What’s In Your Credit Report?

There are four types of information in your credit report namely, personal information, account information, public record information and inquiries.

Personal Information includes:

Your full name including any known aliases
Social security number
Year and date of birth
Residential address you had used while requesting for the report
Current and past information about your employers
And similar information about your spouse if both of you have joint accounts.

The account information includes:

Account name and number
Date opened and closed
Monthly payment history
Available credit limit
Monthly payment amount

Given below is a list of accounts that normally appear on your credit report:

Home loans
Credit cards, store cards, gas company cards
Bank loans
Auto loans
Student loans
Credit union cards and loans

Public record information includes:

Court judgments
Bankruptcy filings
Federal, state and county liens, including tax liens and monetary judgments
In some states overdue child support payments

Unlike account information, public record information does not include account number, credit limit or payment record.

Inquiries information
Inquiries list the names of those who have seen your credit report with in the past one year (in cases of inquiries initiated by employers it is two years.)

Also remember, you have the right to a free credit report once a year. You should use this opportunity to remove information that is inaccurate and this will help with getting credit, renting an apartment, getting good employment or the best insurance deals. A lot of people have been very pleased with what they could achieve financially with their credit reports. It has allowed them to get access to lines of credit that were previously not available to them, and they have been able to negotiate better rates on existing payments.