Who Uses Credcos Services
Credcos services are primarily used by mortgage lenders, but the company could also be on your report for other types of loan applications, like an auto loan or dealership, for instance.
Credco might also run a soft inquiry when you try to prequalify for a loan. Though it wont affect your score, you may still see Credco on your report when this happens.
Well break down the differences between soft and hard inquiries below.
A Comparison Of Hard Versus Soft Credit Inquiries
While creditors and other entities can check your credit report and score through either a hard or a soft credit inquiry, there are some key differences between these types of credit pulls.
First, different information may be shown in a hard versus soft credit inquiry. For example, a creditor or other entity performing a soft credit pull for promotional or marketing purposes will only be able to view a limited report. To obtain your full credit file, theyd have to use a hard credit inquiry.
Also, hard credit inquiries can have a negative effect on your credit by lowering your credit score. Even though soft inquiries are still noted on your credit report, these cannot lower your credit score nor do they show up as a negative on your credit report.
Finally, for a lender or a creditor to conduct a hard inquiry, you must first have granted them permission to do so. Therefore, if you discover a hard credit inquiry was conducted without your knowledge or permission, you can often dispute it.
What To Do If You Spot A Problem
If you cant trace the reason for a hard inquiry or you believe it was done without your consent, you can dispute it online. If the credit bureau cant confirm it as a legitimate inquiry, its required to remove it. Contact each credit bureau individually:
If you suspect fraud, you can have a fraud alert added to your credit reports, which flags applications in your name as requiring extra scrutiny. Alert any one credit reporting agency it will share information with the other two.
Or, for the best protection, simply freeze your credit with all three bureaus to stop anyone from opening new credit in your name.
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Lawsuit Or Judgment: Seven Years
Both paid and unpaid civil judgments used to remain on your credit report for seven years from the filing date in most cases. By April 2018, however, all three major credit agencies, Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, had removed all civil judgments from credit reports.
Limit the damage: Check your credit report to make sure the public records section does not contain information about civil judgments, and if it does appear, ask to have it removed. Also, be sure to protect your assets.
Next Steps: What To Do If Theres An Inquiry Or Account You Dont Recognize On Your Credit Reports
If youre digging around trying to find out why a name like CREDCO is showing up on your credit reports, youre practicing good credit hygiene. Congrats! Identity theft and fraud are things to take seriously, and we commend you for doing the research to stay on top of your credit.
Then again, you shouldnt assume an inquiry or account is fraudulent just because you dont immediately recognize the name. In some cases, lenders may partner with third-party services and companies like CoreLogic Credco. So its worth doing a bit of extra research before you take steps to dispute it as a credit report error.
Heres an extra bit of good news: Credit Karma offers a number of free tools and services to help you protect your credit. These include
- Free credit-monitoring This service can alert you to important changes on your credit reports. Along with checking your credit scores regularly, this feature sends you an alert so you can check any suspicious activity and report any instances of identity theft.
- Free identity monitoring This service notifies you when Credit Karma learns theres been a data breach in which your information may have been compromised. Well also give you tips on how to lock your credit with the three major consumer credit bureaus.
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How A Hard Inquiry Impacts Your Credit Score
Although hard inquiries remain on your credit report for two years, FICO only considers inquiries from the last 12 months when calculating your credit score.
For example, if you see a hard inquiry listed on your credit report but it was from over a year ago, it wouldn’t influence your credit score or deduct any points from it.
Your credit history also plays a role in how much a hard inquiry would impact your credit score.
According to FICO, one credit inquiry on most people’s credit reports will take less than five points off of their FICO score. They say “most” people because not everyone has the same credit history. If you have a healthy credit history and credit score to begin with, it’s likely that any hard inquiry on your credit report would do very little damage to your score, or even none at all.
Hard inquiries tend to have a greater impact on the credit scores of people with a short credit history or few credit accounts. This means that for those just starting to build their credit, a hard inquiry can knock off more points from your credit score than it would for someone who has a long credit history. But don’t let that prevent you from applying for credit. It’s OK to have inquiries periodically it indicates you are trying to build credit but you just don’t want too many hard inquiries on your credit report in a short amount of time.
