You’ve probably seen a lot of things that say you can fix your own credit, and that’s true to a point, but it’s not always as easy as it seems for most people. However, you can certainly take steps to make your credit rating better and more acceptable to lenders in the future if you’re willing to put in the work to improve your credit and your chances of borrowing later on. That starts with step one – knowing what’s on your credit report right now and why. If you don’t know what’s there, how are you supposed to work at making it better?
Step two is to look at your credit reports (TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax all offer them, so get one from all three bureaus, since they can be different depending on how a company you’ve had dealings with reports things) and compare them to see if they match up. If you find that they don’t all match like they should, some of the problem with your credit could be that there are things on your credit report that don’t match with what’s true and accurate regarding your credit history. When you find things like this you should contact the credit bureau and ask to have them remove those items, which they will do if they investigate and find that those items aren’t yours -they are obligated to investigate any legitimate claim that’s not obviously frivolous – and once the items are removed they’ll send you a corrected credit report.
In step three, you’ll want to count up the open, active accounts that you currently have and see that you have at least three, since that’s how many you need to have a good credit score. It’s hard to tell how responsible you are with your credit if you only have one or two open accounts, and if you have three to five it’s much easier to see what you’ve been doing with your credit, especially if those accounts are varied (like vehicle loans or a mortgage) and not all credit cards. You can get more accounts if you don’t have enough, but you’ll have to be careful how you do this, since just running out and applying for more credit cards can actually really hurt your credit score.
Step four is finding someone that you trust and asking that person to add you to their credit cards – but there’s a catch to this. You won’t actually get a card or be allowed to use it, but you will be added as an authorized user, effectively giving the length and quality of their credit on that card over to your credit report, as well. However, don’t try this with someone who hasn’t had the card very long or who hasn’t been paying it on time, or their bad credit will be attached to your credit report, and you definitely don’t want that.
Step five starts into the harder things, like paying down your debt, since having a high balance on your credit accounts makes you look as though you’re not responsible with credit – and it will harm your credit score. When you start paying down balances, focus on getting them down below 50% of what you’re allowed to borrow on the credit card, and from that point work to get them down to 30% of what you owe and make sure that they stay below that level, because when you do that you’ll show that you are being responsible with your credit. You’ll have a much better chance of getting future credit that you might need if you can show that the balances on your cards are low and that they are staying low, so it’s something worth concentrating on, since it shows that you’re taking good care of your credit.
Step six is to not close out your credit accounts just because you’ve paid them off, since open, properly-paid accounts help to build good credit. If you close them out and get rid of them you’ll find that your credit score might actually drop off a bit because you aren’t able to get any more ‘good credit points’ from those companies anymore. There are some accounts, though, that will automatically close when paid, like car loans and mortgages – but leave those newly-paid-off credit cards open.
Step seven is the easiest one: maintain what you’ve done and are doing to keep your credit score high by making sure things get paid on time. Don’t start adding up a bunch of new debt once you’ve gotten rid of the old debt, and you’ll soon see that your credit score will stay high, allowing you to get the credit that you need when you need it. If you only get and use credit when you need it, and you don’t overextend yourself, you’ll have a much better chance of keeping a great credit score for years to come and being able to buy what you need without worrying that you won’t qualify for any kind of low-interest credit.
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