What is a Credit Report (Bureau)?

A credit report or credit bureau is a history of how consistently you pay your financial obligations. Your credit report and resulting credit score, is created when you first borrow money and/or apply for credit. Once established, the companies that lend money or issue credit cards to you (banks, finance companies, credit unions, retailers, etc.) send the credit reporting agencies (Equifax/TransUnion) specific and factual information about their financial relationship with you. This would include things like when you first opened your account, if you make your payments on time, if you make full or partial payments, if you miss a payment, if you have gone over your credit limit, or if you have had an account go into default.

A credit bureau helps our lenders make decisions about granting you credit based on how you have handled your existing credit with your existing credit grantors. It provides a picture of your financial health. For this reason, we will request consent to pull your credit to provide to our lenders.

Your Credit Score

In addition to monitoring your activity on a regular basis, Equifax/TransUnion also assign you a numerical ‘credit score’. This number ranges from 300 to 900 and anything – to receive best rates we look to scores sitting between 620-680. We have lending options for credit scores below this mark.

While it is true many lenders use bureau scores to help them make lending decisions, understand that each lender will base its decision on more than score alone.