What To Do Before An Inquiry
If you are worried about a potential hard inquiry and its effect on your , you have a few options. First, before you apply for any sort of major loan, like an auto loan, a mortgage, or even student loans, ask the lender whether a hard or soft inquiry will be required to secure the funds.
Also, keep your hard credit inquiries to a minimum. You dont want to undercut your credit score by applying for too many credit cards or other loans. Plus, overextending yourself from a credit perspective can hurt you financially.
You should also cross-check the hard inquiries you actually initiated with those that appear on your credit report to avoid credit card fraud. You can do so by getting a copy of your credit report at AnnualCreditReport.com.
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How Soft Inquiries Affect You
Not only do soft inquiries not affect your credit score, they’re not even visible to lenders when they check your report. They’re only visible to you when you pull your own credit report.
Keep in mind, though, that if you pull a copy of your credit report and provide it to a business to review, the soft inquiries will appear, since it is your version of your credit report.
Who Can Pull My Credit Report
There are both federal and provincial laws that govern who can legally request access to your credit report. This means that only you or organizations that you have a relationship with can see the information included in your credit report. In order to gain access to your credit report, an organization must be in the process of:
- Approving you for credit or a loan
- Trying to collect a debt
- Hiring you
- Renting an apartment or house to you
- Proving you with insurance
Learn how to read your credit report here.
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Does Credco Measure The Average Of Your Credit Scores
However, itâs not correct to say that CREDCO merges credit scores. The company makes a point of emphasizing that it never merges scores. Instead, it weaves together the three bureau reports. In the process, it eliminates unnecessary duplication.
If youâve ever compared credit reports from each of the three bureaus, you no doubt noticed that most of your credit history appears on each of the three reports. Once CREDCOâs technology deletes the duplicates, it regroups the unique entries and presents them in an easy-to-read format for CREDCOâs clientele.
What Are Hard And Soft Credit Score Inquiries
There are two types of credit score inquiries lenders and others can make on your credit score: a “hard inquiry” and a “soft inquiry.” The difference between the two is that a soft inquiry won’t affect your score, but a hard inquiry can shave off some points.
Here’s what hard and soft inquiries are all about: why there’s a difference, and who makes them.
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Soft Inquiry Vs Hard Inquiry
There is another inquiry that can occur during a credit check that you should be aware of, and its called a hard inquiry or hard pull. This happens when you apply for credit by filling out a credit card application. Hard inquiries also occur when you apply for a mortgage, an auto loan, or any number of other activities that result in a credit decision for or against you.
Hard pulls can harm your credit score for a few months and may stay on your credit report for about two years. The reason why factor hard inquiries into your credit score is that they assume that if you are applying for additional credit, you might be at greater risk of not paying back your existing debts. However, soft inquiries dont impact your credit score because they are not a formal credit application, so credit bureaus dont include them in their credit score calculations.
Soft inquiries are inquiries that you either didnt request or were made solely for informational purposes, while hard inquiries are the result of the credit application process.
Can You See Soft Inquiries On Your Credit Report
You can view the soft inquiries on your credit reports. If you want to get copies of your credit report, you can request one free copy from each major credit bureau every 12 months on AnnualCreditReport.com. You can also check your Experian credit report monthly for free on Experian.com.
Soft inquiries may be in their own section on your credit report. It might look similar to this:
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How To Reduce The Impact Of Hard Inquiries
Having several hard inquiries a few months apart may have a greater impact on your credit score. This is particularly true if you are applying for different types of credit. Statistics cited by FICO show that people with six or more recent inquiries are eight times as likely to file for bankruptcy as those with none, and scoring formulas reflect that.
Several hard inquiries may cause lenders to worry that you are having financial difficulty or have become overextended. To reduce the impact of hard inquiries, avoid applying for new credit in the months leading up to a big loan application.
If you are shopping around for a mortgage or loan, try to do this in a short window of time. Some credit score models count multiple inquiries in a short window of time as a single inquiry. Depending on the model used, you have 14 45 days to shop around in.
Improving your credit score can also reduce the impact of hard inquiries. The stronger your credit is, the less likely it is that an inquiry will have a significant impact. Practice good credit habits, like paying on time, every time, and keeping your credit balances way below your credit limit.
