View and Monitor Your Credit Score

A credit score is a three-digit number calculated to indicate your credit worthiness. The higher the score, the more credit worthy you are to a lender. Credit score is calculated from information in your credit report and takes into account whether you have been making on-time payments, your revolving debt use, length of your payment history, and other such factors. It is important to know that your score does not take your age, income, employment, marital status, or your bank account balances into account.

You can learn more about credit scores and scoring models from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau website.

Credit Sense uses the VantageScore 3.0 model to generate a score ranging from 300 to 850. VantageScore 3.0 is a credit scoring model developed collaboratively by the three major credit bureaus: Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. 

Credit Sense uses data solely from TransUnion, one of the three major credit reporting bureaus.

There are five major categories that make up a credit score:

• 40% Payment History
  • Essentially what lenders want to know is whether or not you’re good about paying your loans on time.
• 23% Credit Usage
  • Credit usage, also known as credit utilization, is the ratio between the total balance you owe and your total credit limit on your revolving accounts. It is best to keep your credit usage below 30%.
• 21% Credit Age
  • The age of your oldest account, the age of your newest account, the average age of your accounts and whether you’ve used an account recently are all factors related to the length of your credit history. In general, the longer your credit history the better.
• 11% Mix of Credit
  • Your score also takes into consideration how many total accounts you have and what types of credit you have. Your score will likely be higher if you have experience with different types of credit, like mortgages and installment student loans and revolving accounts like credit cards.
• 5% Recent Credit
  • Opening multiple credit accounts in a short period of time could represent a greater risk for lenders - those who see that you have multiple recent inquiries may worry that you are applying to so many places because you are unable to qualify for credit - or because you need money in a pinch.

These scores can vary by 10-50 points. For more information, go to How Credit Scores Are Created from iFi University.  

Were you denied a loan based on credit? Want to better understand your credit score and how to improve it? Check out these free courses and more from iFi University! 

•    Understanding credit reports and scores
•    Using credit cards responsibly
•    Mastering credit and optimizing your score