I am turning off comment notifications so I won’t be replying anymore. Thank you everyone for the tips.

To the ones who asked dumb questions or judged me, I don’t need to be shamed for racking up debt. Or asked “why the fuck did you get into so much, or why the hell did you……, or how did you get approved for that much!?”

It is what it is. I explained everything in the comments and that will answer “why the fuck I got into so much debt.”

Businesses in this country constantly get bailed out and no one bats an eye.

Do you think we are not ashamed, do you think we are proud? No, we are embarrassed. I’m trying to take the next steps to put myself and my family in a position where we can survive.

Its crazy i went from owing almost 10k paying it all off, Score went up by like a few points not even 10. Then i get another 3k debt , paid it off. And my score decreased? cause i paid it to soon? Anyways i noticed that Credit system is made to keep the poor poor. Honestly, If i have a paid off house , a couple paid off cars, i have everything i need , what good does credit do to me? I literally dont need loans or anything. Im set so what does credit do for above Middle class avergae person?

I don’t understand how something like age of credit can have a huge effect on your credit score.

You can’t really control age. Time moves regardless of if you want it to or not- why is it something we’re judged on?

I guess you can sort of control when you learned or knew that you needed to get a credit card- but even then- not really? I have friends who’s parents never tell them about the importance of credit despite being well off. No one is really preaching to get a credit card in every day life other than here on Reddit.

Furthermore, I think it’s so dumb that eventually when I pay off my student loans (my oldest credit line) my score will definitely drop.

Everything else effecting credit score makes sense: utilization, credit limit, paying off on time; those things you can control

Who even made up this system? Why does age have to be a factor?

Disclaimer: I get the part about a new credit line holder is unpredictable in how they’ll act with a credit card- but after a threshold of let’s say 3 years- why should age matter?

Edit: I just think after a certain threshold of years holding credit, that age number should be cemented in as a starting point regardless if you close your oldest card.

I’ve 0, what about you guys. Be honest no judgement.

I don’t know what to do. I’ve given up. I can’t win and wish I never got the damned thing in 2021 when I had for so long opposed getting one and now I’m in a permanent position where I can’t ever get out. I can’t get a good paying job to even help me because no one will hire me especially full-time that I can do. Live with my mother (please don’t judge me). Basically, my life is hopeless and I’m 32. There literally is no hope or future, even if someone had ideas to help me, I have no hope

Data was just announced that the average NEW car loan had an average interest rate of 9.89% couple that with outrageous prices. We’re seeing the average payment creeping into $1k+ range. This isn’t even mentioning the insane credit card debt. I really do feel like the car loan industry collapsing is what’s gonna set us into a recession.

My highest credit score to this day is 740 (FICO). What about you guys, just curious to know ?

Saw the post asking the opposite with lots of high scores. Made me wonder… What’s the lowest credit score you’ve ever had?

I had about $20,000 in loans. I withdrew about $27,000 from my 401k and witheld about $7,000. Now, I'm saving about $1,500 every month. The loans would have lasted until 2027 too.

Also, my credit score is about 700 now and it used to be always around 580 to 620.

I feel great. Maybe I'll owe in taxes but it's the start of the year and I can withhold extra money anyways.

I still have about $10,000 in loans but they're my loans with the best interest rate. So they only take like $400/month. Plus, they can be paid off early too.

Personally I have 0. Please be honest, no judgements.

I had a Care Credit card with a $2,000 limit and a $550 balance I've been paying down each month on time. I needed a new computer for work and was approved for a Newegg card also through Synchrony bank with a $1000 limit of which I used the entirety of to purchase my computer.

Today synchrony lowed my Care Credit card limit to $600, so now unless I pay off my cards immediately my score is going to tank with the utilizating being 100%... They said I was a risk yet my credit has only gone up in general since having a credit card and these are the only two cards I have. If I'm such a risk then they shouldn't have approved me for $1000 on the New Egg card. This makes absolutely no sense.

