Tag: authorized user

The question I get from buyers is usually some version of: does it matter which tradeline company you go with? Or is a tradeline a tradeline? The company matters less than the card — specifically which issuer it’s from, how old it is, and what the limit is. Those are the three things that determine how much an authorized user tradeline actually moves your score, and they’re the variables most buyers don’t dig into before purchasing. If you’re wondering whether you can pay to be an authorized user on someone else’s account, the short answer is yes — and it’s a common way to build credit quickly.

Continue reading “Authorized User Tradelines: How They Work”

People ask me some version of the guarantor vs cosigner question more often than you’d expect — usually because they’re trying to figure out if buying an authorized user tradeline is similar to having one or the other. It’s not, but explaining why forces you to actually sort out what these two terms mean, because even landlords and lenders use them interchangeably when they shouldn’t.

Continue reading “Guarantor vs Cosigner: What’s the Difference?”

The most common message I get from people who find this site isn’t “how do I buy a tradeline?” — it’s “is there a way to get one for free?” Fair question, especially if you’re not sure whether tradelines are even worth paying for. The short answer is yes, there are free ways to get tradelines. But each one comes with a real limitation that the generic SEO posts skip over, and knowing how to get free tradelines is mostly about knowing which limitation you can live with.

Continue reading “How to get free tradelines: what actually works”

Buyers come to me asking for old tradelines specifically. “I want the oldest card you have” is something I hear a lot, and the logic is right — the older the tradeline, the bigger the lift on the age component of your score. But how that age actually shows up on your report depends entirely on which issuer the card is from, and that part catches a lot of buyers off-guard. Seasoned tradelines are worth understanding before you hand over any money, because two cards that look identical on paper can do very different things to your report.

Continue reading “Seasoned tradelines: what actually makes one worth buying”