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Anya Kamenetz Generation Debt

Anya Kamenetz, Generation Debt

What You Need to Know About Credit Scores

by Anya Kamenetz

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Posted on Wednesday, August 27, 2008, 12:00AM
You've probably realized by now that your principal in high school was full of it when he or she warned you about your "permanent record." There is no such thing.

But there is, in a way. It has nothing to do with cutting class or smoking out by the football field. It's called your credit report, and it shows your current credit accounts, outstanding debts, and payment history going back for several years. Credit cards, student loans, auto loans: They're all there, and if you have a problem paying any other kind of bill or have an overdraft on your checking account, it will show up, too.

High Score

So why is this important? Well, credit reports yield credit scores, a powerful little three-digit number ranging from 300 to 850. A bad credit score -- less than 620 is considered subprime -- will have you paying 10.99 percent interest on a car loan when your friend with squeaky-clean credit is paying 6 percent, or 29 percent on a credit card when your friend's card charges 12 percent.

Credit scores can also affect your rates for mortgages and home, auto, and life insurance.

And increasingly, bosses are conducting credit checks when they make hiring decisions.

Credit scores are a great scam for the credit card industry. Without fail, when I give a talk on college campuses about the dangers of credit cards, someone in the audience asks, "But don't we need a credit card to build a good credit score?" And I have to say, well, yes. You need those credit cards to get a mortgage or an auto loan down the road. But you don't have to run up any balances! The most cautious thing to do is to use your credit cards to make a regular payment, like a cell phone bill, and then set up automatic bill paying online each month.

There are lots of businesses, some fraudulent, offering to "repair" your credit.
But as the Federal Trade Commission wants you to know, self-help is the best approach. Here's what you can do:

The Score Decoded

Requesting your credit reports and scores is a good way to start taking control of your money. There is one most common credit score used by banks to make decisions: the FICO score, developed originally by Fair Isaac Corporation.

FICO scores, once again, range from 300 to 850. Three different credit bureaus combine information from credit card companies and banks to make credit reports: TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax. Each of these bureaus may have slightly different information on you in their reports, which yields a different score. The Equifax score is seen by some as being most similar to what banks actually see when they pull your credit report.

By federal law, you are entitled to one free copy of your credit report each year from each of the credit bureaus. Go to annualcreditreport.com to request them. You will have to pay about $7.95 a pop to see the scores as well.

To write this column, I pulled my free credit report from TransUnion. It's pretty easy to read, showing my name, Social Security number, and current address, as well as two previous addresses and the payment history for my credit cards: a Capital One Visa, a Chase/Bank One Visa, and a Washington Mutual card that I've since canceled. I don't have any balances on the cards right now, and I have made nearly all on-time payments. But my credit score is only 705, shy of the "excellent" cutoff of 720.

This is primarily because last year I traveled out of the country, moved apartments, and forgot to pay a $40 charge on my Capital One Visa. The payment went overdue for 90 days, until Capital One finally reached me on the phone. So now I am patiently repaying my cards on time each month, via automatic direct debit, and waiting for my score to improve. On the advice of TransUnion, I'm also going to open another credit card to increase my available credit, which could help improve my score.

The Breakdown

Your credit score is based on several factors, many of which will hit Generation Debt harder than older folks.

1. Payment history -- the biggie, about 35 percent of a FICO score. Also the no-brainer: Any late payments or overdrafts, like mine, will ding your credit score for several years.

2. Amount owed -- about 30 percent

This figure compares the amount you owe to your available credit. So someone who has a $2,000 balance and a $2,000 credit limit -- they're maxed out -- will look worse than someone who owes $3,000 but has cards with $30,000 worth of limits. This may hurt folks with large student loan balances. It's also the reason that you don't necessarily want to close accounts after you pay them off -- it's better to leave them dormant to raise your available credit.

3. Length of history -- about 15 percent

The longer your perfect record of on-time payments, the better your score -- so if you've only been out of school for a couple of years, your credit score won't be as high as it can be down the road if you keep it clean.

4. New credit -- about 10 percent

Repeatedly shopping for credit -- either credit cards or bank loans -- can hurt your score because it makes you look desperate. I learned this the hard way when I got out of college. I had smugly avoided signing up for a student credit card. Well, suddenly I was a freelance writer's assistant, with no regular income. I applied for and was rejected from so many cards in the first few months out of school that I was told I couldn't file any more applications for six months. I finally got a Capital One Visa with a $300 limit. All of this probably hurt my credit.

