Understanding Your Credit Report and Score
Your credit score is based on a formulation used by the credit reporting agencies that creates a general average of your credit history and assigns a number to show whether you have excellent, good, fair or poor credit. While, your credit score is an average of your credit history, it is often the first thing creditors look at when deciding whether or not to give you a loan or credit account. While, you are unable to change the credit score directly, you can change and better your overall credit and credit report which will directly reflect on your credit score.
When looking for a way to improve your credit score there are many steps in the process and it will take a little bit of time for the improvements you make to reflect on your credit score. You can go through the process alone, or you can enlist the help of a credit counselor which can help with the process, paperwork and the law surrounding around what you are allowed to change and dispute and what you are not.
1. Request all of your current credit reports
Your credit report is available from each of the three major credit reporting agencies, including Experian, Equifax and TransUnion. All of these agencies have a web site where you are able to order your credit report that can be delivered in paper form or instantly electronically. Once you have your credit reports, print them out. This will take lots of paper, but it worth it to have them spread out in front of you for the best results when looking over them.
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