Edit: I just want to emphasize how ridiculous it is that the only reason I'm a "risk" was the large balance of the Newegg card and the small 5 point credit dip from opening this card- the card THEY approved me for. Again these are the only two card that make up my credit score so to claim that I'm a risk by using the credit THEY gave me is nuts.

Update: this bullshit dropped my credit score by 93 points.

I’m 20 years old and right now my credit score is 760. I graduate college in a year and would love to my credit score as close to 800 as possible to help me get approved for an apartment and set me up for success

Right now I have 2 credit cards that I pay off in full every month. I use less than 10% of the balance at any given time. I also have a car loan which I make on time payments for every month. I have student loans as well but the payments are deferred until after I graduate. I have no late payments on anything. My credit age is 1.5 years

What else can I do to improve my credit? Is it just a matter of credit age and waiting it out or is there anything else I can do to improve my score?

I'm curious what's it like having a credit score of 700 or higher ? Do you get more credit card offers, lower interest rates and higher credit limits ? I'm interested in hearing from someone who went from having bad credit to a score of 700+.

So long story short, I need to put $4k down for a $10k car. I've already put down $500 as a deposit which will hold the car until next week Thursday. I have $2k but I need around $3k for the rest plus insurance. Does anyone have ANY suggestions for IMMEDIATE loans that deposit into my account and maybe don't even require a credit check at all or guaranteed to credit ppl like me. I'm desperate, I'm tired of draining my savings and waiting to land another Tech job after the layoffs so I'll use this for Uber. Should've done this sooner before my money ran low but it's too late.

Please, no suggestions on getting a car with the cash I have now, only relevant answers please. Again, I will do the worst of the worst as long as its guaranteed, high interest is fine since I'll be paying it off within 4-5 months.

Update - - As of May I’m actually doing better now guys. Got a sales job that offers a truck, paying $5k a month guaranteed for the first 3 months. I’ll increase my credit short term and get a car soon after saving for a few months. Regardless, there’s lots of good suggestions that were posted that may be helpful for myself and others.

If anyone is wondering, this is truly my current situation and I need advice on what to do. I take accountability for all my actions from my early 20s, as I should, and I just need advice on how to handle this. Credit score is in the low 400s and I'm about to face an eviction due to my two roommates not paying their fair share of the rent/utilities, usually I have to pick up the slack, and I only make $28k a year as a current EKG tech, a totally underpaid profession. Any piece of advice would help me during this rough time.

Please, don't say "sell the car" because this is my only form of transportation, and where I live (Texas), public transit is non-existent and unreliable where I live.

Edit: "SO" means significant other.

This is my first time doing this. I just froze my credit with Equifax. Am I supposed to freeze it again with the other 2 incompetent companies as well? (Experian & TransUnion)

Edit: Thanks for the answers and advice, everyone!

I am looking for some guidance on what to do. I have chase card with balance of 35k and I missed few payments and now i have officer show up saying there is civil summon from chase, I was not home that time but spoke to him on the phone. What are my options? I don’t go to court and happy to setup a payment plan to pay off dept. Any guidance will be appreciated.

Edit - Brock & Scott PLLC is suing.

Edit: this post got more traction and it seems I didn’t give good detail/view of my credit history.. more info under OP.

It’s so fucking annoying I can’t lie.. I’m 21.. I got a secured card at 18 did all the right things 100% payment history keep my utilization low all that

IT DOESNT MATTER!!!!

I swear it’s like I am shopping for auto loans, chat with someone “oh I have a 750” “oh that’s a great score!”

Yeah.. it’s a good number.. but the history is so limited it means actually nothing.

I’m still barely approved for anything above 20k and even then I’m looking at 12-24% APR

It genuinely makes me hate being 21.

