In the last post, I mentioned how crucial it was to learn how to do credit repair yourself. I shared the first 3 of 5 quick and easy steps to do credit repair yourself.

Without further ado, here are the last two tips.

1. Raise your credit limits – you may be asking yourself, “How can raising your credit limits help when you are doing credit repair yourself?” The magic about this is that 30 percent of your credit score is directly impacted by the balance on your account compared to the limit on that account. So there is only two ways to change this aspect of your credit score. Either you pay down the balance or you raise up the credit limit. Either can give you an equal result when doing credit repair yourself.

2.  Continue monitoring your credit score – here’s where most people miss it big time. They take the initial actions to repair their credit themselves, but then they never follow up to be certain that those actions really helped their credit scores. That’s the pitfall of doing credit repair yourself; you may not have a good system for following through until you get the results in your credit that you are looking for. The best tool to use here is a calendar and simply putting reminders every one to two months to check your credit report and credit scores again.

So now you have it, the 5 quick and easy steps to do credit repair yourself.  Like I told you before, it’s quite easy if you know how to do it.  These 5 steps will definitely get you started on the right foot.

Don’t forget to leave your comments and let me know if this was helpful.

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In this tough economy, when every dollar counts, it is crucial to learn how to do credit repair yourself. Each and every day, thousands of desperate people are needlessly running to credit repair agencies spending hundreds, even thousands of dollars trying to get their credit up to par.

But it really isn’t that difficult at all to repair credit yourself if you know the basic things that most credit repair services would otherwise do for you for a fee.

If you aren’t aware of those simple actions, here are the first 3 of 5 quick and easy steps to do credit repair yourself.

1. Access a copy of your credit report – you are entitled to a copy of your credit report for free once a year. You can access it in the mail, by phone, or even online. Although you get this free credit report, be sure to also get your credit scores along with your report, as this is the foundation for doing credit repair for yourself.
2. Check your credit report for errors – this is one of the biggest factors that credit repair agencies bank on – the mistakes that can you easy remove yourself while you’re in the process of credit repair. Look for wrong addresses, wrong social security numbers, accounts with balances that you’ve already paid off, and even accounts with late payments that were actually made on time.
3. Negotiate account payoffs – here’s another area that you are typically charged for by credit repair agencies which you can avoid by doing the credit repair yourself. All you have to do is call your creditors on collection or past due accounts and ask them to settle with you. Just let them know that you will pay off the balance, but that you are only able to pay a certain amount. If the creditor agrees, you have just saved a few hundred dollars and you now have a zero balance on that account.

The best thing to do is to start today with these first 3 steps to doing credit repair yourself. Once you complete these, which shouldn’t take long at all, then you’ll

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I was thinking about all the news regarding the credit crunch.  Most news talks about the problems that we face because of this credit crunch, where banks are not giving out credit like they used to. 

Let me be the first to say “Thank You Credit Crunch.”  The problem isn’t that credit is bad.  The problem is that borrowers are bad!  It’s not the type of bad you think of though.

By borrowers are bad, what I really mean is that they’ve been badly uninformed and under taught.  Most people don’t have the slightest clue how to properly handle their credit as it relates to consumer debt and credit scores.

So, the simple idea of making less money available to less qualifies people is really a good thing, because its easy to let credit and debt consume them.  Its easy for debt to consume all of us, and the ones who lose most are our children, spouse, and communities. 

But rather than just penalizing people for not having good credit, there should be more proactive education on how to use credit.  That is a great way to turn this economy around.  Educate people more and they will make better decisions.

Ultimately, if it would help someone like me to regain some control over my finances, then please step in and help me.  Fortunately, education has made a drastic impact on my life and many others have benefited from it.

Let me know what your thoughts are.  I’d love to hear your opinion on the credit crunch and how effective more financial knowledge would be.

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Understanding how credit is scored is a powerful way to establish yourself and your credit scores. Many people want to maximize their credit, however, they really don’t understand the very basics, which will hinder then when it comes to improving their credit.

The first thing that you should understand is that there are three main credit bureaus — Transunion, Experian, and Equifax — and each of these three give you a grade, or score, on your credit-worthiness according to what your creditors report to them. The creditors that typically report this credit information are for the following types of credit; mortgages, car loans, installment loans, student loans, credit card companies, collection accounts, bankruptcy and other public information, and a few others.

While each of the three credit bureaus may use slightly different variables to get to your score, the FICO scoring model is still the major credit scoring model that is used today.

What is FICO anyway? FICO stands for Fair, Isaac and Company, the group that designed the model.

According to the FICO model, here are the factors that determine your credit score:

• 35% – payment history
• 30% – amounts owed
• 15% – length of credit history
• 10% - types of credit
• 10% – new credit

Knowing this will help you make better decisions when it comes down to actions that you need to take to fix your credit score.

Knowing the components of your credit score is helpful, however, you will need your own copy of your credit report in order to start taking any action to fix your credit score. So, how do you get your hands on your own credit report?

Getting a credit report is quite simple, especially considering that you are entitled to obtain a free copy of your credit report every 12 months. However, getting your credit score can be much trickier.

Make sure any company you pay to send you your credit report is also sending you the credit score, so you know the exact number that lenders are receiving. Credit companies that give you access to your credit report typically charge extra to include your scores in your report. This is a good investment though, because you’ll know the temperature of your credit!

