Why Credit Karma is Awesome

In San Francisco in 2007, a company was founded that would change the personal finance field forever. The company we are referring to is Credit Karma, a company that offers a free credit and financial management platform for US customers on the web and major mobile platforms. While the company was originally started to allow individuals to receive their free credit score instantly and review their real credit report online, it has evolved into so much more. On an important note, we received no advertising or payment from Credit Karma; we just believe it is an important tool for those that are working to improve their credit.

Why Credit Karma is Awesome

About Credit Karma

Credit Karma is not just a supplier of easy-to-read credit reports and insights into your credit score, but also offers tools and tips to you help understand and improve your credit scores, as well as, provide a free credit monitoring service that can help you spot potential identity theft.

It’s Awesome

Credit Karma is 100% free for consumers. To set up an account you enter your information into their 128 bit encrypted site and you get free weekly updated credit scores and credit reports from the national credit bureaus TransUnion and Equifax, as well as, daily credit monitoring from TransUnion. Additionally, you get cool credit tools to help improve your score and clean up your report. These tools include the Credit Score Simulator which can simulate how much your credit will improve if you pay off a loan early or get caught up on payments. Credit Karma even allows you to track your credit card spending and loan transactions and balances. All this is yours without having to take a hard or soft inquiry to your credit or enter your credit card information.

Credit Kompetition

There are at least 3 well known competitors to Credit Karma, although nothing is preventing you from signing up for all 4 (all are free and require NO credit card to sign up), to get a broader picture of your credit health. The competitors are Quizzle, Credit Sesame, and the newer Discover Credit Scorecard. The main difference between Credit Karma and Credit Sesame is the updating frequency: Credit Sesame is updated monthly compared to weekly with Credit Karma. Discover Credit Scorecard differs from Credit Karma in the type of score you get: Credit Scorecard boasts a true FICO score while the report you get from Karma is known as your VantageScore – a scoring process that was jointly developed by all three credit monitoring agencies. Quizzle also gives you your Vantage Score but is only updated every six months.

Anyone trying to improve their credit score needs tools like these in order to be able to monitor where you’re at today, plan where you’re going, and be able to see improvements over time. Your credit score is based on a number of factors such as payment history and your total balances compared to your debt. If you’re debt is currently so bad that you can’t get caught up, then you should call on your local bankruptcy attorney to review your situation and find out the best course to help you get back on track and improve your credit.