In an earlier post on simple things you could do to get in control of your finances the following was listed:
Know how lenders see you. Take seven minutes to download a free credit report at annualcreditreport.com. (For year-round monitoring, get a report from one of the three major credit bureaus every four months.) If you spot an error, notify the bureau (online, by phone or by mail) and the creditor (call and also send a letter). You won't find your credit score here, so when you request a report from Equifax, pay $7.95 for your FICO score, the most commonly used score. The range is 300 to 850 - 700 and above is good.
I won't go too far into the specifics of what is in a credit report. It's pretty self explanatory once you see one. The short version is that it is an identity thief's dream come true so be very careful with it. Don't go printing it out and leaving it in your car.
I looked mine over for anything unexpected and luckily there wasn't anything there that didn't make sense.
I then promptly put the credit report in the fireplace and burned it. Figured that when it comes to identity theft it's better safe than sorry.
It's good to know that getting an credit report can be done annually, easily, at no cost to me. I think I'll try to start checking my credit report at the beginning of each new year starting in 2009.
annualcreditreport.com
1 comment:
The strategy I use (which I read in Suze Orman's book) is to order one free credit report from each of the three agencies every four months. So, for example, you would order from Equifax in January, TransUnion in May, and Experian in September. Then start again in January. This way you can do your own credit report monitoring year-round for free.
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