4 Ways to Boost Your Credit Score Today

You have decided you want to buy a house. But you’re not quite sure if your credit score will impress your lender.
Here are 4 quick and easy ways to boost your credit – fast!

1. Pay Down Your Credit Card Balances
   Paying down your debt is the biggest and fastest way to see impact on your credit. The more credit you have open or available the better.  Make sure you pay down your credit cards before your creditor reports to the credit scoring company. Not sure when your creditors report? You could call and ask them or you can keep checking your credit report each month. Having open credit but paid up credit counts for about 30% of your score.
2. Get Your Bills Current
   You probably realize that you have to pay your bills on time to get a good score. If you’re less than 30 days late and you can make the payment today you should do it. Creditors don’t usually report until after the 30-day mark. If you get your bills up- to- date now, it still might take one to two months to improve your credit score.
3. Open A New Account
   Opening a new credit account can help in two ways:
   It increases your total outstanding credit line.
   2. If you only have one type of credit card or small loan, opening another type can help your “credit mix”.
   But don’t go overboard and keep those balances paid off each month. It will take about 1-6 weeks to affect your credit score.
4. Become Authorized User
   Do you have a partner or family member who would be willing to make you an authorized user on one of their accounts? Make sure they have good credit history. The full history of their account will show up on your credit report almost immediately.

For all first-time homebuyers a good credit score will be essential to ensure getting the mortgage amount you want. Take the advice above and be patient while you watch your credit score go up each month.