One service that I recommend is using Credit.com. They will send you a free copy of your credit report with your credit report with a membership. If you don’t plan on keeping your membership with them for some reason, you have to remember to cancel your membership within their 30-day period, and you only receive one of the three bureau’s reports.

Hopefully, you now have a better grasp on the importance of credit and your credit score, and knowing these facts will definitely put you ahead of the pack!

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Identity theft has been a real epidemic as of late, and it can happen without you knowing about it. According to the FTC, 10% of people that have suffered identity theft said that the thieves managed to accumulate over $6,000 from them, and 5% said that the thieves were able to acquire over $13,000. As you can see, identity theft can cause many financial damages, and also completely destroy your credit.

In order to help protect you from this happening, here is a list of steps to take to protect yourself from identity theft and a shattered credit history.

1. Be cautious about disclosing your personal information and account numbers over the phone, online, or by mail. Be sure that you are dealing with a reputable company.
2. Carry only the ID or credit card that you will be using and keep the other ones in a safe place at home. This will minimize the damages and your time to report everything that is missing.
3. When you receive a new card, sign and activate it immediately. You can even sign on the back with ASK FOR ID rather than your signature.
4. Don’t carry your social security card around with you, leave it at home.
5. Shred your mail, especially those with account information, or even preapproved applications. Tearing them apart isn’t always enough.
6. Keep a detailed list of all your account information with account numbers and phone numbers in a safe place. If you happen to lose your wallet or purse, you have a way to contact them immediately and deactivate your cards.
7. Regularly check your credit report. This is most important because you get to see what credit activity you’ve had.

Make sure that you follow these 7 steps to make sure that you are protected.  Who knows, you may end up thanking me later.

If you take identity theft seriously, and your financial privacy even more serious, then I recommend LifeLock.  It is an identity theft prevention service, and it is so safe, the CEO posts his own social security number all over the place.  Find out more about LifeLock, but only if you take your credit and identity seriously.

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When is the last time you reviewed your credit?  This is an important thing to consider, because millions of people are suffering from a low credit score due only to errors in their credit report.

Think about it, people are paying Credit Repair companies thousands each and every day to fix their credit score, but have never taken the time to check it themselves.  Chances are, you may have some errors on your credit that are keeping you from having the top credit score that you want and need.

So, what is it worth to check you credit score?  Considering that you can get your credit report for free once every 12 months at www.AnnualCreditReport.com, it would do you well to start there.  This will not give you a credit score however, but the most important part is to check all the information on your credit.

Some of things errors can range from paid accounts that still show a balance, to collections that don’t belong to you, as well as accounts that were included in a bankruptcy that still show active and open with a balance.

As you can see, simply taking a few minutes to get your credit and check for errors will save you tons of money.  Often, those people that are paying for credit repair services could have avoided it all together by simply checking their credit themselves for free.

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Credit repair is something that you hear about all the time.  First of all, there are credit repair companies.  Then there are credit repair kits.  There are many things out on the market that supposedly make the process of credit repair fast and easy.

In my time working with clients over time, there are have been many excuses why they haven’t taken any steps to repair their credit, however, there are 5 key things that have been consistent over the last 7 years.

1. Lack Of Knowledge – Because we’ve been served so many different ways to achieve good credit, it is obvious that people seem more overwhelmed because of not having the right knowledge about credit or how to improve it.  The first step is understanding how credit really works.  There are 5 key factors which determine your credit score, but sadly, even some professionals don’t really know this precise formula.
2. Different Opinions and Perspectives- Many people that I’ve spoken to have different perspectives on how and what to do to have excellent credit.  This is mainly because the people that we go to learn about credit don’t really know themselves.  So, if we get false information about credit, guess what?  We will pass on the same inaccurate information to others.  Every time, the right info gets diluted and becomes completely false.
3. Not Establishing A Plan To Improve Your Credit- You’ve probably heard the saying “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.”  Well, that also applies to increasing your credit score and working on your credit repair.  There are a number of steps that it takes to boost your credit score, but often, people just shoot from the hip, or take a blind shot into the wind, without properly planning the steps necessary to increase your score.  It is very important to establish a plan because then you know that you are making progress, and you will also provide yourself with accountability to stick to the goal!
4. Can Be Overwhelming- At first, credit repair may look overwhelming.  After all, the task of going from a 537 score to a 700 seems like a huge undertaking.  The simplest way to achieve this and not feel suffocated is to break down your plan into smaller, manageable tasks.  Instead of paying down 5 credit cards so that they reach a 30% balance compared to the credit limit, focus on paying down the smallest one.  Once you do that, move on to the next one, and so forth.  This can give you motivation to continue and also make you feel like you are moving closer to the goal.
5. Lack Of Money or Time To Improve Credit- Let’s face it.  In order to repair your credit, you will either need time or money, or even both.  The more money you have available to do it, the less of your time it would take, and vice versa.  Again, making small adjustments can get you well on your way to credit repair.  First, is there anything that you can cut off from your spending that you can redirect to your debt?  Also, do you have an hour or two that you can schedule with yourself to review your credit and send out any letters to the creditors?  These are small things that you can begin doing to make a difference in your credit score.

As you can see, if you know what some of the road blocks are from improving your credit, then you can plan accordingly and make adjustments when necessary.

What are some of the things that are hindering you from improving your credit?  Feel free to leave comments or questions here and I will be sure to answer them.

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