Message: Confine your credit card shopping to 30 days, and, yes, get a student card if you're in school.

5. Miscellaneous-- about 10 percent

This includes stuff like having a nice "mix" of credit cards, auto loans, and other types of credit.

Mr. Fix-It

First, make sure your report has no mistakes. The Public Interest Research Group found in 2004 that 79 percent of credit reports had some kind of mistake. One out of four had a serious error that could lead to denial of credit.

If you're young and have never requested it before, your credit report may contain information from someone else with the same name. Or there may be duplicate information.

Evan Hendricks, an expert who wrote the book "Credit Scores and Credit Reports", told Bankrate.com that student loan borrowers especially have to watch out:
"Student loan information will sometimes multiply like rabbits on the credit report because student loans are sold from one company to another, and the old company continues reporting and then the new company continues reporting it, and it might make it look like you have more loans than you actually do. Then if they're showing any late payments, you can get hit with double whammies on late payments as well."

If you have a mistake, you need to send a dispute letter to the credit bureau and ask them to "reinvestigate" it. Include copies of any supporting evidence like your drivers license. Keep records of everything in writing. You can also request that the bureaus include a note in your file to help explain any delinquencies -- e.g., you were taking care of a sick parent or were unemployed. "Credit Scores and Credit Reports"  has all the info on how to do this for free, yourself.

If your credit report is accurate, do what I'm doing now. Set up automatic direct debit to pay all your bills on time, on the day they're due. Start paying down your credit card balances, starting with the highest-interest cards, paying at least $10-$15 over the minimum each month. But don't close any accounts -- remember, you need a high ratio of available credit to used credit.

Take courage. It doesn't happen overnight, but after seven years, most blemishes on your credit report -- even bankruptcies -- are erased by your most recent payment history. Take comfort in the fact that there isn't really a permanent record after all.

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136 Comments

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  • Manoj - Sunday, September 28, 2008, 2:49AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    Quite good and the very first article from the author which I have nothing but praise. When I read the one star response, I realize what kind of twisted logic people have. If you try to correct a problem and the problem is not correctly promptly, think what went wrong. Did you gave incorrect or incomplete information. Just because you escalated the problem doesn't mean you did it right. Think why others get timely response and you don't? Think what is know about the process is enough or not? Education is a like light and ignorance is the darkness. The more light you have, less you will be in dark.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Saturday, September 6, 2008, 11:47AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    very informative in simple understandable way

  • Tim L - Thursday, September 4, 2008, 4:46PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    As usual, numerous commenters here are knuckle-draggers who opine greatly on things about which they know little. To those of you who pay cash for everything except maybe a house (and then pay 20% down) - good for you. You're missing out on free money from the credit card companies (I average about $600 per year in rebates), but you know that you aren't overspending your available cash. That, however, gives you no license to make those who know how to conquer the credit card companies out to be fools. I am probably $7000 richer after learning how to beat the CC banks at their own game over the last two years. They play by rules that anyone can learn, and you simply need to follow them. Step One is ALWAYS PAY YOUR BALANCE IN FULL EACH MONTH! For 99% of cards, that will lead to ZERO interest. If you succumb to the temptation to just carry a "little" balance, you are on your way to a lifetime of your own self-imposed debtor's prison (there ARE ways out, but they require a lot of skill to successfully negotiate). If you have conquered your spending, the next step is to play the credit card arbitrage game, where you actually take advantage of CC banks' temporary low-rate offers to make more money in interest that they charge you in finance charges! Before trying this, however, make sure you have done your research and have a solid, virtually foolproof plan. It is far superior for young people to have their first experiences with credit cards with their parents' guidance (assuming THEY know how to deal with them) than to set them adrift with no knowledge at all. If you don't understand how credit cards work, take the time to learn about them. It will be time well spent. One final note: demonizing the CC banks is not the answer. Yes, they do engage in certain near-predatory practices (a $39 fee for being one day late with a $10 minimum payment?) and they definitely take advantage of the ignorance of their customers. However, with the availability of the WWW, there is no reason for anyone to lack understanding. Knowledge is just a click away!

