Kind-of-Lost

How to Get Tradelines for Your Business

If you’re trying to figure out how to get tradelines for your business, the first thing worth knowing is that business credit and personal credit are two different animals — and a lot of the advice floating around blurs them together. I sold authorized user tradelines on the personal side, so I’ll be honest about where they help a business and where they don’t. For the consumer version of all this, my post on primary tradelines is a good companion, and I get into the numbers in how much will a tradeline boost my credit.

Why Is My VantageScore Lower Than FICO?

Buyers sometimes contact me having watched their Credit Karma score climb for months, then run into a wall when a mortgage broker pulls their actual FICO and the numbers don’t match. Sometimes by 40 points. Sometimes more. The question that follows — why is my VantageScore lower than my FICO? — is one I hear fairly often, and it usually comes with a side of frustration, because the free score on their phone every week isn’t the one that matters to a mortgage underwriter. It also matters who actually pulls it — who uses VantageScore covers which lenders rely on it.

What Is a 611 Dispute Letter? When and How to Use It

A 611 dispute letter is one of those credit repair tools that gets oversold in online forums. People treat it like a secret code that unlocks automatic deletions — send this letter, watch the bad stuff disappear. The reality is more modest, but it is a genuine legal right, and in the right situation it can matter. Let me explain what it actually does and when it’s worth your time.

Does Removing Hard Inquiries Increase Credit Score

At one point I had around ten hard inquiries on my credit report. That’s what happens when you open cards specifically to season them for tradeline sales — you apply, they pull your credit, repeat. (I’m back down to around five now, which is more comfortable.) So I’ve thought about this question more than most: does removing hard inquiries increase your credit score? The answer is: technically yes, but probably not by enough to matter for most people. Related: When Do Credit Inquiries Fall Off — worth reading if this applies to you.

Date of First Delinquency: What It Is and Why It Controls Your Credit Report

Buyers who reach out to me about tradelines sometimes have a collection sitting on their credit report and want to know whether they should pay it off before adding a tradeline. My answer almost always circles back to one question: when is the date of first delinquency? That date — not the collection date, not the charge-off date — is the anchor for how long a negative entry can legally stay on your report. Get that date wrong and you could be waiting out a clock that’s already expired.