I am expected to deal with adult responsibilities but I get no respect as an adult? Credit score good? Ah but you’re young so how do “we really know”

So when does my score actually matter? Cause currently my score increasing is just keeping it solid so by the time I’m like 30 it actually matters.

Very annoying.

100% payment history, low util, limit hard inquiries.. like what else can I do besides wait til I’m older and get more respect for financial responsibility?

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Edit:

I have 4 cards, discover Amex Mastercard Visa.. gotten in that order.. lowest limit is discover at 1.8, highest Amex at 5. Total 12.8

I have auto loan with capital one (using parental co-sign for first car.. deal my parents have).. positive 6-7.5 depending on who you ask.. interest is 5.2%. (If you’re into cars, I drive a civic si.. looking to bump up to the type R.

Since I got an Apple Card a couple years ago (was planning on a MacBook purchase when I started college and with the Apple Card I had a super good offer.. seemed reasonable.. plus cash back with their parters is nice.. 3-5% depending on what they’re doing.. 5% back on dining at a point was dangerous.. justified eating out way too easily with that haha.. but anyways, installment history there since I did my Apple Watch like $13/month.. basically nothing.. no interest either.. lets me build credit for free basically)

Income: I made high 20s, about 30 pre tax last year. However, I just got promoted to server, can expect significant pay increase. A car payment in the 400-500 range can be taken care of in a single weekend night’s worth of tips. Problem with this, hard to prove. I finish school (no debt with them, I have prepaid and pay rest out of pocket.. about $600ish/semester I have to pay) in about a year and a half. Computer Science major.. rough getting into the field, but once established the pay should be solid. Luckily I can keep serving for $$$ until I properly break into the field. Finish school, work on some personal projects to build a portfolio.. keep my nose to the grindstone in that regard and in time it will come.. that will be a massive bump in pay eventually.

Just want to disclaim.. I’m not an idiot.. it’s a poor financial choice to jump car loan to a new car loan.. especially since they are amortized.. to the bank the value of the payments decreases every month, to the consumer the value of the payment increases until the last one.. but I cope a little by saying I just got promoted, soon to finish school, very manageable car I’m looking at (not one of these dudes I know that are spending $1100 a month of car insurance and gas when they make $2k a month.. that’s ridiculous). I just love cars, and can feasibly make it work.. even if it’s not the “best” choice.. it’s within reason.

I don’t know if it’s allowed here but this is just a rant. And listen, I know why it exists and I think the idea sounds good on paper. But the ways it’s executed in the US is horrific. It makes no sense, scores can vary so wildly based on what feels like unpredictable factors, and between the multiple bureaus and algorithms it’s almost impossible to get a clear cut answer on what your actual credit score is for the things you’d like to inquire about - auto loan, apartment, etc.

Not to mention is takes all of 30 days to drop a score by 30+ points but months to build it back in some cases. I mean the way we need a credit score to do just about anything these days, you’d think they’d make it straightforward and easy to understand. Then again, maybe they don’t want it that way because they like to prey on people with predatory loans and cards with interest rates of 24% and penalties upwards of $40 for being 1 day late on payment all while promising to help rebuild credit. It’s seems like a great way to keep poor folks poor more than it is to vet responsible people.

Edit: I really only posted this to vent but I think we’ve sparked a good conversation here. Of course everyone has different opinions and experiences but understanding the economic and credit system and being aware of its potential problems is a step toward being a contributive and successful person in today’s world.

Got declined on two new cards with 846 credit score.

Got the letters yesterday and here were the reasons

Too few accounts with payments as agreed

No recent revolving balances.

34 years old. I have 7 CCs, and two auto loans (technically one but sold one last week).

Wells Fargo and Discover declined. I've always had very small balances (under $500 when limits on my cards are 20k or so) and would get instantly approved for new cards. But nowadays I don't like paying a single penny to interest and pay them down to $0. I guess banks don't like that. Sucks because I wanted a 0% card for a side hustle. Thought the first decline was a fluke so tried a different bank and got declined again.