  • zaphodsclone - Wednesday, September 3, 2008, 3:48PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 2/5

    If you want to spend your life being a slave to the banking system then by all means keep credit cards, pay them off and try to keep your history clean and your fico high. OR: Do what I and many others have done. Have Zero credit cards, Zero debt and pay cash for everything. Including decent used cars and the primary residence (if you must go the mortgage route, than please at least put 20% down and get a 15 year fixed, a decent credit union near you wont be all that flustered if you don't have a history as a debt monkey). Trust me on this citizens; nothing feels as good as being beholding to nobody. Imagine all the saving and investing you can do if you had no payments of any kind. Imagine the kind of future you could build for your family and all of the good works you could do. Stop paying attention to folks like Anna, Suze, Carmen et al ad nausuem. Debt is evil and debilitating, nothing good can come from being partially owned by HSBC or MNBA (or fill in the blank). If you can't figure out how to do it on your own, perhaps watching and listening to Dave Ramsey might be a step in the right direction. Best wishes for your future success.

  • David - Wednesday, September 3, 2008, 1:13PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    People says everyone should know this - but they don't! Young people should be taught the basics of practical finance (credit & borrowing, investing and taxes) early on - say high school.

  • George - Wednesday, September 3, 2008, 9:07AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    In addition to opening new credit cards, another thing you can do is ask for your current cards to raise your limits. That's usually a good idea every 6 months or so, and it will reduce your utilization by raising your available credit. If you're ever rejected on a credit raise or when applying for a new card, you can also review your credit file for free (even if you've requested a copy less than a year ago).

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Wednesday, September 3, 2008, 12:40AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    Anya, you need to check out this article on the perils of automated billpay: http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/105662/Automated-Bill-Payments-Are-a-Cinch-Not-So-Fast It was written by the NYT, so you should be on the same wavelength (since you both are raging lefties).

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 7:56PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    CREDIT SCORES AND FICO SCORES ARE ONE OF THE GREATEST SCAMS ON THE PUBLIC OF THE LAST TWO DECADES. Everyone should refuse to participate in this scam. I have and it has had no bearing on my ability to get credit or a good rate. If your solid and pay your bill, and always paid you bills on time pay it no mind. It is a system for idiots.

  • Tommy - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 7:15PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    I actually found a mistake on my credit report a few years ago. It was a hospital bill from when I was about 5 years old! I called the credit company and filed a dispute. The hospital had 30 days to respond or it was dropped from my report. Needless to say, that item is no longer on my report.

  • Peter - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 2:30PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    This is all mostly basic information that should be common knowledge to everyone, but it seems that this is very helpful for some financially misguided college students. I would like to add keeping an eye on your debt to income ratio because, even if you credit score is above 720, your debt to income ratio can prevent you from approving for a mortgage. This is a good column. I don't see it as advising people to go into debt and stay in debt, but helping people to understand what it will take to maintain a decent credit score. I would advise some of my friends and family to read this.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 1:46PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    I agree with yattaboy. Thanks for your comments. It prevents me from having to type all that. Recommend myfico.com usergroups. learn what works and what does not. And by the way I am fixing my credit reports and removing inaccuracies and unsolicited requests for my credit even pre-approvals. Remember information is power. Understand the system and use it to your advantage. I use my credit card for everything and pay it off every month just out of convenience and it helps with my credit in 2 ways - increased limit (increased by 20% without my request when others are seeing theirs reduce) and payment history.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 12:29PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    If I was in my 20s this would be helpful info.

  • Jigar S - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 12:02PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    This article was very helpful for someone like me who was clueless on know credit scores are calculated and how they work. Also thanks yattaboy for putting the 1-star guys straight.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Tuesday, September 2, 2008, 10:37AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    Gee, a personal financial expert that doesn't even have a great credit rating? How can I take advice from her?

  • MR - Monday, September 1, 2008, 8:07PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    The article was straight forward and right to the point.

  • Robert - Monday, September 1, 2008, 10:04AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 3/5

    Overall good information

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Monday, September 1, 2008, 9:11AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 3/5

    It is a no brainer!!! To improve your credit score fill all the all the credit applications you get. Everybody get many a day in the mail.

