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We paid off $10k of credit card debt a few months ago. I'd like to check and see what impact this has had on my credit score. What's the best way to do this? Just order one of the $19.95 reports from this site? Which one of the three is best to check? Score Watch would give me a free check, but it does not seem to be very easy to cancel.
Scores were 720 before, so hoping for enough to jump up to Excellent range.
Also, moving forward, what's the best strategy to maintain a good score, but use the cards as little as possible?
Can I just choose one of the cards each month and charge a small amount and then pay it off (all at once or over time??). We have four total. If each is used once every 2-3 months, is that good enough?
Thanks!
@salsa34 wrote:We paid off $10k of credit card debt a few months ago. I'd like to check and see what impact this has had on my credit score. What's the best way to do this? Just order one of the $19.95 reports from this site? Which one of the three is best to check? Score Watch would give me a free check, but it does not seem to be very easy to cancel.
Scores were 720 before, so hoping for enough to jump up to Excellent range.
Also, moving forward, what's the best strategy to maintain a good score, but use the cards as little as possible?
Can I just choose one of the cards each month and charge a small amount and then pay it off (all at once or over time??). We have four total. If each is used once every 2-3 months, is that good enough?
Thanks!
There is a discount promo code that's available:
E1308BDY20FST
Gives you 20% off the price, so all 3 would be ~$45
Thanks for the code! If I just order one, which one should I choose?
@salsa34 wrote:If each is used once every 2-3 months, is that good enough?
Each issuer can have differing activity requirements. Verify with the issuers.
If your intent is to order only one then the EQ report provided here is the FICO score that lenders normally use. Do you have a monitoring service that allows you to check all three reports on at least a monthly basis? Don't concern yourself with scores from these services but once we have good credit it is often a wise idea to monitor our reports to ensure that no false negative information gets in and regular creditors are reporting correctly.
As far as your four credit cards go, using them every couple of months should be enough activity to keep them open, just be aware that some issuers are more sensitive to non-use than others. The members on the Credit Card forum can guide you if you tell them what specific cards you have.
For best scoring you would want to let one of the four cards report a small (less than 9%) balance each month and the other 3 be $0. You need to know the statement date that the card reports to the credit bureaus. Then you can pay the remaining balance before the due date to avoid incurring interest charges. There are a lot of discussions in the forums about maximizing credit scoring if you are interested. A simple search will turn up most of them.
Congrats on your financial achievements and great credit responsibility.