Maintaining Good Credit

[satchmo]

Man how much bullshit is credit? Everyone will have to use it at some point. Whether it's applying for a car loan, house loan, or job, your credit can be used for or against you. Oh but god forbid you actually want to see your credit score for free. No no no. Oh so you want to pay off your loan early? That'll cost you 50 points. Want to close down that old credit credit card you don't use anymore? Go ahead see how much that drops your credit!

"But but buut i pay off my credit card every month so it's basically a free loan" Really it is? Every time you use your card, the retail outlet is charged a transaction fee from the credit card company. Do you think that cost doesn't get passed onto the consumer? Do you fuck face?

What a load of shit. I play the game, and I play to win... but let's not pretend this whole system isn't designed to fuck us.

You seem like an angry little man

 

[Diablo Ryu**]

Credit is some fucked up shit...even getting your credit ran say for different apartments will negatively hit your credit.

 

[RerouteToRemain]

I have always used my credit card and paid it off in full every month. I have never left a balance. When I got my credit checked for my house my scores were 806,799,783. I have read/been told to increase your score you should leave a certain percentage but I never liked or wanted to do that and paying it off in full obviously worked for me. I didn't like the idea of purposely leaving myself in debt. I think the leave a balance was a myth by the banks to gain more $ off interest. If everyone in the country thinks its a good idea to leave a couple hundred- couple thousand balance, the bank makes a ton of interest $ on that.

 

[BJ@LW&WW]

I have always used my credit card and paid it off in full every month. I have never left a balance. When I got my credit checked for my house my scores were 806,799,783. I have read/been told to increase your score you should leave a certain percentage but I never liked or wanted to do that and paying it off in full obviously worked for me. I didn't like the idea of purposely leaving myself in debt. I think the leave a balance was a myth by the banks to gain more $ off interest. If everyone in the country thinks its a good idea to leave a couple hundred- couple thousand balance, the bank makes a ton of interest $ on that.

Leaving a balance is not what I was talking about. I'm talking about not exceeding a percentage of your maximum balance.

 

[SevenSamurai]

Credit agencies make up these rules to encourage you to go into debt.

-like if you don't leave a decent balance on your credit from month to month it will hurt your overall credit because you are not demonstrating that you can pay interest

haha what a great business -give me your money even when you don't want to or I will hurt you.


Don't play their game -pay it off monthly, and have it for emergency access and for the ability to finance a house.

 

[seamus1979]

my credit got fucked up a few years ago and im working hard to build it up again.
my daughter died and i had a bit of a breakdown which lasted a few months.
i had money in the bank so all my bills where paid apart from one small loan which i paid over the phone.
once i got my head back together i went through the mountain of mail by my door and found out i had missed 3 payments and defaulted on my loan.
i rang up the bank and paid the sum in full and explained what had happened but they refused to wipe the default.
its a big black mark against me that will last six years. in all my life i have never paid a bill late but one black mark against you can fuck you up.

 

[RerouteToRemain]

Leaving a balance is not what I was talking about. I'm talking about not exceeding a percentage of your maximum balance.

Was just chiming in on a couple things like leaving a balance is bullshit imo. To your point I have made many big purchases maxing out my limit and paying it off before it is due. I always pay it in full and usually well before it is due. Idk I don't really watch what my credit does and I didn't know how good it was before the credit check on the house. I some times spend a couple hundred or max it out but I always pay it off immediately. I guess I'm not that helpful towards your question but in my experience paying it off in full early every month worked well.

 

[Henry Swanson]

my credit got fucked up a few years ago and im working hard to build it up again.
my daughter died and i had a bit of a breakdown which lasted a few months.
i had money in the bank so all my bills where paid apart from one small loan which i paid over the phone.
once i got my head back together i went through the mountain of mail by my door and found out i had missed 3 payments and defaulted on my loan.
i rang up the bank and paid the sum in full and explained what had happened but they refused to wipe the default.
its a big black mark against me that will last six years. in all my life i have never paid a bill late but one black mark against you can fuck you up.

I have nothing to add to your credit situation, but I just want to extend my sympathies to you for the loss of your daughter.

 

[Henry Swanson]

Was just chiming in on a couple things like leaving a balance is bullshit imo. To your point I have made many big purchases maxing out my limit and paying it off before it is due. I always pay it in full and usually well before it is due. Idk I don't really watch what my credit does and I didn't know how good it was before the credit check on the house. I some times spend a couple hundred or max it out but I always pay it off immediately. I guess I'm not that helpful towards your question but in my experience paying it off in full early every month worked well.

I've heard that before, about how you should carry a balance each month and NOT pay in full or else your credit score will get hit. I was never comfortable with that so I've always paid in full.

I actually make payments every week so that my balance never gets out of hand.

 

[MC3521]

So I've read from a few online sources that the major credit raters doc off points if you spend money on your card till you've reached your credit limit. They suggest you always float around a certain percentage (say 25%) of your credit limit to avoid this.

I was wondering, if I pay off my credit line earlier than it's due date, is it safe to keep spending up to 25% multiple times a month? Or should I only spend 25% of my credit line per month, regardless of if I've paid it off or not.

