Just Pay On Time

People sometimes tell me very proudly that they don't just pay their minimum credit card payments, they pay the entire balance --- or at least they pay more than the minimum. But guess what ... the credit bureaus don't care. Just make sure you pay on time, that's all. The only reason paying more than the minimum will help your credit score is if your current balance is more than 50% of your available credit, but otherwise, it's not going to make a difference how much you pay as long as it's at least the minimum. Using more than 50% of your available credit can hurt your score, too, which is why it would be a good idea to make larger payments if that's the case. But as long as you're under 50%, paying more than the minimum won't improve your score.

Credit is Key for Mortgages

I just started a mortgage blog 'cause that's my business. Credit scores are a big thing in the mortgage world and it occurred to me that I'll probably come up with a lot of things to say about credit. That's why I created a separate blog for that.