What To Know About Rate Shopping
Research has indicated that FICO Scores are more predictive when they treat loans that commonly involve rate-shopping, such as mortgage, auto and student loans, in a different way. For these types of loans, FICO Scores ignore inquiries made in the 30 days prior to scoring. So, if you find a loan within 30 days, the inquiries won’t affect your scores while you’re rate shopping.
In addition, FICO Scores look on your credit report for rate-shopping inquiries older than 30 days. If your FICO Scores find some, your scores will consider inquiries that fall in a typical shopping period as just one inquiry. For FICO Scores calculated from older versions of the scoring formula, this shopping period is any 14-day span. For FICO Scores calculated from the newest versions of the scoring formula, this shopping period is any 45-day span. Each lender chooses which version of the FICO scoring formula it wants the credit reporting agency to use to calculate your FICO Scores.
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How To Dispute A Hard Inquiry On Your Credit Report
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If youve checked your credit reports, you may have noticed youre not the only one taking a peek.
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Utilities use them to decide whether to charge you a deposit.
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Companies may check your credit standing so they can market products to you.
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Potential landlords and employers may look to see how reliable you are.
Inquiries stay on your report for two years, but not all of them affect your score. Heres what you need to know about when and how to remove a hard inquiry from your credit report.
How Do Credit Scores Work Anyway What Is A Credit Inquiry Letter
A credit score is a considerable aspect of your financial life. It plays a crucial role in a lenders decision to state yes or no to your loan or credit card application. For instance, individuals with credit rating listed below 640 are usually considered to be subprime borrowers.
Loan provider often charge interest on subprime home loans at a rate higher than a traditional home mortgage in order to compensate themselves for handling a high danger borrower. Depending upon how low your credit score is, they might likewise require a much shorter payment term or a co-signer.
On the other hand, a credit score of 700 or more is usually thought about good and could lead to you receiving a lower rate of interest. On loans like home mortgages, a somewhat slower rate of interest can end up conserving you 10s of thousands of dollars over the repayment term!
Scores greater than 800 are thought about outstanding. Its worth keeping in mind that while every creditor defines its own varieties for credit scores, the following FICO score variety is often used:
- Excellent: 800 to 850
- Fair: 580 to 669
- Poor: 300 to 579
In short, your credit score is a mathematical analysis of your creditworthiness and straight affects just how much or how little you may spend for your credit. Your credit score can also figure out the size of a deposit needed on products like phones, utilities, or apartment or condo rentals.
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How To Dispute Hard Credit Inquiries
We recommend checking your credit reports often. If you spot any errors, such as a hard inquiry that occurred without your permission, consider disputing it with the credit bureau. You may also contact the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, or CFPB, for further assistance.
This could be a sign of identity theft, according to Experian, one of the three major credit bureaus. At the very least, youll want to look into it and understand whats going on.
Keep in mind, you can only dispute hard inquiries that occur without your permission. If youve authorized a hard inquiry, it generally takes two years to fall off your credit reports.
How Many Points Will A Hard Inquiry Impact Your Credit Score
A hard credit inquiry could lower your credit score by as much as 10 points, though in many cases the damage probably wont be that significant. As FICO explains: For most people, one additional credit inquiry will take less than five points off their FICO Scores.
FICO also reports that hard credit inquiries can remain on your credit report for up to two yearsbut when FICO calculates your credit score, it only considers credit inquiries made in the past 12 months. This means that if your credit inquiry is over a year old, it will no longer affect your FICO credit score.
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Soft Inquiries Or Soft Credit Pulls
These do not impact credit scores and dont look bad to lenders.
In fact, lenders cant see soft inquiries at all because they will only show up on the credit reports you check yourself . A soft inquiry happens when there is no credit decision being considered. For example, its a soft inquiry when you check your own credit report or an existing lender checks your credit in a context where youre not applying for new credit .
The next time you get a copy of your , look for the section labeled requests for credit history or something similar. This part of the report will list the names of all of the companies that have recently requested a copy of your credit report.
Equifax, like Experian and TransUnion, used to count phone and internet service inquiries as hard inquiries. But, effective April 6, 2020, inquiries on Equifax credit reports for wired and wireless phone, internet, and pay TV accounts can be counted by service providers as soft inquiries. By June 30, 2020, Equifax will automatically classify those new accounts as soft inquiries.