Tips to Raise Credit Score

Many people when needing or wanting to raise credit scores immediately find someone else to do it for them. They call a credit repair company and assume that is the best they can to do increase their credit score. Enlisting the help of a credit repair company to raise a credit score is a good idea in most cases. But there are other steps people can take as well to increase their credit score.

What is Credit Repair?

Credit repair is using federal law to remove derogatory items from credit reports that are erroneous, obsolete, or unverified by a creditor. It can be very effective but in most cases will not remove every negative item from a credit report. Why? Let’s consider a negative item that is not an error and the date of the last activity on the account is within the last 7 years. The only way that the item is going to be removed by the credit bureaus is if the creditor does not respond to the dispute of that item. If the creditor continually responds stating that the item is accurate, it’s not coming off until the 7 years is up.

So then why is credit repair effective? Because many creditors don’t respond to the dispute sent to them by credit bureaus. It’s as simple as that.

Credit repair is one step that someone should take but there are other aspects of a credit report that should be addressed as well.

Balances on Revolving Accounts

Many people think that if they simply make their minimum payment every month on their credit cards they are doing their best to maintain or raise credit score. That’s not true if the balance on the credit card is higher than 30% of the credit card limit. So, pay down your balances to under 30% of the limit.

Late Payments

Late payments are one of the worst enemies of a high credit score. As we work with clients sometimes we are removing negative items and they call us upset that their credit score has gone down. After investigating we find that they have made a recent payment late such as a car payment. Late payments can reduce a credit score by as much as 60 points. By making future payments on time the score will increase again. But if someone is trying to raise credit score don’t make late payments.

Positive Accounts

Many people don’t realize that even if they have very few or no negative items on their reports they are not going to have an excellent credit score unless they have positive accounts as well. The more positive accounts the easier to raise credit score. Find ways to add positive accounts to your credit reports.

Don’t spend money you can’t pay back on time. But find a company that reports to all 3 credit bureaus and open an account. Make a small purchase and pay it down to 30% of the credit limit immediately. Depending on your current credit score perhaps go to a bank or credit union that has credit builder loans. Even if it’s just $500. They will put the money in a savings account and you can pay back the loan from the savings account. It will cost you some interest but will raise your credit score.

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To clarify, we are credit repair experts. Credit repair is a very positive step. But we also educate our clients on what I’ve shared above and other things depending on their personal circumstances. We also provide other tools for our clients to raise credit score at no extra charge other companies don’t. Click "Book a Phone Appointment" below or visit the Credit Repair Page on our website.