Buying or renting a new house can be stressful enough without nasty surprises such as a poor credit rating slowing things down, especially when it may be easy to improve if you know about it in advance.
When choosing to rent, letting agents and landlords want to know you are credible and can pay your rent on time. An easy way for them to check this is to look at your credit report. If you know your score in advance, you can plug any holes in your credit history, consolidate any debts and help make sure you get the home you want.
Homebuyers are subject to similar scrutiny. Each time you apply for a mortgage (or any other credit like a loan or credit card), it leaves a record on your credit report. Lenders and mortgage companies checking your report will worry if they see lots of credit applications in a short period of time because that makes them think you could be too dependent on credit. And that makes your credit score go down.
So checking your Experian Credit Score in advance gives you a great idea of how lenders see your financial standing, and whether you need to explore your Experian Credit Report in more detail.
So, what exactly is your credit score?
Simply put, it’s a number that lenders calculate based on a range of different factors to decide whether they’ll lend to you or not. The higher your score – typically up to a maximum of 999 – the better your credit standing and your chance of being approved for a mortgage with a good interest rate that best suits you.
While that sounds simple enough, there’s a lot that goes into calculating it. Along with the information you provide in your credit application, lenders also have their own criteria that could include your income, how much you want to borrow and whether you have defaults or similar on your credit report.
But by checking your Experian Credit Score – which is based on your credit history to give you an idea of how lenders may view you – you can see where you stand and if you need to improve it.
