PSA

[desh]

About a year ago, the US government passed a law mandating that everyone be able to receive a credit report at least once a year from each of the three main credit bureaus, free of charge. This law was to be phased in over time.

As of 3 days ago, the Northeast part of the country was added, and now everyone is eligible.

Do yourself a favor and double-check your credit, now that there's no reason not to. Head to http://www.annualcreditreport.com (the official site; the bureaus are allowed to charge you if you try to get your credit report through any other means), pick your favorite bureau, and make sure there's nothing in your report that you weren't expecting. You can do this every 4 months if you pick a different bureau each time, or every year if you want to do all 3 at once. It's worth 10 minutes for the peace of mind.

I'm going to stop sounding like a spam email now. Goodbye.

Comments

[pkzimmer.livejournal.com]

Actually, there is a reason not to. Having your credit report checked too often will lower your credit score.

[desh]

Certain types of checks, yes. If you attempt to get credit from a company, and they check your report to see if you're eligible, that can potentially lower your credit score. (That's called a "hard" credit check.) (And hard checks from insurance companies generally don't hurt your score, I don't think; just every other type of company.) When a company checks your score on their own in order to send you junk mail (a "soft" check), it doesn't hurt your score. And when you obtain your credit report yourself for informative purposes, like this, your score will be unaffected.

[pkzimmer.livejournal.com]

ok cool. I didn't know there was a difference between hard and soft checks.

Thanks for the info.