re: Free Credit Report website

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Is credit karma accurate? I don't really understand what's happening with my score. I bought a house in December and had a score of 789. Just bought a car a month ago and it was 712. I attributed that to keeping ~33% balance on a 0% credit card and buying a car for the wife in March. I've paid the credit card down to get my score back up. Checked today, and credit karma says I have a 660!!!. I'm hoping that I can just continue to pay everything for the next year and my score shoots back up. But I don't know what the hell caused it to drop so much.

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CreditKarma is a good free way to see what's on your credit but it isn't always accurate. My FICO score (which is what lenders use) is about 30 points higher than my CreditKarma score right now. The scoring models weigh the variables differently. Your FICO score will be maximized if you pay that card down to less than 10% but still keep a small balance on it. I use MyFico.com and have played around with my score, leaving different balances on my cards just to see how it affects the score. I keep a 0 balance on all my credit cards and less than 10% on one. That seems to be the sweet spot for most people.