If you would have asked me this question a week ago, I would have said no. Most landlords and property managers do not report your rental history to the credit bureaus unless you do not pay and they have to evict you.
Last week I was working with a first time home buyer that had very little credit history. He worked hard, paid off his car loan quickly and never carried a credit card balance. He was in the process of purchasing a home in Redding with a 20% down payment. One would assume that this situation would be a slam dunk, right? Actually, it was not.
The loan underwriter was concerned about the buyers lack of credit history. So, the loan officer, scrambling to figure away to make this deal work, contacted one of the three major credit bureaus and provided them with the lease agreement and a statement from the landlord explaining that the rent was on time and the tenant was great.
After this change was applied to the buyers credit, the loan officer was able to re-submit the loan to the underwriter and they approved the loan! The last two years of good rental history was enough to put him over the edge.
After hearing about what this loan officer was able to do, I did a little research and concluded that this is something that every renter should do. The first step would be contacting the three major credit bureaus and ordering a copy of your credit report.
Experian-1-888-397-3742
www.experian.com
TransUnion-1-800-916-8800
www.transunion.com
Equifax-1-800-685-1111
www.equifax.com
Once you receive the report, verify that the rental history is not already listed. If it is not, you can contact the credit agencies and ask them to add the history to your report. They will most likely ask you for documentation to backup your claim, such as a copy of your rental agreement and copies of canceled rent checks.
I would love to hear your experiences with this. Please feel free to comment below.
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