credit web-sites oh my!!

RED PHOENIX NATION!!! It has been a while since I've last posted, life in the world of credit has been keeping me busy. Time for credit pulling web sites and my spin on them! I have chatted it up about this before, but it never seems to sink in. I'm going to give you my take and refresh my faithful about what they are and how or why to use them. First things first! REMEMBER, THERE ARE 3 MAJOR CREDIT BUREAUS!!! There are thousands of credit bureaus, but for lending purposes we deal with the BIG 3! Experian, Equifax, a.k.a CSC and Trans Union. I bring this up because most people I talk to only pull one bureau because they have to pay for the other two bureaus. That doesn't do a whole lot of good. FACT!!!! NOT ALL CREDITORS, COLLECTION AGENCIES OR PUBLIC RECORDS REPORT TO ALL THREE BUREAUS. If you pull one and think you're all fine and dandy then wonder what the heck happened when you tried to get a loan, its because lenders PULL ALL THREE BUREAUS! REPEAT, LENDERS PULL ALL THREE BUREAUS! Further more, if your purpose is to simply see your score because you want to buy a house or finance a car you need to know what you FICO SCORE IS. www.myfico.com is your resource for it. Buck up and pay for it friends. You buy beer, wine and latte's buy your credit report its $20. All those web sites that advertise every where you look are owned by one of the big three with the exception of www.myfico.com and from what I can tell credit karma. There might be more, but I honestly don't waste my time searching the web for all these sites. I have a handful I use and I use them for different reasons. WHY USE THEM IF THE SCORE ISN'T WHAT I NEED? Here is one reason: Typically you can get all three bureaus on a combined report and the information is typically accurate and they are inexpensive. I use them for that purpose, not score. I want the information, I want to see who is reporting to each bureau and to look for public records. (judgments, bankruptcy and tax liens) I want the information on one report and I want it cheap, so that's why I use it. I can usually estimate the FICO score off of this information, but I've looked at thousands and thousands of credit reports. That is why I use them and only for that purpose. If I feel someone is getting close to what they need to qualify for a mortgage I ALWAYS USE www.myfico.com If that is you, and you are wondering about your score and how close you are to getting a mortgage that is where you go. Lastly, you can also monitor your credit by using FICO's site. However, its not as elaborate as one of the other guys. Meaning you typically can't pull multiple fresh reports each month like you can using one of the other sites. I'll leave you with this my friends. Decide why your looking and what your intentions are when pulling your credit. Score, info or both? FICO does give you a credit report with your score but its separated onto different reports. Need help, have questions I'm always around.... john@redphoenixco.com www.redphoenixco.com