Buying a Home - What Does Your Credit Report Say About You?

FICO, FICO, FICO - Know Your Score. Improve Your Score, Monitor Your Score...

My focus is working with first time home buyers and I always take the time to thoroughly discuss and review the steps a client needs to implement in order to build a successful home buying plan.

The first step you need to take towards home-ownership is getting pre-approved for a home mortgage. Which lender to choose is an important decision, and like most big (financial) decisions you should seek out advice from trusted sources.

No matter the lending institution you work with, your FICO score speaks volumes about you and your credit risk.

Most people have heard the term FICO - what does it stand for and how did it get started, let's ask Wikipedia - Hey Wiki What's a FICO?

First time buyers are inundated with lots of advice from countless sources. My advice to building a successful plan and approach to buying a home is not unique; in fact I teach what I've learned. My value is that I take the extra time often needed to educate and counsel new buyers about the importance of knowing your FICO score and what it means and what they can do to improve it.

Many share the dream of home ownership; home shopping on line and in person (open houses) is fun and exciting. And while having a specific wish list of must haves and type of home, area and amenities you want is helpful and necessary, knowing what you can afford and more importantly knowing what the lender says they will loan you is essential and should be the starting point of turning your dream into a plan and into a reality.

The first step in getting pre-approved for a home mortgage is finding out what your credit report says about you, and the level of risk that you pose for your mortgage lender.

You may not know it, but, you can monitor your credit history (free of charge) on an annual basis through:

https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp

And any/all of their three participating credit-reporting companies:

1) Experian: http://www.experian.com/,

2) Equifax: http://www.equifax.com/,

3) Transunion: http://www.transunion.com/

You are allowed to down load your current credit report once every year from each company listed above. All without any charge to you what so ever.

For an additional one-time charge of $6.00 to $10.00 (depending on which one of the companies you use) they will give you your current credit score (which usually includes information from as little as a week or two ago).

And, for about $30/month you can have unlimited access to both your credit reports and credit scores from all three companies.

Knowing your FICO and keeping it strong - It is the step that you should always take first.... when you decide to purchase a home, or any other large purchase where a loan and interest rate are involved.

Please feel free to give me a call @ (631) 697-5777 or Email me at

paul@callpaulhome4sale.com

For answers to any/all of your Real Estate questions!!

"Call Paul Home 4 Sale" ~ "I can help you build a plan"