  • gert - Monday, September 1, 2008, 8:14AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 3/5

    I see people who open there wallets and have more credit cards and all then a deck of cards hot shots who have to pay for it. live with in your means

  • yattaboy - Monday, September 1, 2008, 1:02AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    OK, to the last 1 star geniuses: PASTEXOXOX - yes, I have worked with all three major agencies to fix mistakes - they were all cooperative and timely, partly because there are now laws saying they must, but I had the mistakes corrected before any compliance laws were put in place. USER AUG 31 at 11:34AM - if you (apparently) are a young college student, you've got a lot more to worry about than this article. No where did I read anything that said you had to go into debt. You read something and modified its meaning in your own mind. The article said get a credit card (singular, as in one), the implication being that it may be easier than waiting to graduate. After getting one, either don't use it, or use it to buy necessities like gas, and pay it off each month. Was that so hard? PAUL R - Anya has a 705, so you don't think she should write articles? I don't know what depresses me more, the fact you favor FICO's scoring mechanism, or the fact you think the consumer-oriented behaviour scoring model actually serves any useful purpose for gauging a person's financial capabilities. Case in point: I started with a FICO 830 two years ago, and tapped one of four credit sources. All payments made within the grace period, plus lots and lots of unused available credit, which I will never use. I have never missed a bill of any kind since moving out and graduating in 1990. Yet my FICO now dropped to 730. Why?? Because I chose to use one of my available lines of credit to float the business. I wonder how many other entrepreneurs could tell horror stories of their personal credit ratings -- but does that mean they are all bad business people? The FICO score doesn't care if you're Wharton trained, from Alabama, rich, poor, pay everything in cash, pay ahead, buy all-terrain vehicles or just organic health food...its a rating system that makes assumptions, and they are often incorrect for any given individual. If all of this example were not enough, Anya acknowledged she missed one payment for 90 days ...yep, that'll do it. Why don't we just burn people at stakes again for making mistakes. After all, you've never made a mistake, have you? I don't always agree with Anya's advice, but she publicly showed what her score was and why it was that way. This fact and reason behind it cannot serve as any argument to whether I agree with Anya on future issues. Are you and other commenters grown-up enough to think this logically? USER AUG 31 11:35PM - "Missed a lot of points", "how credit card companies can change the terms at will". What? This is a short Yahoo! article on credit, not a dissertation to satisfy people who need to read 40,000 words per day before they can fall asleep. Why would you expect the requirement of all the "missing" information you cite to be in any given article? Did Congress pass a law saying that from now on, anyone writing about credit cards must include all the information that you think should be included??? And I don't think the "missing" info you so selfishly think is needed is pertinent to "What You Need To Know About Credit Scores", which if you missed it, was the title and therefore subject matter of the article. And then you launch into a diatribe about how horribly Chase treated you. Well, there, you're right. Anya and any future writer, blogger, reporter, analyst and every person in the United States of America (heck, how 'bout the Earth) should have ESP and just know that they must include your own personal example in any article ever written on the top of money, commerce, credit cards, subprime, etc etc etc. I'm still waiting for a 1 star commenter for any of the columnists who can actually offer a persuasive argument.

  • Phyllis - Sunday, August 31, 2008, 11:36PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    Have you ever tried to have a credit report corrected? GOOD LUCK!!

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Sunday, August 31, 2008, 4:35PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    This is the kind of information I would like to see. Concise and practical with examples. Now some one in another article has to inform us how in the world these credit rules were imposed on the American citizens? Did our reps in the US Congress vote for them?

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Sunday, August 31, 2008, 11:34AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    This is terrible advice for any young college student. This article makes it look like going into debt and staying in debt is a good thing. If you cant afford it then you need to get a credit card to pay for it, that is terrible advice. This is why the economy is in such bad shape as too many people are borrowing money they cant pay back. Pay cash for everything and you dont need credit.

