Comments on: How to Review Your Equifax Credit Report

By: Donald L Schlack

Donald L Schlack — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 16:09:02 +0000

I want to thank you for the information on saving an Equifax report. I tried to copy and paste, but found the report too big. Why don’t the Credit Report companies make it easy to copy.
I found your site, just by doing a search and I think I may stick around and do some more research. Thanks again!

By: dewey phillips

dewey phillips — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 12:53:35 +0000

these credit co should be made to find out more true facts before they go shooting nos around ihave paid shell oil co each month never been late . they canceled my c c they said that i was no longer credit worthy there should be lawthat wont let them charge a high intrest rate. just because you have a lower ctedit score

By: Jim

Jim — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 03:19:44 +0000

Your employment info won’t affect you score, but employers are always curious about discrepencies between what you say and what is reported about you. I would do it just to keep it current but I wouldn’t consider it pressing.

By: Mike Leone

Mike Leone — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 03:17:54 +0000

What about out of date employment info? I recently checked my TransUnion report, and the “Employment Reported” section was from 14 years ago. While it apparently doesn’t affect my score, should I report my current employment situation to the 3 agencies? Just to make sure everything is up to date.

By: Jim

Jim — Thu, 28 May 2009 19:20:25 +0000

That seems very strange, usually banks will only do a hard inquiry for a checking account for the purposes of offering you overdraft protection (ING Direct did that when I opened their checking account). Thanks for the warning though, people should be made aware of that. “Identity purposes” are almost always soft pulls because they simply ask for personal information, not lending information.

By: Ron

Ron — Thu, 28 May 2009 15:05:07 +0000

In my haste to open an online high yield savings account, I applied for an account with West Bank and they did a Hard Inquiry. They told me they would do a credit check for identity purposes so I didn’t think it was a big deal. My question is why would they do a Hard Inquiry when the main purpose of having the account is to save money not borrow.

By: eric

eric — Thu, 28 May 2009 14:36:44 +0000

I spread my credit reports out, taking one every 4 months. On Macs, there’s a native print to PDF option so I do that and save them on my computer also.

By: Cap

Cap — Thu, 28 May 2009 12:56:00 +0000

I call credit score an “I love saving thousands of dollars on interest for my home loan score.”

Considering it as a society that gives us financial incentives to ‘borrow’ money puts you in a certain predisposition if you just end the thought there.

Why not think: You’re living in a financial society that gives you financial incentive to BORROW — and then REPAY the money promptly?

I consider myself living in a society where you get highly rewarded by knowing how to properly manage your cash flow and knowing how to properly manage your credit. Maybe that’s putting a pretty spin on consumer credit, but consider other definitions of credit beyond finance: source of honor; something that gains or adds to reputation or esteem; recognition by name of a person contributing to a performance; recognition by institution that a person has fulfilled a requirement; reliance on the truth or reality of something; influence or power derived from enjoying the confidence of another or others.

They’ve use the word credit to describe this financial instrument for a reason — most people just seem to have missed that completely.

By: Jim

Jim — Thu, 28 May 2009 12:29:50 +0000

You don’t have to borrow money to get a good credit score, your credit card reports your balance at the time your statement closes. If you were to charge $200 to your card each month and pay it off in its entirety, it would look as though you were carrying a balance of $200 but you didn’t carry anything.

Interest on consumer loans is not tax deductible, it is on student loans and mortgages. Credit is only necessary because everyone else uses credit. If there were no loans and you had to pay for cash, then prices for everything would fall. People can afford to buy $300,000 homes because they can get a loan. Part of the reason why home values are depressed right now is because of lending, a lot of people can’t get loans for the homes they want so the demand is falling.

I don’t think it says anything about our society.

By: labelcd6

labelcd6 — Thu, 28 May 2009 12:10:51 +0000

This is an excellent post.

I have a question, however. Dave Ramsey calls a credit score an “I Love Debt” score. Without turning this into a pro/con Dave Ramsey debate, how does everyone feel about that statement?

How should we feel about credit scores, which go up when we borrow and pay back lots of money?

I’m aware of several financial benefits from having a high credit score (and I do have a good credit score from paid off students loans and such); however, how should we feel about living in a society that gives us financial incentives to borrow money?

In fact, with interest being tax-deductible (at least I think it is), with credit cards seeming to be “necessary” to function in middle-class society, and with the collapse and panic surrounding the drying up of “easy credit,” what does that say about our society? What does that say about us?

By: Wise Money Matters

Wise Money Matters — Thu, 28 May 2009 11:52:36 +0000

It’s always good to check your credit score at least semi-regularly. I found a ding against my credit from over a year prior. It was a medical bill and they had the wrong address for me. I eventually paid the bill and got it removed from my credit score, but I likely wouldn’t have caught it until buying a house or the like. And that would have been frustrating.