You're right on the soft checks to a degree. If you run multiple checks in a short time frame the credit companies see that as shoping for a card/rate and don't "ding" your credit as much as if you have multiple inquires over a period of time. As for loans something to keep in mind is that sometimes a loan less than 6 months won't show up. Keep all your loans for at least 6 months and it helps, an easy way to boost your credit is before paying cash for something get a loan on it, direct deduct the payments for 7-8 months then pay off the balance. You'll pay a bit in interest but it helps boost your score. and a lot of banks like to see at least 3 years of credit history from loans so 5 years is great.

 

6 months is enough to keep the loan? I thought it was a year.

 

i wouldnt ask to lower your credit limit unless it is exhorbitantly high. Another item that goes into the FICO score is your debt:limit ratio. If you charge about $300 each month, you dont want your credit limit to be $300, cause it shows you maxing out your limit every month, regardless of the small dollar value.

 

Never thought of that! Good thing I never come close to my credit limit. Never thought to even take that into consideration. That sucks for people with low credit limits then.

 

msn has a whole bunch of stuff on it...i was readin it over the weekend....taking that, and adding to the fact that I post *****'d here over the weekend, it was rather uneventful.

 

I don't really worry too much about my credit score after I have already bought a house. I think some of that stuff is frickin stupid. I mean, why should your credit get hurt unless you have something like an outstanding bill you refused to pay, bill collectors afteryou for other reasons,or a bankrupcy? If you bought everything cash cause you had the money, your credit score would be horrible even although you were rich! Just something to think about....

 

Lol. I prefer cash, but now I'm looking into gold. It always has a high value. I would rather have a milion dollars in gold than a milion dollars in cash because what if the value of the dollar goes down dramatically? The gold will still be worth about the same.

 

gold does fluctuate as well...

 

I guess when it comes to credit you have to prove yourself worthy of handling it. In order to do so, must have a history of handling credit well. Kind of makes sense if you really think about it since the person loaning you money doesn't know you in person and just on paper.

And you don't care about your credit score? Just a thought....what if interest rates plummet 10 years from now and you want to refinance to save money, but you had a philosophy of not caring about your fico score and you can't get approved for the lower rate because your score is teh sux0rz.

 

Cke ..... please note 00accord's caveats (sp?)