  • Pablito - Saturday, August 30, 2008, 11:43PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    How in the world did you end up with only 705? Someone with a credit score that low has no business advising anyone with money.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Saturday, August 30, 2008, 11:35PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    Missed a lot of points. How credit card companies can change the terms at will, never having to abide by the original terms of their own card member agreement. If you reject their change of terms, they close your account, dropping your credit score by more then 100 points. Chase Visa did this to me, promising me 0% for one year and then a permanent fixed rate of 11.99%. After the initial year, they gave me 11.995 for 3 months and then sent me a Change of Terms, changing my rate from 11.99% fixed to 27% Variable. All this after I paid all my accounts on time. After closing my account they reported to the credit bureaus I closed the account. After 2 letters asking them specifically why they reported I closed that account when I didn't, they replied both times with, "the account had to be closed.", but never answering my question why they reported I closed the account when I didn't. This then triggered Washington Mutual, who promised not to change my rates as long as I paid them on time, which I did, to raise my rates also. If there is any one credit card company out there that dosen't break contracts, I sure would like to know who they are.

  • Karl - Saturday, August 30, 2008, 12:59PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    Not a bad report. However, under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, a bankruptcy will remain on the public records section of your credit report for 10 years, not 7 as indicated by the author.

  • Johnna - Saturday, August 30, 2008, 2:09AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    Informative article. I do object to those professional credit repair organizations. The cleaning up of "bad" credit that is factually true on a credit report is one of the underlying problems of this housing crisis. Representing a borrower (a loan) to the lender/investor in a light that is not factual is harmful to all. For example, a doctored credit report or an inflated house appraisal is in nobody's best interest. Making good loan decisions with factual information is far better to the person and this country than a get the loan at all costs and any means approach. A credit report that reflects the actual person, good or bad, is better to the person, the lender and this country. Please keep the preceding in mind when acting on this article.

  • ChrisW - Saturday, August 30, 2008, 1:11AM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 4/5

    I was in the same case as the author, moved abroad, forgot a $50 bill (6 months late on last power bill), bad mail forwarding, the works. After the bill was paid, I explained the change of address SNAFU and the person at PG&E removed the ding on my credit. A tiny little bit of work that brought me back to the 800s. Say you're buying a house in a few months and they'll feel bad about the whole thing and make you a favor. It worked for me.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Friday, August 29, 2008, 8:48PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 1/5

    Sheesh. To the author: do yourself a favor and go to www.creditmatters123.blogspot.com. After you've gone there and educated yourself, you can thank me.

  • Yahoo! Finance User - Friday, August 29, 2008, 6:58PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 5/5

    What amazes me are all these negative comments of how all this is "common sense". My favorite comments are those that say people with high FICO scores don't need loans. Which leads me to believe most of these people writing these idiotic statements on here are probably the ones with the 6K/month loan on a three year interest only option arm. The fact is a lot of people are in debt, take on a high mortgage, that is way too high for their income level, or max out their credit cards without the thought that this needs to be paid back. The free money mentality has got to end. The FICO score, more or less, measure responsibility. Those that pay their bills on time and live within, or below their means, are the ones who obtain good rates. There is a correlation between a high FICO score and responsibility. If all this were “common sense” we wouldn’t have double digit foreclosure rates and the average credit card debt being close to 10K. People need to take responsibility for their actions. If they take out a loan they need to pay it back. If you simply cannot afford it then don’t buy it. Our lustrous leaders in washing may have a “borrow and spend” mentality but as individuals we need to take responsibility for our financial future both as individuals and as a society.

  • Kirk J - Friday, August 29, 2008, 1:34PM ET  Report Abuse

    • Overall: 3/5

    Showing how the scores are generally determined (30% history, 15% length of history, etc...) is a nice entry. There are differences between debt, available debt load, and their respective ratios. If someone has 20k available in cards and carries less than 5k, their score may be better than someone carrying 10k on their 20k available (assuming similar income and employment histories). For bank loan purposes, the ability to go 20k into debt in revolving credit may act as a basis for denial for a loan. I suppose the moral of the story is "all things in moderation". Closing an unused/little used card to reduce the possibility of going too far may demonstrate better judgement to a bank than carrying around the potential for abusing credit with too many cards with available balances.

Showing comments 6-35 of 136<< PreviousNext >>

More from Anya Kamenetz

Read the Generation Debt Book

According to economics professor Laurence J. Kotlikoff, Generation Debt offers "a truly gripping account of how young Americans are being ground down by low wages, high taxes, huge student loans, sky-high housing prices, not to mention the impending retirement of their baby boomer parents." Generation Debt will inspire you to take charge of your financial future.

Read more from Anya Kamenetz here and here.

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