About Your Credit Score

Before lenders decide to lend you money, they want to know that you are willing and able to repay that mortgage loan. To assess your ability to repay, they assess your income and debt ratio. In order to calculate your willingness to pay back the loan, they consult your credit score.

The most commonly used credit scores are FICO scores, which Fair Isaac & Company, a financial analytics agency, developed. Your FICO score ranges from 350 (very high risk) to 850 (low risk). You can find out more on FICO here.

Your credit score is a direct result of your history of repayment. They don't consider your income, savings, amount of down payment, or factors like sex ethnicity, national origin or marital status. These scores were invented specifically for this reason. Credit scoring was envisioned as a way to assess willingness to repay the loan without considering other demographic factors.

Your current debt load, past late payments, length of your credit history, and other factors are considered. Your score is calculated from the good and the bad of your credit history. Late payments will lower your credit score, but establishing or reestablishing a good track record of making payments on time will improve your score.

To get a credit score, you must have an active credit account with a payment history of six months. This payment history ensures that there is sufficient information in your credit to calculate a score. Some people don't have a long enough credit history to get a credit score. They should build up a credit history before they apply.