by Jon Ochs
Let me start off by saying that understanding how the three major credit bureaus arrive at your credit score is one of the most powerful pieces of knowledge you can have. Most likely this is not something that you have ever been taught. In fact, when it comes to your credit scores, the three major credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian, and Transunion, run sort of a "black box" operation.
To explain what makes up your credit score in as simple terms possible, this is how it works
35% - Payment History Your history of paying your bills (on-time, late, etc.). The largest factor of your score.
Utilization of Credit 30%: This represents the percentage of available credit against the amount used. Here is where we will focus our activity for this article.
Credit History 15%: A more seasoned account carry more weight than one that was just opened.
Recent Inquiries 10%: Whenever you apply for any kind of credit, a credit inquiry is reported. Too many of these, and they can negatively effect your scores.
Credit Types In Use 10%: The number of accounts in use, and the type of credit accounts. Finance company accounts are of the lowest value, and too many of them can cause a negative effect on your scores.
Ok, now we have some powerfull knowledge. It's time to put it to use with 2 things we can do in about 30 minutes to increase our credit scores...
Raise your limits! Raising your credit limits is much easier than you might think. Most people don't realize that just by simply asking for a credit limit increase, you will most likely get one. We have proven this over and over again with clients. Just call the phone number on the back of your credit cards, and tell them you are considering transferring the balance to another card with a higher limit and lower interest rate, but that you would like to keep the account if they could just raise the credit limit. In my personal experience, it has worked 100% of the time. Often they will also lower the interest rate as a bonus. Lowering the interest rate will not help your credit score, but it will sure help your finances.
Let's say for example you have a credit card with a $5,000 credit limit, and you currently have a $4,000 balance on it (80% utilized). After your quick phone call, they agree to raise your credit limit to $6,500 (now 62% utilized). This alone will immediately increase your credit scores. Remember in the "Credit Utilization" section above, we want to ideally keep our balances below 50% of the credit limit. This brings us to the next powerful tip.
Lowering your balances to add more points. Continued from the above example, you are now utilized at 62% on your credit card. What this means is that you still have room to further increase your scores. If you coule put just $750 on this credit card, you could bring the current balance to 50% of your new credit limit ($6,500 credit limit, with a balance of $3,250). You might be saying that you don't have $750 to put down on your credit card. Ok, you could stop right here, since you already increased your scores, and you can most likely get the limit raised for all your credit card accounts. However, if you are trying to buy a home, or a new car, you can potentially save thousands, or even tens of thousands in interest on that new loan and even get a lower monthly payment, just by paying a little down on your current accounts. When that results in higher credit scores, you may qualify for much better loan terms. In one case, a client paid down $450 on one credit card and was able to increase their scores so they could purchase their new home with zero down, instead of the $5,200 required down payment they were previously facing.
These are very powerful techniques. I have seen this work for clients time and time again. One client recently was able to raise the credit limits on 3 credit card accounts and raise their scores by 105 points immediately.
Bear in mind that these techniques are recommended to those with a clean credit history. Credit card companies are more willing to work with those that have an established history of making payments on time. If you have negative items on your credit, perhaps a more aggressive credit repair approach is more appropriate.