Consumers are constantly looking for ways to boost their credit scores, though there are many “hacks” out there that don’t actually do much to boost scores. In this article, we want to shed some light on a few credit boosting strategies so you can figure out which ones are legitimate and which ones are a waste of time.
Boosting Your Credit Score By Paying Off Loans Early
Exploring Credit Boosting Strategies
While it might feel counterintuitive to many, you cannot earn more points on your credit score by paying off your loans early. Nothing gets added to your credit report when you pay a loan off early or before the term of the loan ends. What will show up on your credit report is that the balance of the account in question is now at zero. While your credit score might see a very slight boost with a zero balance on your report, you also have to consider the number of accounts you have that have balances. If the debt you have isn’t hurting your score, there is no reason for you to get rid of it so fast.
Boosting Your Credit Score By Paying More Than The Balance
People often think that paying more than the balance owed on their credit card will boost their score. However, credit card accounts cannot have negative balances. While you may get “credit” on your credit card account by doing so, it will still report to the credit bureaus as zero. Essentially, paying off the amount you are supposed to pay off vs paying off more than you owe doesn’t make a difference. The only thing it will do is tie up your money in a place that doesn’t earn you any interest. The best option is to simply pay off your balance in full every month. That way, you can avoid making interest payments.
Boosting Your Credit Score By Making More Than One Payment Each Month
While this technique might have some truth to it, it doesn’t always work in the ways that people claim it does. People often think they can trick the credit score system by making more than one payment each month. The truth is, credit scoring models only take all of the payments you made during the month into account at once, not each payment individually. The one reason you might see a slight boost on your credit score with this trick is that you are paying down the balance prior to the closing date and prior to the credit bureaus receiving the
reports. Because the report shows a lower credit utilization ratio overall, you end up with a few additional points.
Bottom Line
With so many myths out there about credit score boosting, it makes sense to go with techniques that have been proven to work time and time again, which is why we offer consumers authorized user tradelines. Make sure to get in touch with us here at Boost Credit 101 if you are interested in seeing how tradelines could potentially boost your credit score.