Coming to Terms with Your Credit Report
Contributed by Boo Roberts
What is a Credit Report?
If you are like me, you probably had no idea what a credit report was until you tried to buy a house. A credit report measures your credit and how much of a credit risk you are. Any credit card application you fill out, any time you make a late payment on your credit card, all of it gets kept track of by big companies. These companies compile your credit information into a credit report.
Why is a Credit Report so important?
I found out how important a credit report was when attempting to purchase a house. When you get pre-approved to buy a house, the financial institution will pull a credit report. The credit report will show all sorts of financial activity for your whole history of using credit for anything. Whether you have used credit for school, used credit cards for new outfits, used credit cards to fund your somewhat lackluster singing career, all of these things go into your credit report.
Sadly, because I had attempted to do all of the above (and maxed out more credit cards than I could count), I had a miserable credit report rating. Naturally my new dream of owning a house had to be put on hold. I had to figure out how to clean up my credit report.
How can you improve your Credit Report?
One of the first things I discovered about cleaning up my credit report is the power of scissors. Never underestimate how powerful a small pair of scissors are when your dream is being threatened. My first step to improve my credit report was very simple: cut up all but one of my credit cards. After a restorative cup of tea, I went to work. As the pieces of my sordid credit history piled up around me, I began to feel a sense of control.
