Monday, June 05, 2006

My Home: Prepping My Credit Score

One of the first things you should do as you embark on the journey of buying a house is getting to know you're credit score. This will tell you if you are on track to get the best rates available. A score of 720 and above is considered to be in the upper tier, based on my meeting with the loan officer at my credit union, and you should have almost no problems getting the best rates with a score like that. I'm not sure if there are even better rates to be had if your score is, say, 800+, but it doesn't hurt. I'm know my Experian credit score is 762 right now, but I'm not sure about the other 2 credit agencies. My credit union told me that they take the 3 scores, and look at the middle score as the one they use to establish my loan. I'll have to work on that. In preparation, I've decided to limit my credit inquiries to only essentials. This means no more 0% credit cards for awhile. I'm also targetting January 07 as when I'll pay off a majority of my credit card debt, which is at 0% right now. One credit card has 0% set until midyear 07, so I won't pay off everything. My main goal is lower my debt to credit limit. Too high of a ration, hurts my credit score. So far, that's my only plans in place. I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to resist a two year 0% offer though!

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