Free Credit Report And Free FICO Credit Score - How To Clean Up Bad Credit History  

First of all it's important to know you can check your personal credit score and see your personal credit reports without it affecting your credit rating or credit score negatively.  You just need to know how to do it and that is what I am going to help you with.  You can get an annual free credit report instantly online from all three credit bureaus. First of all you need to already have your annual credit report or get one fast.  There are three credit reports you need to get, one each of the three most important credit bureaus.  These are the credit reporting agencies that are the ones mainly used to check your credit history. Doing so will not in any way affect your credit in a bad way.  You can request these reports free at www.annualcreditreport.com or by calling 1-877-8228 however the fastest way is to go online. By phone will delay your report or it will come by mail.

To get your personal FICO score, all of the consumer credit websites online will charge a fee. These fees can often be outrageous or expensive.  One website I checked on promoted by a female money guru costs $47.85! There are others who may charge less however. But there is a good way to get it without paying anything for it in other words, free.  If you apply for a loan through your credit union, bank or any other lending institution they will have your personal FICO credit score on file.  They need it to help decide if they are going to make the loan and if so at what interest rate. Get Equifax Score Watch Now!

All you need to do is ask your loan officer, loan broker or mortgage broker or car salesman what your FICO score is; they will tell you.  I have asked for it myself more than once.

The FICO credit scale ranges from 300 to 850, and half of adult consumers in the United States have credit scores over 700. If you have anything that is below 620  it is considered "sub-prime."  Sub-prime definition: a borrower may have a very good chance of defaulting on their home loan, mortgage or other type of loan. People who with scores on the scale that range between 550 and 599 have a 52 percent chance of defaulting on any type of  loan or credit card account.  This data come from the Fair Isaac Corp. the official creator of the FICO score.  For people with scores of 750 or more they only have a three-percent-or-lower default rate.

Bad FICO scores wouldn't have made a big difference  in 2006  when getting a mortgage was easy but now with the credit problems and foreclosures things have changed in the credit marketplace.

You need to know that if you have a bad or low credit score that you won't be able to clean up or fix your credit  as easily. But there are some things you can do to fix negative credit or repair your credit history.  There are credit repair ebooks available that can help you with that. This is a much better approach to the issue than paying for expensive credit counselors.  Your credit problems didn't just show up overnight, however if there are mistakes in basic data or obviously wrong information on file or even if you have someone else's charges or credit history, you can write a quick dispute letter to take care of this problem easily.  Changing the actually history of late payments or no payments will be harder to do if at all.

But you can turn things around to boost your score.  You should try to pay off any of your credit cards as soon as possible but it is not a good idea to close the accounts. This can work against you on your credit report.  Try not to charge more than ten percent of your credit limits in any month.

Try to pay each of your credit card balances in full, each and every month.

Don't waste any of your time trying to change any of the true but bad or negative information on the credit reports you got from Experian, TransUnion or Equifax, such as any late payments and charge-offs because this will be a  waste of time.

If you've had accounts turned over to collection agencies you can negotiate with some of these collection agencies to remove the collection accounts from your reports in exchange for some or all of the payments. But there is very little incentive for your original creditors to change what they have reported in your personal file. Your current actions will help reduce the effect of your past bad actions on your FICO credit scores.  Make sure you take care of present and future credit and credit card issues before you get into any deep water again.

There is credit and budget software that you can get to help you organize your loans, mortgage and credit card accounts.  Review the Consumer Protection Act so that you understand fully your rights. Beware of costly consumer credit counseling services who are in it for a profit.  Seek out any non-profit credit counselors if they are available to you for free and get help with loan consolidation if that will benefit you or help with a refinance or equity loan if that will help solve the credit problems. Best of all get a good book on the best credit repair to help you turn your credit around.  These books are cheap and can do a lot to help you.  This information should help you get a free credit report instantly online and help fix or clean up your bad credit history and FICO credit score. Get Equifax Score Watch Now!

copyright©2008  Helen Hecker All rights reserved. No permission is given to copy or reproduce this article in any way or in any form.