My full time job is in the auto industry (google me, I’m easy to find), and I cannot tell you how frustrating it is when a very needy car buyer comes in hoping to get a new automobile and leaves sad.
All excited, they have picked out the type of vehicle they want, and using Credit Karma to get their credit score, they have done basic math to learn what they can afford based on said score.
The problem? Credit Karma is not real. It does NOT reflect your true credit score, and in fact ALWAYS shows a persons score higher (or MUCH higher) than it actually is. This only leads to disappointment when they come in, thinking they can afford a vehicle they are dreaming about, only to discover their true score is much lower, and the dream car is just that, a dream. Not reality.
I like what Credit Karma is trying to do, but they have and are failing. They are simply setting up people for disappointment, and from what I can see, is now only designed to rake in information from you so they can sell advertisers your information. Love spam!!
So please, don’t use Credit Karma. It’s not real.
- Tim Robertson
You are correct. Except…. I am signed up for WAY too may credit monitoring agencies, as each breach gives yet another few years of credit monitoring. And each of them also gives you “access” to your credit score. Turns out, most of them report almost the same numbers. When we bought a house 3 years ago, the credit number the broker got was actually higher than what these so called credit score agencies were reporting. I do agree Credit Karma seems to be the worst for showing a number similar to the others, but sadly, these ‘public’ reporting companies are all the average person has access to. Do you have another suggestion on how to get a more accurate numbers, without hitting the credit report, which can lower one’s score. (Which is what happens when you look at the dealership.)
Freecreditreport.com. It does not hurt your score to pull from all three bureaus once a year, and those are your actual scores.