(NAPS)—Every year, millions of Americans are denied loans for homes and cars due to errors on their credit reports. While a late payment or derogatory mark from a creditor may seem harmless, it can have long-standing consequences on your credit, most notably your credit score.

Credit scores are important as 90 percent of banks use this number to determine a person’s creditworthiness. The more errors on one’s report, the lower the score and therefore, the harder it may be to obtain credit.

Credit errors that can affect your score are most commonly found in:

• Merchant Trade Lines—department store cards, auto loans, mortgages and credit cards. If you have a history of late payment, or if the trade line was included in bankruptcy, charged off or put into repossession, that’s bad for your credit.
• Collection Account—was your account referred to collections because of delinquency or a bad check? Any type of collection account, whether paid or not, is considered very negative by all credit grantors.
• Court Records—bankruptcies, judgments, liens and divorces. All court records, including satisfactions, are considered negative by all credit grantors.
• Credit Searchers—Every time a potential credit grantor looks at your credit file, a credit inquiry appears on at least one of your credit bureau reports. If too many recent inquiries show up on your credit report, credit grantors may become nervous.

The more questionable negative items on your credit report, the lower your credit score and the lower your chances of getting the money you need at an interest rate you can afford—and one in every five Americans has mistakes on his or her credit report.

Fortunately, according to the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you have the right to challenge the information recorded on your credit reports. That, however, is not always easy. Effective, enduring credit repair requires taking appropriate action with your creditors rather than simply creating ineffective disputes for credit bureaus.

That’s where a credit repair company can come in. For example, Lexington Law will challenge questionable items on your behalf through direct, electronic communications with all three credit bureaus: TransUnion, Equifax and Experian. Although it has a relationship with the three, it doesn’t hesitate to ask tough questions that affirm all three reporting standards: A credit report should be accurate, fair and substantiated. The firm challenges information that may be technically accurate but still unfairly reported or unsubstantiated. It finds out where the information on your report came from and how it’s been documented. It knows which laws to leverage and how to leverage them appropriately, legally and ethically. The end result is a fair, accurate and substantiated report.

As best-selling author and consumer credit expert Dr. Randy Padawer put it, “If the credit industry is going to buy and sell consumers’ personal and private information for profit, they need to be able to answer a lot of tough questions about it. Lexington Law is a center for advocacy rather than just simple disputation. While other folks leverage one law, Lexington leverages many laws.”

That can help you have a fair chance at getting approved for what you want and open up opportunities to achieve your dreams.

Learn More

For further facts and figures about credit and how to repair yours, go to www.lexingtonlaw.com or call 833-336-1839.