It is extremely important to find out your credit score – this score is a based on your financial history and is a determining factor for various things such as:
- Renting or buying a home
- Buying a vehicle
- Requesting open credit
- Securing a loan or a mortgage
- and much more…
Recently I decided to get honest with myself and start the debt diet (as you all know); it’s been going swimmingly and I am proud of myself. I’ve been a spender all my life and never really valued money until I lived on my own; I was smacked with reality and needed to get out quick – I moved back with my parents and decided to get money smart for 2010.
I’ve checked my credit a couple of times in the past. This is also good because you can see if any one has opened any fraudulent accounts by stealing your identity. Nothing to report here!
I was petrified that my credit score would be in the crapper; I am happy to report that is is a great score. My credit ranks higher than 24.28% of the Canadian population; however, my creditworthiness is poor. There are a number of factors leading to this:
- My credit cards have a balance on each of them
- I have high interest rate credit cards (only one)
- I’ve closed four credit card accounts in the past (did you know this actually makes you take a hit on your credit score?! It’s absurd!)
- I have large loans (mainly student loans)
Thankfully I am taking the time to fix this problem before it gets more out of hand. I actually have to phone the credit score company to update a lot of stuff of the file; some of the personal information is outdated… it still has the address of my apartment on the file as my current address.
Checking my credit score and profile (I have 0 accounts that have been past due… EVAR!) has taken a huge weight off my shoulders. There still is a lot of work to be done, but I am so happy that my credit score hasn’t tanked to oblivion.