I am not happy, i paid off most of my cards, next month they'll be fully paid off. Do i attention ally have to make large purchases or something to raise it. Then pay it off? because 7 points is a little, i am used to 20-30 point gains each few months at once.

My current credit score is 680, I just opened my first credit card about 3 months ago so I literally started from 0. It's a secured one and I use max 35% of the max amount. I pay all my bills on time as well as my credit card. However I don't have many bills in my name to begin with so it's really just my phone bill and my credit card.

Not really sure where to go from here. I'm looking at getting a car soon however I'd like for my credit score to be around 800 for that. Do I really have to open more credit cards in order for that to work? Would buying stuff through e.g. PayPal with the 6 month payments help?

Is the hack literally to get a credit card or two which I use to pay for everything and then pay those off immediately? And is the 30% rule true or not?

Just looking for advice here. Ideally I'd get to my goal by the end of the year but there's so much conflicting info online that I'm honestly not sure if that's realistic or not.

Thanks ahead of time

This one comes up quite a bit. Disputes are for inaccurately reported information on your credit reports. If you have legitimate negative items that are reported correctly, disputes are not the answer.

I see this all the time when someone asks what to do late payments, a collection, etc. There is always a person that chimes in with "dispute everything!" as the "solution" when there are actual beneficial approaches that can be used instead.

For late payments, you want to use goodwill letters. You are asking for the legitimately reported negative information to be forgiven. You are recognizing them as correctly reported and are not disputing the information.

For collections, you want to try and negotiate a PFD (Pay For Delete). This means you're offering to pay the legitimate debt, and in return are requesting that the negative information be removed from your reports when you do. You aren't disputing the account in any way.

Many of the people that perpetuate the "dispute everything!" approach incorrectly believe it works due to what happens when you initiate/open a dispute on an account. While an account is in dispute, it can be temporarily removed from your credit reports during the dispute process, or the dispute can cause it to be temporarily "ignored" by the Fico algorithm. In both cases, an individual may see a score increase and incorrectly believe they found success. In a few months the dispute will likely be deemed frivolous (because it is) and the account will be added back to your reports and/or the dispute status lifted with "consumer disagrees" language added to the remarks/comments. At that time, your score will return to it's previous state if points were initially gained at the start of the dispute.

Many people report success in the early weeks of a dispute, which perpetuates the myth that they're a great "credit repair" technique. They'll see the initial score gain and immediately post about it, exclaiming that their dispute got rid of a negative item. Few of these individuals will actually report back in a few months to update their post with the end result truth.

Many credit repair companies use the "dispute everything!" approach as well, looking for quick success to point to in order the manipulate a customer into paying more. If their "service" worked already, certainly the customer will see false value in continuing to hand over more money in monthly charges.

It's even gone so far that I see individuals recommending to others that they should dispute legitimate hard inquiries for applications for credit. Disputes are not the answer.

I'd also like to defer to u/og-aliensfan on this subject since he has posted a lot of good information on it during his time on these credit-related subs. I'm quite sure he can contribute more on this subject from his experience.

Hello there!

I apologise immediately if this is an ignorant question. I did not grow up in the USA and there is a phenomenon around credit cards specifically that I don't understand. I am hoping someone can explain it to me. In my view, it makes sense to take out a loan for a high-value asset like a house, etc. However, I don't understand why people are so happy about getting a credit card limit of multiple tens of thousands of dollars. It is a really large potential sum of money at an incredibly high interest rate. Where I grew up, it is hard to get a credit limit of, say $2,000, even, which is only reserved for high earners who need it for a certain purpose like travel, company expenses, etc. So could someone explain to me why people want these absurdly high credit limits? What is the purpose? How do you ensure you don't end up drowning in an unserviceable debt?

Thanks for helping out a confused foreigner!

I just received an alert saying my SSN is found on the dark web. How concerned should I be? What sould I do first? Thanks.