After two days of learning about credit reports and credit scores, the time has come to find your number. Unlike the sleep number, this is a number that can have a real impact to your financial life today and in the future. Start by pointing your browser to creditkarma.com. From there, click on the Get Started for FREE link.
From there, fill out the secure form (make sure the top says https, not just http).
Now you are set, you just have to pull the score!
I know I just warned you all about how credit inquiries impact your score. What’s great about this is that it doesn’t count! This type of query is called a “soft hit”. A soft hit is similar to the credit check that companies do to check for your credit worthiness before sending you a pre-approval letter. Only “hard hits” count on your credit report and impact your score.
Credit Karma makes money from offers displayed on the page targeted to people with your credit score. Don’t sign up for the offers. In the last post I covered how new lines of credit hurt your score in the short run. If we are working on building our score, we don’t want to take any offers.
You can go back daily to update your score, but it will likely only change every month or so. Your score updates when banks report your updated credit history to the reporting company.
So, how is your score? Let us know in the comments. Want to make your score better? Subscribe to the Narrow Bridge RSS feed to get regular updates on personal finance including credit.
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