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Shopping Around For a Loan
- - Lavonna C. Speck

Before you take out a loan, it’s a good idea to shop around with a few lenders to make sure you’re get the best loan deals.

Check Your Credit
First, consider your credit history. It’s always a good idea to check your credit report and credit score before you shop for a loan. That way, you can gauge your likelihood of getting approved without actually applying for the loan. Each loan application puts a credit-score damaging inquiry on your credit report and can hurt your chances of getting a subsequent application approved. Check your credit report for any errors and dispute them before putting in your loan application. Make sure you’re current on all your accounts, even debt collections, to improve your chances at getting improved.

Find Out the Cost
Get the cost information – interest rates and fees. As you discuss the loan with a loan officer, make sure you completely understand the cost of the loan. The Truth in Lending Act requires lenders to give you a disclosure that outlines the interest rate and fees of the loan. It will include details about the annual percentage rate (APR), finance charge, amount financed, and total payments by the end of the loan. Each of those factors is important. Look for a low interest rate loan with a low total payment amount.

Know the Life and Payment Amounts of the Loan
Get the length of the loan and monthly payments. It’s important to know how long you’ll be paying on the loan and how much you’ll be paying each month. You want to afford your monthly payments, but keep in mind the lower your payments, the longer you’ll pay on the loan, and the more you’ll pay in interest charges.

Get Loan Quotes
Compare quotes from different banks. Don’t stop at a quote from a single bank. Chances are, there’s a better deal out there, but you don’t know until you look. Get quotes from at least three different banks and compare the terms of each. Unless you’re shopping for a mortgage, you should do your loan shopping as quickly as possible. Mortgage loan applications made within 30-45 days won’t affect your credit score, but other loan applications will hurt your score as soon as the inquiries appear on your credit report. You can always explain away inquiries by letting lenders know you’re shopping around. If you have a solid credit score, additional inquiries might not hurt too much.

Negotiate the Best Loan Terms
Negotiate a better deal. If you like a bank, but don’t like part of the deal you’ve been offered, try to negotiate a better one. It’s easier to negotiate if you have good credit and a steady income on your side. Let the loan officer know you’re looking for the best deal. Don’t be afraid to turn down a loan offer that is outside your price range.

Loan Discrimination is Illegal
Lenders must give your loan application fair consideration. The Equal Credit Opportunity Act, a federal law, prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, age, participation on a public assistance program, or exercising rights under the Consumer Credit Protection Act. If your loan application is denied, the lender should send you a letter letting you know why. You may be able to fix the reasons and reapply.…

Long Loan Shopping Could Hurt Your Credit Score
- - Lavonna C. Speck

It’s a good idea to shop around for a loan to make sure you get the best terms and even better the lowest interest rate. But, loan shopping could hurt your credit score.

An inquiry is placed on your credit report each time a lender checks your credit history to qualify you for a loan. Your credit report is a compilation of most of your credit and loan accounts and is the key factor used to determine your credit score. Credit inquiries count for 10% of your overall credit score. Each additional inquiry can knock your credit score down a few points, affecting your ability to qualify for another loan.

The model for the FICO score – the most well-known and widely-used credit score – helps protect you from the impact of rate shopping for mortgage and auto loans. The scoring model essentially ignores inquiries made within a 30-day window while you’re rate shopping. So, if you find a loan during that time, your lenders never know you’ve been putting in loan applications all over town. Even after the 30-day “grace period” is up, all the inquiries you’ve made are treated as just one inquiry when your credit score is updated.

The FICO score calculation has been updated a few times over the years, so the length of the grace period depends which credit score calculator your lender’s using. One model has a 14-day grace period, another uses 30-days, and the newest model uses a 45-day time span.

It’s important to note that the loan-shopping grace period for credit report inquiries only applies to mortgage and auto loans. If you’re shopping for another kind of loan, you don’t get the convenience of hidden inquiries. When you’re on the market for a personal or student loan, your best bet is to find a loan within a few days before the credit report inquiry makes it to your credit report. Otherwise, your credit score will feel the full brunt of your rate shopping. Then again, inquiries only count for 10% of your overall score, so they couldn’t hurt that much, could they?…

Remove and keep inaccurate items out of your credit report
- - Lavonna C. Speck

You must remove old or inaccurate items from your credit report and keep monitoring your credit report to keep it clean.

For a Powerful One-Time Upgrade of Your Credit Report

Did you know that 4 out of 5 people have at least one inaccurate item on their credit report? You need help to eliminate any inaccurate items on your credit report.

Errors on your credit report can have a significant and troubling impact on your life. Among other things, you may be denied a mortgage, car loan, credit card or even employment because of these errors. But you do have rights to get your credit report cleaned up.

Monitor Your Credit Report to Keep it Clean

After you get your credit score under control, you’ll want to monitor your credit report for any changes that could affect your credit score.

– Receive weekly email alerts to changes in your report
– Immediately find out about credit report changes including fraudulent activity, new inquiries, new accounts, late payments, and more
– Receive a brand new credit report four times per year
– Receive updated credit scores four times per year that includes personalized analysis with tips for improving your score
– Graphical trending helps you manage your progress

Try the 30-day trial credit monitoring. It can help you keep your credit report clean.…

Clean up your credit report
- - Lavonna C. Speck

But, there are steps you can take to clean up your credit report, and then keep it clean.

Become a Good Credit Risk
To clean up your credit report you must begin to pay your bills on time. Don’t use charge cards unless you can always make the required payments on time.

If you have a credit card debt problem there are some steps you can take to get your finances back in balance:

– Pay down debt on credit cards you’ve maxed out in order to reduce your ratio of debt to borrowing power.

– Reduce your overall debt–especially high interest credit cards.

– If your home has more value than your current debt load think seriously about transferring high interest debt to a lower interest consolidation loan

– Make your rent or mortgage payments on time

– Think differently while shopping using these tips for spending money wisely

– Establish a personal budget

– Obtain guaranteed Master card to establish good track record…

Why do you say “Clean up my credit report”?
- - Lavonna C. Speck

Millions of people need to clean up their credit report to improve their credit score.

Easy Credit Our commercial filled, easy credit society has encouraged too many people to spend beyond their means to pay for their purchases. Many people do not even think about the price of an item; they only wonder if they can make the payments.

After too many credit card purchases, their minimum payment requirements exceed their ability to pay.

When your bills are not paid on time notations are made in your credit report and your credit score suffers.
Identity Theft Because dishonest people want things they cannot afford, they steal identities of innocent victims. These criminals then use the good credit ratings of others and go on a spending spree.

Their philosophy is, “Buy Now, Pay Never!”

The result is that innocent people spend months or years trying to redeem their good names, not to mention correcting their credit reports and improving their credit scores.

If you are a victim you can see how you can help prevent future identity theft and help free yourself from unauthorized charges made to your credit cards at Identity Theft Help and Prevention.…