These days just about everyone is checking credit. Credit card companies check credit before giving
you a credit card. Banks check credit before giving you a loan. Even employers check credit before
giving you a job. Sadly, bad credit can leave you jobless and homeless. The good news is, a bad credit
history can be fixed.

Order Your Credit Report and Score

The first step in credit repair is ordering your credit report. Your credit report contains a detailed history
of all your credit accounts, including balance and payment history. You’ll need your credit report to figure
out what needs to be repaired.

Three major credit bureaus – Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion – collect and compile your credit
information into credit reports. You can order a copy of your personal credit report from any (or all) of
these credit bureaus.

You’ve likely seen offers for a free credit report online. However, most of these offers require you to sign
up for a paid subscription for another service.

Fortunately, the federal government gives you the right to a free annual credit report that has no strings
attached. You can access this credit report via www.annualcreditreport.com. Each year, you’re able to
access one credit report from each of the credit bureaus.

The information in your credit report is given a number based on how good or
bad it is. This number is your credit score. The government has not made a law
that will allow you a free credit score. So, if you’d like to know your credit report
score, you will have to purchase it. Your credit score isn’t necessary for
repairing your credit, but it can help you gauge how bad (or good) your credit is.

Get Rid of Bad Information

Once you have your credit report, review it carefully. Look for anything that’s
wrong with your report, like accounts that don’t belong to you or payments
reported late that were actually made on time. If you find anything wrong on your
credit report, dispute it with the credit bureau issuing the report. Instructions for
making disputes will be included with your credit report.

When you make a credit report dispute, the credit bureau must investigate your
claim and remove the information from your report if it’s indeed wrong. Getting
this incorrect information taken off your credit report is one of the easiest ways
to improve your credit.

Past due accounts and high balances are two of the most damaging things to
your credit. Next, you need to get current on your accounts and pay your
balances down. Based on your budget, you can figure out the best way to take
care of your past due accounts. It’s best to get first get current on past due
accounts, then pay down your high balances.

Seek Professional Help

Many people have a hard time figuring out how to best pay off credit card debt.
Using a non profit consumer credit counseling service can help in this situation.
A credit counselor works with you to figure out how much you can afford to pay
on your debt each month. Then, based on what you can afford, the counselor
contacts each of your creditors and negotiates a lower interest rate and monthly
payment.

Another alternative for paying off your creditors is using bad credit debt consolidation. Consolidation
involves using a loan to repay your debts, then making a single monthly payment toward that new loan.
Debt consolidation can improve your credit immediately because all your bad accounts are brought
current and below their limits at a single time.

In your quest for better credit, you might consider credit repair services. These businesses make
tempting promises, but often have dishonest practices for repairing credit. The Federal Trade
Commission, whose mission is to protect consumers, says that it has not yet seen a legitimate credit
repair service. Not only that, the FTC receives the most complaints about credit repair scams. It’s in your
best interest not to waste your time or money with a credit repair service.

Wait For the Results

You can ruin your credit in just a few short months, but repairing it can take much longer. Your credit will
improve as you start replacing the negative information on your credit report with positive information.

This article was submitted by Robert Valentine of Financial and Retirement Management.Robert Valentine is a well-known expert in the matters concerning investors. His articles on financial planning matters that concern investors have been published by several publications throughout the United States.