Credit is valuable currency. Today, your ability to obtain goods and services for fair prices is often dependent on your credit score, and even your employment can be negatively impacted by a low score. In order to reap the maximum benefits, you’re likely looking for ways to raise your credit score. It’s not a quick fix, but it can be done! Consistency and detailed focus are both key in raising your credit score.
Today, we are going to cover 4 simple ways that anyone can use to raise their credit score. For this article, we’ll focus on 4 relatively easy “medium impact” approaches that – when combined – can have a significant positive effect.
Obtain Your Credit Report
Before you start, you’ll want to obtain copies of all three of your credit reports. There are three credit bureaus who report your score: Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. Though you are entitled to one free report per year from these credit reporting agencies, it’s not always the best option. “Free” services can come with risk of identity exposure and may even trigger collection agencies. We recommend a service like www.identityiq.com to get your credit scores for a fee. This allows you to see, in detail, exactly how your credit score is being reported.
Step One: Dispute Incorrect Information
The first simple step to raising your credit score is to dispute outdated information on your credit report. This includes, but is not limited to, incorrect and outdated name and address variations, as well as any other accounts that are past the 7 year mark and should have been removed.
As always, you’ll get the best results when your disputes are unique and specific to you and your situation. (In other words, don’t use “canned” disputes!) It’s also best to dispute the errors in writing rather than online; the paper trail works to your benefit.
Step Two: Confirm All Good Accounts Are Reported Correctly
The second thing you should do is to make sure that all of your good accounts are being reported correctly. If you’re looking to raise your credit score, you’ll need all the good information you can get! Check to see if there are missing credit limits, or if other information on your positive accounts is incorrect. The higher the credit limit, the better. If your good accounts aren’t accurately represented, attempt to get them corrected by contacting the creditor. You may also have to write to the bureaus to ask for a correction.
Step Three: Keep a Healthy Debt to Credit Ratio
The third simple key to raising your credit score is making sure your debt to credit ratio (i.e. credit utilization) is healthy. You don’t want to be using most of your available credit for debt. If you are using large amounts of your available credit, this can be remedied by adding new credit lines, paying off some of your existing debt, or using “friendly loans” to reduce the amount of credit you are using.
Step Four: Get Rid of Late Payments
The next simple step that many people can take is to tackle any late payments that occurred in the last few months. This is especially important if you’ve got a good track record, but have a single late payment on any of your accounts. If that’s the case, many creditors will remove it as a kind of “good faith” gesture to (hopefully) keep a happy customer. Often this can be done with a simple and polite phone call. It’s absolutely worth a try, since late payments can seriously hamper your attempts to raise your credit score.
Call In An Expert
If you want the ultimate solution to improving your credit score, you’ll want to check out the services of InCreditable Advisors. We offer proven strategies and hands-on support wrapped into one complete system for improving your credit score. Get started today!
