What happens to my credit score when i get married

krc333 · 07-17-2007, 07:51 AM

What will happen to my credit score when I get married in Nov. Mine is a low 650, but my girlfriends score is like 740. I’m assuming our scores will remain separate as long as we don’t apply for credit together. Just her name or my name on the credit ap. Am I assuming right? I don’t want to bring her score down, while I’m working on getting my up. I’ve had some people tell me once we get married they automatically add them together, but that doesn’t sound right to me

**Blackbeauty** · 07-17-2007, 07:57 AM

It's not true. You stay seperate.

If you're married, you need both individual and joint accounts.

Many wives rely on their husband's credit and vice versa these days. Everything is in their spouse's name. I personally do not think this is a good strategy.

If both of you are contributing to the household income, it's important to have as many different accounts as possible. Have a mix of individual and joint credit accounts.

In fact, if you both have individual credit accounts in your names, you may be able to save a lot of money over the years by putting new cars in the name of whoever has the highest credit scores at the time.

loosenut · 07-17-2007, 08:09 AM

They stay separate. Whoever is listed 1st on the account, owns it and it is reported on their credit report. My wife has a higher score than I do, but she has less in her name.

The quickest way to lower you score is to be at 50% or less on any account that you can. So if you have a $10K limit on a credit card, make sure your balance is $5K or less.

krc333 · 07-17-2007, 08:17 AM

thanks for the feedback, i found out recently i had a parking ticket from the city of Denver from 04 that was sent to collections. I never even knew about the ticket but that was killing. Plus i had a couple of late payments while i was in school and that also brought down my score.

loosenut · 07-17-2007, 08:24 AM

Contact the places that you paid late. Sometimes you can get them to remove the credit blemish if you have been an on time payer since then. I can't hurt to try, right!

I have a great morgage broker and he helped me with getting my credit score as high as posssible for a better rate.

Ourbaby · 07-17-2007, 10:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by krc333

What will happen to my credit score when I get married in Nov.

IT ENDS JUST LIKE YOUR SOCIAL LIFE!!! J/K

That collections will haunt you for a very long time, at least 7 years after payoff. You can use her as the main pull for any loans and use you as a Co-signer.