Credit Scoring – Frequently Asked Questions
(1) Does Checking My Credit Score Lower My Credit Rating?
Checking your FICO score or pulling your own credit report does not hurt your credit rating. The credit scoring system is set up so that inquiries made by a consumer checking his or her own credit score or credit report do not count in any way whatsoever towards lowering or raising one’s credit score.
Credit inquiries made by credit card companies or mortgage lenders checking your credit report to send you pre-approved offers do not count either. If they did, every American would have a very low credit score. However, if you respond to those offers, and the credit card company or mortgage lender pulls your credit report to do a more thorough investigation, it does count. It also counts every time you apply for any sort of financing, housing, insurance, employment, etc., and your credit report is pulled. How much does it affect your credit score? Each credit inquiry can lower your score by five points.
Five points for each credit inquiry sounds harsh, and it would be detrimental to someone who applied for many mortgage loans with many different mortgage lenders. However, the FICO scoring system counts multiple inquiries made in a 14-day period as just one inquiry, and all inquiries made within 30 days of the credit score being calculated are ignored. Therefore, if you are shopping for a mortgage loan, you should do all of your applying with various lenders within the same week to protect your credit score.
(2) Will credit counseling hurt my credit score?
Enrolling in a credit counseling or debt management program will not hurt your credit score; however, some lenders will refuse to approve your loan if you are enrolled in such a program. This fact shouldn’t worry those who are enrolled in credit counseling because there are plenty of lenders who won’t punish you for it. In addition, once a person has completed credit counseling, all references to it are removed from one’s credit report.