Indianabound

Hi I moved to work in Indiana in January, I have since got married and I'm starting to apply for a Green Card.

One problem has been my lack of credit history but want to build history and improve my score ASAP so I can ultimately get a mortgage in the future...

How do I best do this?

At present I still can't even get a credit card... anyone been in a similar situation?

Thanks for you help everyone

gazzpfc

When we went there we were same as is everyone.
If you banked with HSBC for example it seems a relatively simple process to get US account with cards etc.

We took bank statements, letter from mortgage company showing we owned house outright in UK as it was final payment stuff and I suppose best of all we got company to talk to its bankers.
Took about 4 months of running our checking account well before we got a visa initially low limit of $2000 but by end it was at $10000.

Indianabound

Yeah I've been able to get a bank account, but wonder how can I kick-start my credit score/credit history...

Trixie_b

get a secured card. give your bank $300 and they'll give you a credit card with a max limit of $300 - use this for a year or two and you'll have a credit score.

As a point of reference, I've been living here for 2 and a bit years and now I have a pretty decent score - it's this last year that's made a difference

Bob

This topic has been covered hundreds of times, with a lot of good info in a horde of threads, there's even a pretty good wiki article on how to get started....worth looking out for.

Bob

Score alone ain't all that important though really....it's the history that makes a real difference when going for a mortgage...

Trixie_b

I was still a bit "young" on history when I got my credit reports for a re-fi 2 weeks ago.

meauxna

Is your spouse a US citizen? How's her/his credit? You may still benefit from being an 'authorized user' on their existing account; my DH went from zero to 800 very quickly.

gazzpfc

Well we also got car finance relatively easily that will I presume show on your credit rating.

Bob

after 6 months it will.

Indianabound

this article is great... http://www.kamya.com/intro/miscstoriescred.html

thanks everyone lots of great advice

meauxna

omigosh, there's a blast from the past! kamya FTW!
(bear in mind that those experiences may be 10 years old and no longer applicable)

Michael

As meauxna stated, being an "authorized user" on someone credit card (only if they have a good credit history on that card) will build up your credit score quickly. Since you inherit the history of the card, you will also get a credit history.

The practice of piggybacking on someones credit card to build up a credit history was temporarily discontinued in 2007 but was reinstated after Fair Isaac (FICO) lost a lawsuit to a credit repair company (they were using master credit cards to build up clients credit scores). Now it is much more difficult for credit repair companies to piggyback even though it is allowed for normal customers.

http://www.creditcards.com/credit-ca...-user-1265.php

You are allowed to check your credit report for free from the 3 credit bureaus annually by using the following government sanctioned site.

https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp

princessconsuela

This is something that's really worrying me for when I move over in January. The things I have done are to get an American Express card in the UK which can easily be transfered to an American American Express card. I've also opened an account with HSBC in the US and they'll give me a credit card too. I'm going to stop at 2 credit cards though because more than that I've heard can negatively affect your score. I was also worried about buying a car because I would need a loan for that so I am buying one through international autosource as they'll give you a good deal and give you a loan without a US credit history.

So that's my plan of attack so far! Good luck!

Bob

Getting a car lone is a great way to build credit history...put the deposit down, get lone and if you can pay the bulk of it off do so, but keep the remainder going for at least 6 months.