Consumer Car Buying Advice Blog

Credit Karma teams up with TransUnion to provide free credit scores for consumers.

The best things in life are…

Go ahead, finish the sentence. But if you answered with the word “free”, I’d have to take exception. Air, water and one credit report from each of the major bureaus are all free, but everything else, including your credit score, requires that you cough up a few bucks. In the case of your credit score, that means signing up for one of the services, or a combination of services, offered by one of the three credit bureaus at a cost of $15 per month or more.

Credit Karma to the rescue

That is, until now. Here at Auto Credit Express, we’ve written about the internet site CreditKarma.com before. But the last time we discussed the San Francisco-based company, it wasn’t clear where they were pulling score from. Today, that mystery has been cleared up in a press release issued by the company:
SAN FRANCISCO, – Credit Karma, a resource that helps empower consumers to actively manage their financial health, today announced an agreement with TrueCredit.com, a leading provider of credit reports and consumer credit education, that will enable consumers to obtain their TransUnion credit scores at no cost. Both companies believe that it is more important than ever to provide consumers with the tools and information to better understand how lenders are evaluating them.

A recent Federal Reserve Board survey showed tightening lending standards across every major loan category, including mortgage and credit card interest rates. Moreover, financial experts suggest that to qualify for the best mortgage rates in today’s market, consumers need a much higher credit score; some suggest it will need to be as high as 750 to qualify for the most favorable rates.

“Credit scores are being scrutinized more than ever before, so it is critical for consumers to know what their score is and how it’s likely to be viewed by a lender,” said Lucy Duni, vice president of Consumer Education at TrueCredit.com by TransUnion. “Since your credit score is derived from the data in your credit report, reviewing your report on a regular basis is also essential to gaining a truly holistic view of your overall finances.”

“We are proud to partner with TrueCredit.com to provide consumers with the chance to access their score for free,” said Kenneth Lin, founder and CEO of Credit Karma. “Credit scores are a window into one’s financial health, and Credit Karma remains committed to giving consumers free access to that score as well as educating them about the tools they can use to understand it.”

To obtain your free TransUnion score from Credit Karma, visit http://www.creditkarma.com

The Bottom Line

So there you have it. Your free credit score through Credit Karma will be coming from TransUnion. You also need to remember that your credit score can vary from bureau to bureau, so the scores from both Equifax and Experian could be different from the one you receive from Credit Karma. One other thing – there is a catch to receiving your score from Credit Karma - you have to endure marketing offers from various companies based on your credit score in order to view the results.

Even taking this into consideration, however, one free credit score is better than none at all and it does give you a real idea of where you stand with lenders. What that means is that, from our perspective, maybe at least some of the best things in life are for free.

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