There are many reasons for having a bad credit rating, and not all of them are your fault. Sounds odd doesn’t it, but it’s true. I had a bad credit rating many, many years ago just because i signed on the dotted line for someone else who had bad credit. Suffice to say they didn’t keep up the payments on their sofa, or whatever it was, and i was landed the bill; and surprise surprise, i couldn’t pay it…
Now back then they defaulted me. These days they may wait a little longer, particularly in today’s economic climate, but all the same, it’s not something you want to be digging yourself out of. It really is not a good idea to sign to secure something for someone else. Only sign for things that you are directly resposible for paying for.
The biggest problem with credit scoring is that you actually seem to need to be in debt to get credit! It’s really strange like this, but it’s almost as though you don’t exist without a credit card or a loan. People need to check you against something all the time these days, so if you’ve just stepped out of school, you have a well paid job, and you live at home, you are often unable to get any serious amount of credit because they can’t find out how much of a good payer you are. The trick is to have credit but don’t miss your payments; easier said than done i know!
Tags: bad debts, credit cards, credit scoring