We used to do a "Funny Money Friday" post each week here at CreditBloggers. But, as the economy sunk, each week it was getting a little bit harder to find anything funny in the gloomy economic and real estate headlines. So instead, let's use our Friday's to focus on the positive. We certainly could use some good news these days.
Today's email comes from Edith. A rare success story that found its way to our inbox. We've been repeating that good credit is key in this tough economy and she's living proof:
good credit and payment histories are being charged high interest rates and
their credit limits are being lowered.
husband and I, we have 3 major credit cards and all of them keep raising the
limits and the interest rates on all three have been going down. About every
two weeks or so they all send us those annoying checks to use.
use them to earn those points. They are irresistible.
the dealers preferred bank with a great interest rate. We didn't even bother to
find financing before we went to the dealership.
800's.
to have any problems. I hope people learn to live within their means, but I
don't know if that is what the problem is.
both of our credit records frozen.
ever laid off people and mine is 123 years old). Both of our companies are
still growing at about the same rate as they have been in previous years, yet
even we are scared of everything that is going on. So we stopped shopping for
everything except for necessities.
terrible environment.
Well done Edith! She's a great example of how having good credit can help you thrive during a recession. Not only is she avoiding the credit card issues that people with scores under 700 are facing, but she was also able to take advantage of the car deals available now.
If your credit is less than stellar, here are four steps to take: 1) check all three of your credit reports and credit scores online to get the whole story. 2) Identify any late payments, high debt balances, public records, collection accounts or inquiries that might be damaging your score. 3) Use our free credit score estimator tool to see how certain changes might impact your score. 4) Make those positive changes!
Emily Peters – Credit.com's personal finance expert and former TransUnion credit bureau insider. Emily writes about credit reports, credit cards, loans and personal finance as the CreditBloggers.com editor.