Credit Report Analysis

Analysis and Reflection - Option 1

1) The credit report was full of information. The first thing which caught my eye was the credit summary section which has an overview of all accounts I have, including my credit cards and loans. This part of the credit report lists things such as payment amount, credit limit, debt to credit ratio and number of accounts. The next section of the credit report was account age. This part was interesting because it will list out all of your accounts and the amount of time you have held them open for. This would be useful information if you wanted to close out accounts, you could find out which you've had open the longest and keep that one open to make your credit improve. As I moved down the report the installments section came up. This gave me an in depth summary of my loans I have right now. It breaks down each loan to show the amount of the loan, my monthly payment amount and even sets up a time-table plan to pay off the loan. The last section which really had interesting information on my report was the revolving accounts section- breakdown of my credit card. The most useful thing I found here was a breakdown of my month to month payments and if I made them on time, 30 days past due, 60 days past due etc. It also shows me my max limit, current amount and the most I've ever had charged at once. All interesting to see summarized for you.

2) To be honest I did not see a whole lot that surprised me in my report. I consider myself pretty responsible in tracking my finances and know just about everything I do. Therefore seeing that I had paid all my credit charges on time, etc was no surprise to me. I guess the only thing that really caught me a little by surprise was when it came to the student loan section. Seeing how much money I could pay monthly, and how long it would take to pay off came as a little shock (not a good shock either). Definitely makes me want to increase the payments when I graduate and get the loans paid off as quickly as I can. The second thing that sort of just surprised me was all the exact detail the report included about all my accounts, which I provided none of the info for. Pretty cool!

3) Not necessarily for my situation, but the number one way I know many of my friends could improve their credit is to be more discipline while using their credit card for spending so they can pay the bill on time. As seen from this report, it tracks every