It’s the Catch 22 of a global recession: people are taking hits on their credit rating due to being laid off, while more companies are asking to see credit reports before they hire someone.

Your FICO score is more than just a credit score – it can have a big effect on areas of your life that, at first glance, completely unrelated to it. No, it’s not just your …

There’s this pervasive myth going around that paying off your credit card balance in full each month will score you points (literally) with TransUnion, Equifax and Experian. The fact of the matter is that it …

Those hooky satire songs from FreeCreditReport.com hide a dark secret. First of all, that dude is a French-Canadian, so he probably doesn’t even have a credit history in the U.S., and to make matters worse, …

If you’ve ever signed up for a free credit report, you’ve likely been pitched on TransUnion Credit Monitoring. Like most people, I declined this option and opted instead to save my $11.95 a month. But …

Thanks to a new 5-day Free Trial offer, you can now get a free credit report from SmartCredit.com. In addition to a rundown on your credit history, SmartCredit.com offers you tools for monitoring your …

In the third and final part of this series on getting your free credit report without the not-so-free extras, we’ll be looking at Equifax, one of the trickier credit reporting agencies.
1. Begin by signing onto …

GoFreeCredit.com is another vendor that offers you a free credit report when you sign up for their credit monitoring service. This credit monitoring service is $14.95 a month – but as long as you cancel …

In part two of our series, we’ll be showing you how to pull your credit report from Experian without accidentally signing up for any subscriptions (check out Part one – Transunion). That is, we’ll be …

Repairing your credit isn’t easy and it isn’t fun, I should know. But, it’s possible to do if you have the patience and will to get it done.
Why Bother?
I’ve had a number of clients over …

Those songs from a certain misleading ad campaign sure are catchy – and I don’t just mean that their melodies are hooky and infectious. The main catch from this supposed freebie website  (which shall …

Canceling a credit card may seem like the best option, especially if you don’t use it very often- but doing so can lower your credit score. Here are six reasons why you might want to …

The precise formula that credit reporting agencies use to determine your credit score is as elusive as Google’s PageRank algorithm. But there are some things we consumers understand well about the factors that go into …

Last year I made a bunch of New Year’s resolutions and by the end of January I had broken pretty much every single one of them. And you know what? 2008 wasn’t half bad. Even …