FICO Scores, What Are They And Why Should You Care?
A FICO score is a number between 450 and 850 that is suppose to represent your ability to pay back credit. But what exactly is it and how does it affect you?
Your FICO score represents your ability to be financially responsible. It takes into consideration a few different items, the biggest of which being your history. If you have not paid your bills in the past it is going to show people that you are not responsible. On the other hand if you have paid your bills consistently for the last few years it is going to indicate how trustworthy you actually are.
Banks will look at these scores before lending to people to get an idea of who they are lending to and how likely it is that they will get that money back. Scores above 700 indicate that they are likely going to get paid back, while scores below 600 indicate that they will almost certainly not going to see that money again.
How in the world does this affect you and what would be the purpose of keeping it high? The biggest reason to keep your FICO score as high as possible is that everyone looks at it.
If you want to buy a house and do not have $100,000s lying around you will have to go out and get a loan. If your FICO score is really bad then you will find it hard to get a loan and if you do find a loan with a bad FICO score it isn’t going to be on favorable terms.
Also if you want to rent an apartment or a house your landlord will be looking for indications that you are responsible and that you will repay them. The best way to do this is through the FICO score.
Your FICO score really determines the quality of your life in so many ways. Everybody can look at the score and get an idea of how financially responsible you are, so if you want to have a good reputation in that field and want to improve the quality of your life keeping your FICO score high is a must.
For information on how to raise FICO score quickly visit Shaun’s article on how to build credit history
