Intuit Credit Karma
CreditKarma, launched a little over a year ago, offers a free credit score from TransUnion, along with a credit analysis tool and simulator, which helps you see how certain actions (say, applying for a new credit card or paying late) will affect your current score.
Denver borrowers recorded a 7 percent rate of decrease in their credit-card balances during the third quarter versus a 5 percent decline in Colorado and a 4 percent decline nationally, according to a report Wednesday from Credit Karma, a San Francisco provider of consumer credit-reporting services.
Like most good things in life, credit cards can do us good or bad. So will the limitation help or hinder? According to Ken Lin of Credit Karma, this limitation could just keep young adults from building credit.
CreditKarma.com, which also relies on TransUnion data, gives you one of the same credit scores that TransUnion sells directly to consumers. In addition, it provides a report card grading consumers from A to F across seven key components affecting their scores and ranks the importance of each factor on a scale of high, medium or low.
Credit Karma.com, which launched its Web site in March 2008, now has close to 1 million users who have checked out their score, according to Ken Lin, founder and CEO of the San Francisco company. "People are so worried about ID theft and their credit these days, it really helped with growth," Lin said. "Credit scores have been a very opaque process. There's been very little visibility on how it works."
Now, there are two ways to get a pretty good sense of your credit score for free. First, Creditkarma.com will give you an actual credit score. I have checked my score a couple of times through this site and have found it to be accurate.
I love the site. I have been on it since June and using it to track my score is nice.
It's a common misconception that credit scores are united in marriage, says Ken Lin, CEO of Credit Karma, a credit-score management service based in San Francisco. While you may share financial obligations in marriage, your credit scores will remain separate. But you may find that your spouse's credit habits can affect your credit score, Lin says -- with such details as whether you pay bills on time, or how much of the available balance you use on joint credit-card or joint-loan accounts...
The credit card culture is changing for good, as a result of new regulations. And consumers must learn new rules when it comes to paying with plastic. "Consumers may find it's going to be much harder to get credit if they're on the margin," warned Ken Lin, CEO and founder of Credit Karma in San Francisco.
"There is a small but vocal minority that has never used credit," says Ken Lin, CEO of credit tracking Website CreditKarma.com in San Francisco. Although Lin understands some consumers' decision to totally abstain from credit card debt, he says that when used properly "credit is a fantastic convenience".