Checking your own credit reports often involves what’s known as a soft credit inquiry, or “soft pull.” You can help yourself prepare for a hard credit pull by monitoring your credit reports and making sure there aren’t any unpleasant surprises. All of these factors help creditors decide whether to extend new credit to you or give you additional credit. They also want to know how much credit you’re juggling and how long you’ve been managing your credit. They use that information to assess how you’ve handled credit in the past, how often you’ve paid your debts and bills on time, and whether you have any derogatory marks on your credit reports. When lenders check your credit with a hard inquiry (also known as a “hard pull”), they often make a note of their official review in your credit reports. If you’ve applied for financing or other credit and the lender checked your credit scores as part of the process, you’ve probably experienced what’s called a hard credit inquiry. Of course, the offers on our platform don't represent all financial products out there, but our goal is to show you as many great options as we can. That's why we provide features like your Approval Odds and savings estimates. But since we generally make money when you find an offer you like and get, we try to show you offers we think are a good match for you.
The money we make helps us give you access to free credit scores and reports and helps us create our other great tools and educational materials.Ĭompensation may factor into how and where products appear on our platform (and in what order). The offers for financial products you see on our platform come from companies who pay us.
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