Checking Credit Score

[Chala]

I am sure this topic was covered but whats the best and least expensive way to check my credit score?

[Anonymous]

CreditCheckTotal has a $1 intro offer. You get true Fico 8 scores for all three bureaus. You also receive the 3 reports for all three bureaus. You can cancel within 7 days to not have to pay the monthly fee. 

[Anonymous]

I agree with the above reply regarding credit check total if you are looking for all three of your FICO 08s.  You did however say credit "score" (singular) and if you're looking for "cheapest" there's an option for $0 rather than $1 which is through discover.com / creditscorecard.  You'll only get 1 score this way instead of the 3 from CCT, but it will be a genuine FICO 08 score from Experian data.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I agree with the above reply regarding credit check total if you are looking for all three of your FICO 08s.  You did however say credit "score" (singular) and if you're looking for "cheapest" there's an option for $0 rather than $1 which is through discover.com / creditscorecard.  You'll only get 1 score this way instead of the 3 from CCT, but it will be a genuine FICO 08 score from Experian data.

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Great Point BBS. Thanks!

[Chala]

my apology i meant, scores/reports, and thats only one time, how often is it recommened to check? thanks for responses

[Anonymous]

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@Chala wrote:

my apology i meant, scores/reports, and thats only one time, how often is it recommened to check? thanks for responses

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Hi Chala, if you want all of your scores then creditchecktotal.com is probably what you want. Like I said before it is $1. And then you can cancel within the 7 days. Some myFico members actually redo the $1 trial with creditchecktotal as often as once per month or every two months or something like that. But, I decided to keep my subscription to creditchecktotal and I check it quite frequently for experian and once per month for Equifax and Transunion. 

[Anonymous]

You are getting some great advice from folks here.

One thing you will want to do is to balance at least three different things against each other.  The three that come to my mind immediately are simplicity vs. cost vs. comprehesiveness.

If a zero cost solution is preferred, let the folks here know and we can give you one.  The likely recommendation would be getting a free FICO 8 monthly Experian score, some tools that will give you free monthly credit reports from all three bureaus, and some tools that will give you free Vantage 3 scores from all three bureaus.  Or you can avail yourself of the $1 Credt Check Total offer and then cancel -- perhaps twice a year, three times a year, whatever.  There are many approaches that are zero or ultra low cost.

If you are fine paying $15 per month for Credit Check Total, that has a real nice simplicity aspect to it.  You will get free monthly FICO 8 scores and credit reports from all three bureaus, and I think you'll get Experian updates on a daily basis rather than monthly.  There's a "one stop shop" quality to that approach and you don't ever have to think about cancelling.

The most comprehensive solution would be myFICO.  I think they have a new package now that gives you about two dozen different scores once a month and a monthly 3B credit report for about $50 a month.  Contributor SouthJamaica is a subscriber to that I believe as are others.

[Anonymous]

PS.  A really important thing for a person who is new to the world of credit scores and credit reporting is learning how to pull his credit report (that's different from his credit score) and to do so fairly often.  In your early stages you need to be going over all three reports (Equifax, Experian, TransUnion) every month and becoming very confident at reading them and understanding every piece of them.

[Chala]

@ItsPossible thanks for that info, but creditchecktotal allows you to do multiple trails? That is rare with websites.

@CreditGuyInDixie thank you i can definitely do the $15.00 a month with Creditchecktotal, however don't multiple credit checks hurt your score?

[Anonymous]

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@Chala wrote:

@Anonymous thanks for that info, but creditchecktotal allows you to do multiple trails? That is rare with websites.

@Anonymous thank you i can definitely do the $15.00 a month with Creditchecktotal, however don't multiple credit checks hurt your score?

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No, there is no penalty for pulling your credit reports and/or score, when it is requested by the consumer.  You could pull your scores and reports once a day (365 times a year) and there would be no scoring penalty.

CCT is odd that way, but apparently you can sign up for their $1 trial. get your scores, then cancel.  And do that (say) four times a year.  Each time it costs you $1.  That surprised me too, but hey whatever.

The key thing is that you are fine with $15 a month.  One of the folks on this thread can give you the lowdown on how to get the special $15 rate.  I think you have to sign up for the $1 trial, call in to cancel on day 6 or 7, then allow them to offer you to stay on at $15/month.  One of the folks here will know how that works.