors will charge-off debt after 180 days of less-than-minimum or no payments.

It may sound good, but don't start celebrating just yet. In declaring your account a charge-off, the creditor or lender has declared it a loss for the company; however, the debt has not been canceled and you are still responsible for paying it off. The creditor will close your account and you will not be able to make purchases anymore, but you'll continue to receive bills and they will continue to attempt to collect on the debt.

Additionally, creditors report charge-offs to the credit bureaus and the negative entry will remain on your credit report for seven years.

Intuit just announced that they're purchasing Mint, so maybe you'll see the best of both in one product soon.

Easily one of the best rewards cards out there, especially with the $50 bonus on $200. Combine with the AMEX Blue Cash and you can't go wrong. I've had Chase cards for years (last one was an Amazon) and twice I've had problems with theft and fraudulent purchases. In both cases, Chase refunded the money to me immediately and the whole process was hassle-free. My wife had cards from another company and when hers showed up with fraudulent purchases, it was a total trainwreck. After speaking with tons of managers and seemingly every department in customer service, we canceled her cards and switched her over to mine.

I can't comment on rate increases, because we pay off our balance monthly and we only use the cards to make money on our purchases. I don't really care what my rate is; I want cash back and high limits (for debt-to-credit ratios). Chase has raised my limit a few times without my asking (and a couple of times after I asked). If you have good credit, I'm not sure why you're worrying about your rate. You should put all of your big purchases on a 0% card anyway if you plan to carry a balance for an extended period of time.