FICO high achievers

FICO high achievers have

- Their oldest accounts is 19 years old.

- The average age of their accounts is between 6 and 12 years.

- opened their most recent account 27 months ago.

Opening new credit account or short credit history will hurt your FICO score.

- 93% of them have no missed payments at all. But of those who do, the missed payment happened nearly 4 years ago.

Missing payment will hurt your FICO score.

- Ratio of their revolving balances to their credit limits is 7%.

Too many credit cards carrying balances or heavy usage of your credit will hurt your FICO score.

myFICO packages

From msufcu.com

Whether you're applying for a mortgage, auto loan or credit card, banks use your FICO scores to base the approval and determine what interest rate you'll pay.

You have 3 FICO scores, one for each credit bureau - Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion; and you can purchase them from myFICO.com.

Choose the package that best suits your needs:

FICO Standard - $15.95 / each score.
Receive your individual FICO scores and credit reports from Equifax, Experian or TransUnion.

FICO Deluxe - $47.85 or $42.84/year.
Perfect for first-time users. Purchase all three of your current FICO scores.

Suze Orman's FICO Kit Platinum - $49.95.
Designed for those who want tips on how to improve their scores. Receive your three FICO scores and Suze Orman's FICO kit.

Score Watch - $8.95/month (minimum 3 months) or $89.95/year.
Monitors your credit file at Equifax on a daily basis and your FICO score on a weekly basis. Each year, you will have 2 Score Power reports that include your score and credit report.

Please note that you don't have unlimited retrieving of your FICO score and your credit report in all the packages from myFICO.

You have 4 credit scores

This article reported that there are 4 credit scores on your creditworthiness.

You'll be best served by getting the credit score that your lenders are most likely to see.

1) FICO

Created by The Fair Isaac Corporation, your FICO score can range between 300 and 850 - the higher, the better.

You can buy your FICO scores directly from myFICO.com, the consumer division of FairIsaac. You can also get your FICO score based on your Equifax report either from Equifax's Web site or when you request your Equifax report through annualcreditreport.com.

Experian and TransUnion, however, do not sell FICO scores to consumers, only to lenders who request them.

2) VantageScore

Introduced last year by the three credit bureaus as a direct competitor to FICO. It is the default score sold to consumers by Experian and TransUnion, either through their Web sites or via annualcreditreport.com.

Your VantageScore can range between 501 and 990 - the higher the better. In addition, your score is assigned a letter grade (e.g., an "A" is for scores between 901 and 990; an "F" is for scores between 501 and 600).

3) TransUnion's TruCredit score

This is a proprietary score from TransUnion that you can't buy alone but it's included when you purchase the bureau's 3-in-1 credit monitoring service.

4) Experian's PLUS score

This is a FICO-like proprietary score from Experian that you can't purchase alone, but it comes with your purchase of other Experian credit products such as its Experian Credit Report and Score.

Credit report freeze

A security freeze lets you stop anyone from getting credit in your names.

It locks, or freezes, access to your credit report and credit score. Without this information, a business will not issue new credit to anyone under your names.

When you want to get new credit, you may use a PIN to unlock access to the credit file.

However, not all states give us this important weapon to prevent identity theft!

Boost your credit score

Source: Money.com

Your total balance should not exceed 30 percent of your total credit limit across all your credit cards.

The bigger your balance as a percent of your credit limit , the lower your score will be.

Consider increasing your credit limit by open a few more credit cards but use them sparingly.

However, newer credit accounts may lower your score in the short term.

Don't close any unused older credit accounts.

Closing accounts would lower your total credit limit; and older accounts count more than newer ones in your credit score.

Don’t send in your loan or credit card payments late.

On average past delinquencies that were resolved might still cost you 15 to 20 points of credit score.

Order a free credit report once a year from each of the three major credit bureaus, and make sure they're accurate.

Order a report from one of the three credit bureaus every four months. Free report by going to annualcreditreport.com or calling 877-322-8228.