get credit score

Question by Kat:
How can I find out details about my credit report?
I have done the freecreditreport.com thing and I know I have a low credit score but I don’t know who I owe money to. Is there a free way to get it in detail so I know exactly who I owe and how much??

Best answer:

Answer by lathom01
Be wary of freecreditreport.com because, in order to get your reports, you have to sign up for monthly credit monitoring, which costs money and all they do is alert you if something suspiscious ever shows up on your report. (Which, in my opinion, is too late. I signed up for Lifelock because I’d rather know about a problem BEFORE it happens rather than after!!) Anyway, when you get your credit reports, you should be able to print them out. As you read over each page, it will look a little less confusing and you’ll soon get the hang of it. Each open account will have the name of the bank or lending facility that owns the loan. For instance, the loan on your car might read “Ford Motor Credit”. It will state when the loan started, what the monthly payments are, how much you still owe, and underneath all that is usually an button you can click on to show a detailed month-to-month record of your payment history. Sometimes it will just show up without having to click any extra buttons. Anyway, in the area where it says who owns the loan, there should be a company name as well as an address and phone number. This is who you contact to find out how much you owe but, like I said, it will already show the amount on your credit report. If the account has gone into collections, dont contact the original debtor (like Ford Motor Company) because they will have already sold the account to ABC Collection Agency, and it wont belong to Ford Motor Company anymore. In fact, the area that shows Ford Motor Company will also say “refered to collections”. This is a very bad mark and cannot be erased no matter what you do. If you want to pay the debt, you have to contact ABC Collections using the phone number provided on your report. If there is a nondescript company name and no address or phone number, you can write a letter of dipute to the credit bureau. They have to confirm that the debt is valid but if they cant find an address or phone number either within about 30 days, the debt is dropped from your records. More often than not though, they are able to come up with the address and can confirm the debt. You might get lucky though. Dont just look at your report on the computer….print it all out (even though it will be several pages long) because that’s the only way you’ll get the details.

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