How to Build Credit
Practical, low-risk ways to build and strengthen your credit over time.
How you actually build credit
Building credit comes down to showing, over time, that you handle borrowed money responsibly. There's no shortcut, but there's no mystery either.
3 min read
How credit utilization works (and why it matters so much)
Credit utilization is the share of your available credit you're using: your balances divided by your limits. It's one of the biggest factors in a score, and unlike most things, you can change it fast.
5 min read
How to build credit from scratch (when you have no credit history)
You build credit from scratch by getting one or two accounts that report to the credit bureaus and paying them on time. A FICO score generally becomes available once you've had an account open about six months and reported within the last six months; there's no universal number it starts at, and some other models may score you sooner.
5 min read
Does debt consolidation help or hurt your credit score?
Debt consolidation usually causes a small, short-term dip in your credit score (a hard inquiry plus a new account), and it may then improve some scores if it materially lowers your revolving credit card balances.
5 min read
You fixed your credit score, now what?
Keeping a good score is a different job than fixing one, and honestly an easier one. Once your reports are clean, your score is maintained by a handful of boring habits: every bill on time, credit card balances kept low, old accounts left open, and a periodic check of your reports for new errors.
5 min read