 TITLE: How Does Inflation Affect Your Credit? CONTENT: Inflation Is Not a Credit Score Factor\n--------------------------------------\nRising prices and the dollar's purchasing power have no direct impact on credit or credit scores: Credit scores are calculated using the data compiled in your credit reports by the three national credit bureaus (Experian, TransUnion and Equifax). Credit reports document your accounts, their status and your history of borrowing and repaying debts. Economic measurements such as inflation do not influence credit scores. Only the following factors affect your FICO® Score☉ , which is the credit score used by 90% of top lenders:\n*   **Timely payments**: Paying your debts on time each month is the top factor for promoting credit score improvement. As a result, late or missed payments can do significant damage to your credit scores. Payment history is responsible for about 35% of your FICO® Score.\n*   **Credit usage:** Your total debt, and especially your credit utilization—the percentage of your credit card borrowing limits represented by your outstanding balances—contributes about 30% of your FICO® Score. As the sum of all your balances approaches and exceeds 30% of the sum of all your credit limits, your credit scores can see a potentially significant drop.\n*   **The length of your credit history:** Lenders value borrowers with lots of experience managing debt. For that reason, credit scores tend to increase over time in the absence of missed payments or other credit slip-ups. The age of your credit history accounts for about 15% of your FICO® Score.\n*   **Credit mix:** Lenders also value a borrower's ability to handle multiple types of debt at once. Your FICO® Score may be helped if you have multiple open accounts, and combinations of installment debt and revolving credit. Credit mix is responsible for about 10% of your FICO® Score.\n*   **New credit:** When you apply for a credit card or loan, the lender typically requests a copy of your credit report and, often, a credit score based on that report—a credit check known as a hard inquiry. Hard inquiries have the potential to cause temporary credit score drops. The appearance of a new credit account can also result in a short-lived score drop. New credit accounts for about 10% of your FICO® Score. END