I was speaking about ways to save money with a coworker who mentioned that she wanted to buy a house soon. She was worried about the rate she would get because she knew her credit score was bad .

This person, I’ll call her S, said she had a lot of unpaid medical bills and phone bills from her past. There were also a few bills that had been late in the past but then she had settled with the company so she hoped that had already dropped off her credit report.

S told me she was thinking of hiring a credit repair company to clean up her credit report because she had heard they could take items off. This is the point where I had to stop her and put on my Personal Finance hat. In the short time that I have been blogging about my personal finances I think I have learned a few things that I could share with someone.

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This is a follow up to Crazy Things that Kill Your Credit Score…Part 1 of 2 where I spoke about the first two items on the list.

Here are the two other strange items that can really ding your credit score in a bad way.

Using Limitless Cards

Library fines and other fees

Let us take a deeper look at these two items and how they can end up having a negative effect on your credit score.

Using Limitless Cards

Limitless cards are basically those cards that do not report what the actual credit limit is. These cards report what your highest balance is and the credit bureaus use this as their guide.

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I found this story about a Widow who finds her Credit tied up in her husband’s name after he died. This is a very unfortunate circumstance for her but it just goes to teach us the importance of having your own, separate credit history when you get married.

I have already decided that when I get married my husband and I will keep separate accounts. This is not so that we can hide money from each other, but rather to protect against one of us losing access to credit history if something happens to the other one.

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Do you know what hurts your credit score? We all read about the obvious ones like Closing off old Credit Cards and Opening New Lines of Credit.

Did you know that opening a new line of credit can affect your credit in a negative way for up to ONE YEAR after you open it?

According to an article on MSN Money here is a partial list of Weird Stuff that Hurts your Credit Score.

Opening New Lines of Credit

Making Balance Transfers

Using Limitless Cards

Library fines and other fees

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Welcome to the February 18, 2008 edition of credit report stories.

I am sorry the carnival is late but there was an error with the host.

Rob Moshe presents Live Your Best Life By Serving Others posted at Rob Schaumer, saying, “This is not necessarily a fitting post for your carnival. Once the project starts, each day I will recognize a fellow blogger that “Helped”"

credit card

DotLobby presents What is a Recession? 4 Signs and Symptoms posted at DotMakeMoney, saying, “Of course, you probably could have looked that up yourself, so let’s look at the subject in a more “How does this affect me?” way…”

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I had only heard about life lock two days ago and thought about the people who use it. Then imagine my surprise when I got a letter in the mail from my insurance company that said I was at risk for identity theft!!!!!

I Am At Risk for Identity Theft

I was told that a laptop containing my sensitive information had been stolen from the company that handles one of my insurances through my job. I immediately thought about the number of times I read about things like this happening but never thought it could happen to me.

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Welcome to the September 17, 2007 edition of credit report stories.

teaspoon presents Solving Our Savings and Budget Issues - The No-Budget Budget Way posted at www.TeaspoonFinance.com - Financial wisdom, one teaspoon at a time…, saying, “Proposing a way of looking at handling your savings and budgeting called the no-budget budget.”

Golbguru presents No More Free Money - Pulling The Plug On Credit Card Arbitrage posted at Money, Matter, and More Musings, saying, “No more credit card arbitrages for me. Also, Discover has some weird qualification criteria for credit cards - and does not really go by credit score!”

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Welcome to the September 3, 2007 edition of credit report stories.

There were a number of articles sent in that are not included in this edition of the carnival. Those articles, while well written, had nothing to do with credit so I had to omit them.

Please remember to link back if your article made it into the carnival and visit the other people listed here as well. The next edition of the carnival which will be hosted on September 17th, can be found over at Life Of Baz.

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