Your credit score is an important number. Do you know yours? It is a number that ranges from 350 to 850. The higher your number, the better rates you’ll receive on loans, and vice versa.
Why is this number so important? Let’s do the math.
If you have a high credit score, and have a $200,000, 15 year mortgage at 4% interest. You are looking at paying a monthly principal and interest payment of $1480.
If you have a low credit score, with the same $200,000, 15 year mortgage, but at a rate of 8%, your monthly payment will end up being $1911. That is $431 more that you are having to pay per month, which adds up to more than $75,000 over the life of the loan. So, the higher your score, the more money you save on loans!
Since your score is so important, we will give it to members of the credit union for free.
SavvyMoney
When you log into your online banking, you now have instant access to your credit score and credit report, along with personalized tips on how to improve or maintain your score.
This new tool breaks down and grades each section of your report on payment history, credit usage, total balances, credit age, and recent credit. SavvyMoney tells you why your grade is what it is and how to improve it to increase your score.
Free Credit Score & Report
Checking daily, weekly, or monthly won’t hurt your score! You can log in anytime to see your personalized tips for credit score improvement, find out what you’re doing well, and what needs to change.
How to improve a credit score
Our new credit score tool can help you learn more about improving your score. This beneficial tool also has a section of advice and information from financial expert, Jean Chatzky.
A few tips to get you started:
- Payment History: Pay your bills on time.
- Credit Usage: Don’t keep a high balance on credit cards. Also don’t open new cards just to increase your available limit.
- Total Balances: Keep a diverse mix of debt accounts. A mix of installment and revolving accounts is better than having only one type of debt.
- Credit Age: Don’t open too many accounts too quickly. Keep your oldest account open, if you can. Also, don’t close unused cards.
- Recent Credit: Do not open too many accounts in a short span.