How do you read a credit report, and what should you look for?

Federal law entitles you to free reports from Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion through annualcreditreport.com, which is the only officially authorized source, and all three bureaus now offer free weekly access. Pull all three, since lenders report to them inconsistently and an error on one may not appear on the others. The report has four main sections: identifying information, credit accounts with their payment histories, inquiries showing who has requested your file, and public records and collections.

Read for errors with a specific checklist. In personal information, look for addresses and employers you never had, which can indicate mixed files or identity theft. In accounts, verify every account is yours, the open date and credit limit are right, the balance is plausible, and the payment history shows no late payments you did not make. Late payments should drop after seven years, and closed accounts in good standing can remain for ten. In inquiries, hard inquiries you do not recognize suggest someone applied for credit in your name. In public records, bankruptcies remain seven to ten years and civil judgments and tax liens were removed from reports in 2017 and 2018.

Dispute errors in writing with each bureau reporting them, with documentation, and the bureau must investigate within 30 days under the Fair Credit Reporting Act. Dispute with the creditor as well, since the bureau will generally just ask them. Errors are common enough that studies have found a meaningful share of consumers with at least one material inaccuracy. Note that the report contains no score; scores are computed from the report by various models, and the free score in a banking app is one of many. If you find evidence of fraud, place a fraud alert or freeze at all three bureaus, which is free, and file a report at IdentityTheft.gov, which generates the documentation creditors will ask for.