I know the credit bureaus don't release their methods so no one really knows for sure. Just trying to see if there's a consensus out there.

This is your main issue. Please ask a qualified financial adviser.

 

[HIMBOB]

I have never seen nor heard of this 25% of limit theory before.

Someone mentioned getting a good credit rating with a home loan in mind.
I do know this, for every $1,000 of credit limit you have (current balance irrvelevant) they will reduce the amount you can borrow by $4,000 to 5,000, not much on a $1,000 limit card, but say you have a $20,000 limit, it could reduce the amount you can borrow by up to $100,000.

Personally I have worked many cards up to max, and sometimes over (but never over for long), I repay at least double the minimum payment each month (average would 4 or 5x), I have done many credit card balance transfers for honeymoon rates (I am usually paying less on credit card debt than I would for a home loan) and I have always been approved for more credit*.

* The only time I was declined credit was after I tried to get a loan for a car that was overpriced, had pooor resale, was unreliable as hell, yeap an Alfa.
Anyway I did get approved by a few places but the rate was so high I tried to find better many times.
I believe the sheer number of credit applications hurt my credit rating.

But that was a few years ago and I am back to getting approved for whatever I apply for.

 

[HIMBOB]

That said, I used to read those Credit Forums and some of the people on there were rolling 20+ cards. They didn't carry any balances but holy shit, that's a lot of eye weal notices.

Assuming most have an annual fee in excess of $50, that is $1,000+ wasted.

If I say someone doing that I wouldn't lend them money, they are clearly an idiot.

 

[zackryder]

best way to improve ur credit is to hit 30% of ur max every month

then pay only the minimum balance. paying off ur credit score completely will NOT improve ur credit unless u just began and have no credit

safest way is to have multiple credit cards. (about 5-10 in use)

 

[Henry Swanson]

Assuming most have an annual fee in excess of $50, that is $1,000+ wasted.

If I say someone doing that I wouldn't lend them money, they are clearly an idiot.

I think for the people that have that many cards, a good chunk of them are dept. store cards that they've signed up for "to save an additional 10% at the register."

 

[RSmith47]

Building credit is one of the biggest misconceptions people have. There are still tons of people that think carrying a balance on your credit card is good for building credit. Which is just ass backwards. Not being able to pay your bills is not how loan officers deem you safe to loan money to.

All you have to do to build credit is just purchase whatever with your credit card and then pay it off before the end of the month. Don't worry about percentages, carrying balances etc. You can build enough credit to buy a house by buying Snickers bars with your credit card and paying them off at the end of the month. It doesn't matter. Just have 1 card. You don't need multiple cards and you don't need to be financing anything to build credit.

The only way your credit will take a hit is by late payments and using your credit to take out another loan.

Honestly the only time anyone should ever take out a loan is to buy a house. Everyone needs a home and they're too expensive to just buy outright for 99% of us out there.

 

[BJ@LW&WW]

best way to improve ur credit is to hit 30% of ur max every month

then pay only the minimum balance. paying off ur credit score completely will NOT improve ur credit unless u just began and have no credit

safest way is to have multiple credit cards. (about 5-10 in use)

that sounds like bad advice bro.

 

[Noxab]

I screwed myself over pretty hard when I was younger. Maxxed out 4 credit cards and didn't make payments on time for a long time. Lowest I got was around a 450. Finally smartened up paid that shit and been on time for the last fee years and while I'm still onthe low end ~700 its going up slowly but surely.

 

[SammyPops]

Not really going to answer your question, but I was at a dinner party, and one women there works in this kind of thing, and she said one of the worst thing you can do is miss paying a bill twice in a row.

 

[HIMBOB]

Not really going to answer your question, but I was at a dinner party, and one women there works in this kind of thing, and she said one of the worst thing you can do is miss paying a bill twice in a row.

Very believable simply because that just makes perfect logical sense.

If I was lending people money and they failed to make one payment, ok this is not good, but two in a row =never lending money to them again.


On that I will say one thing, if you are totally unable to make a payment call them and tell them, often they will just thanks for letting us know, sometimes you will pay a small fine sometimes not, BUT they will not mark your debt as deliquent (which hammers your credit rating).


Oh and last one, dispute any late charges.
I have been charged late fees for missed payments because I paid off the money before the due date and thus made no payment later, so they charged me a like $20-$40 fee, dispute it and they will waive it. If not leave that company.

I have been charged a small fee like this upwards of 20 in my life for all manner of minor issues, too early, day late, etc etc I have only once been actually made to pay the fee and I cancelled that card 3 days later and got a new one.

I once got charged a $45 fee because I made a minimum payment of say $200.00 when the minimum payment was $200.53, I called said WTF and they apologised and waived it.

 

[Naramie]

Don't carry a balance pay it off at the end of the month. NEVER EVER carry a balance unless you have one of those 0% interest cards but even then be careful of how much you put on there because if you don't pay attention to it and aren't paying it off during that time, you're going to be screwed when the introductory rates end.

Pay off everything at the end of the month, if you can't afford to pay it off at the end of the month or it will cause a burden doing so, then you shouldn't buy it or if anything save up some money.