Manage Inquiries into Your Record

The more often someone asks a credit bureau about you, which happens whenever you apply for a loan or a new car, the lower your credit score will be.

Recent rules for lenders require them to count all inquiries for the same purpose during a one month period (all inquiries from mortgage lenders, for example) as one inquiry, but it’s still not a good idea to apply to more than four or five places for credit in any six month period.

Automate to Be on Time

There are some months when we all goof. We forget to pay the Visa bill. We forget to write a check to AT&T. One way to stop this from happening is to automate as many payments as possible. You can now authorize everyone from your health club to your mortgage lender to your utilities company to automatically deduct funds electronically from your checking account each month.

Then your only challenge is making sure the funds are there to cover those payments. (In fact, some lenders will give you a break on your interest rate for paying this way.)

Your thoughts on this subject? Your comments appreciated!

Content © Rich Brott, 2011

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