Credit and Credit Scores

As you know, credit is a huge part of mortgage lending.  Credit scores directly determine qualification and costs of obtaining financing.

If you don’t know about your credit, take advantage of the free credit report that we all can receive once a year.  These reports don’t include scores (you have to pay for them) but you use them to make sure there is no wrong information on your credit, and if so, you can take steps to correct them.  This is why it is so important to check your credit well in advance of considering a home purchase.  Call me early and we’ll map out a plan, check your credit, and work together on cleaning up any issues we can.  Sometimes the credit repair process can take a few months or more.

As mentioned, consumers can buy their credit scores. If you choose to do so, just make sure you get the scores used by the mortgage industry.  It seems like the scores you get for free are consumer scores and are not recognized in obtaining financing for real estate (just to make things more confusing).

As always, give me a call and we can talk about it all.