There is one lady named Carla who was planning to take a car loan after checking her credit score. But her cousin convinced her that there was no need to do that because if she checks her credit score herself, it will reduce the score. She did not consider his advice and applied for the loan without doing any checks, and as a result, she had to pay a higher rate of interest for her loan.
That single piece of bad advice cost her real money. It’s one of dozens of credit score myths floating around, passed from friend to friend like it’s fact. Some of these myths are harmless. Others quietly wreck people’s finances for years.
Myth: Checking Your Own Score Hurts It
This is probably the most common of all the credit score myths, and it’s just not true. Checking your own score is called a soft inquiry. It doesn’t affect your score at all, no matter how many times a day you look. People go years avoiding their own credit report because of this one myth alone.
What actually lowers your score a little is a hard inquiry, the kind that happens when a lender checks your credit because you applied for a loan or a new card. Even then, the drop is small and temporary. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau confirms that pulling your own free credit report never affects your score in any way. Check it as often as you want.
Myth: Closing a Credit Card Helps Your Score
Closing a card you’re not using sounds responsible. It usually backfires instead, and here’s why. Closing a credit card hurts your credit score in two specific ways. It lowers your total available credit, which raises your credit utilization ratio, the percentage of credit you’re actually using. It can also shorten the average age of your credit history if the card is an old one.
For example, assume that you own three credit cards worth $15,000 in total and owe a balance of $2,000. This is a low utilization rate of 13%, which is good for your credit score. Close the card with the $8,000 limit, and your ratio jumps to over 28% on the same balance, even though you didn’t spend a dime more. That jump alone can drop a good score by 20 points or more, depending on the rest of your credit file.
Myth: Carrying a Balance Builds Credit
Here’s one that quietly costs people real interest money for nothing. The myth of carrying a balance will improve your credit score revolves around keeping a small unpaid balance on your account to show the lender that you are a good borrower. This is simply not true. No one knows where this originated from, but it just won’t die.
Your credit score is affected by whether or not you are making timely payments and how close you are to maxing out your account.Paying your statement in full every month is better for your score and your wallet. Experian states plainly that carrying a balance provides no credit score benefit and simply costs you money in interest.
Myth: You Only Have One Credit Score
People expect one single, official number. Nope. You have several credit scores, which are computed based on various models such as FICO and VantageScore, and are obtained from the three main bureaus that are Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. That’s why the score a lender pulls during a mortgage application can land 40 points away from the one you saw on a free app last week. Both numbers can be accurate at the same time.
Myth: Your Income Affects Your Credit Score
A lot of people assume a bigger paycheck means a bigger score. Nope. Income isn’t part of the calculation at all. Someone earning $200,000 a year with missed payments and maxed out cards can end up with a lower score than someone earning $40,000 who just pays on time, which throws people off since it seems backwards. Lenders do look at income separately when deciding whether to approve a loan, but the score itself only reflects how you’ve handled credit, not how much you make.
Myth: Getting Married Merges Your Credit Scores
Newlyweds sometimes worry a spouse’s bad credit history will drag their own score down the moment they say “I do.” Take a breath; it won’t. Credit scores stay individual for life, marriage or not. There’s no joint score that averages the two of you together, no matter how much your finances merge in every other way.
What can change is your credit if you open joint accounts together, like a shared credit card or a mortgage. Once both names are on an account, that account’s payment history shows up on both credit reports. So a spouse’s late payment on a joint card can hurt your score, but their old, pre-marriage credit history never touches your report at all.
What Actually Improves Your Credit Score
Since the myths get so much attention, it helps to end with what genuinely works.Timely payment of all bills has been the largest contributing component accounting for about 35% of the total FICO score. The second largest contributor to one’s score is the maintenance of your credit utilization ratio under 30%, preferably 10%.Together, those two habits alone account for nearly two thirds of the score.
Beyond that, how to improve your credit score usually comes down to patience more than tricks. Avoid opening several new accounts at once. Let old accounts stay open when you can. Check your credit reports for errors through AnnualCreditReport.com and dispute anything that looks wrong, since mistakes on a credit report are more common than most people realize.
Why These Credit Score Myths Are So Hard to Kill
Most of these myths stick around because they sound reasonable. Closing a card feels responsible. Carrying a balance feels like proof of trustworthiness. Sorting credit score facts vs myths usually just takes checking the math instead of trusting your gut, but the myths keep spreading anyway, usually from someone repeating what they heard from someone else.
It’s not a fancy solution, but it gets the job done. Rely on the credit bureaus and official government sources rather than the information that your uncle received from the backyard barbecue. If an offer regarding your score seems too easy to be true, it might just be. You can find more breakdowns like this on our credit score myths resource page.
FAQ
Does checking my own credit score lower it?
No. Checking your own score is a soft inquiry and never affects your credit score, no matter how often you do it.
Does closing a credit card help my credit score?
Usually not. Closing a card can raise your credit utilization ratio and shorten your credit history, both of which can lower your score.
Do I need to carry a balance to build credit?
No. Paying your balance in full each month is better for your score and saves you money on interest.
Why do I have more than one credit score?
Scores can be calculated using different types of scoring models by different credit bureaus, thus resulting in multiple numbers reflecting the same credit history.
Does my income affect my credit score?
No. Income isn’t part of the credit score calculation at all, though lenders may still consider it separately when approving a loan.
