Here is my 'guess' and it is just that...a guess. Concerning 2 and 3. refinanced my mortgage early in 2005 to a very good rate. This now shows as a 'new' loan, and it has not been paid down much in one year, by their way of thinking. I have about $160K in untapped equity (no HELOC or anything), in what remains If I understand you correctly, you have equity in your home, but have not applied for a HELOC on it. Right? They don't have any idea really then that you have that equity...right? Now this is just a 'thought' but you might want to pay off the car loan with some of that equity in your home, and then concentrate all your efforts toward paying off the HELOC. I imagine there will be some who will say 'NO' to doing that though. I applied and was approved for a HELOC a few years ago, but have never tapped into it. I 'thought' I might want/need it to get the driveway paved, but found another way that was interest free for a year and that was all I needed. I might add that I have no loans 'open' at this time and no revolving credit 'owed', as CC are paid off each month. My guess is that once the car loan is paid, that your score will improve significantly. In the meantime your score is a high B, which is still miles above the norm. Sue

cissado, I assume that your CC means Credit Card ... and I'm wondering if I missed something, as I didn't think that there was a reference to credit cards in the present discussion. Sparksals took her bequest cheque, drawn in Canadian dollars, to a local financial agency (in AZ?) and was rather distressed that they wanted a rather hefty fee for the exchange. It was suggested that she have the money exchanged into U.S. funds in Calgary, as they have a large number of U.S. folks up there and do that all the time. As she said, the exchange rate had the Canadian Dollar increase in value relative to the U.S. one in the meantime, so she ended up getting something better than US$22,000. for her CA$25,000., rather than better than $19,000. which she was offered originally in her area. __________________________ Sparksals, As you begin (to learn about and) investing, especially when you have small amounts, mutual funds are useful vehicles. In the meantime, I suggest that you begin to learn how the money markets work, with a view to buying your own stocks directly, later. In Canada, the managers of equity-based mutual funds usually charge more than 2% of the funds managed annually as their management fee ... in the U.S., it's usually aound 1.5 - 1.75%, I think. Still, when long-term average rate of growth runs around 8%, that means that the mutual fund managers are pocketing a substantial portion of that increase ... and they get their percentage, even in years when there is no growth. I'd suggest that you visit the business and investment section of a major library and ask the people who know that section of the library to suggest some materials for you to study. I think that the 332. section will have some useful materials. If they have the Value Line evaluation system, that gives an in-depth study of a large number of companies. There's another program of investing that is comparable to mutual funds, but the annual fee is much lower, called Exchange Traded Funds. Quite a number of mutual fund managers use them, some rather extensively You can buy one issue that includes shares of a number of major companies in, say, financial, or medical, or mining, consumer, transportation, utilities and other sectors. Or you can buy a piece of a number of shares of major companies in a number of countries or areas of the world ... look under "ishares" in the NYSE listing. As the management is much less, their annual fee is much smaller - usually about 0.5% or so. While the rates of return on your CDs remains approximately the same over a number of years, there are a number of companies that have increased their dividends annually for many years ... I think that Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) have increased theirs every year for the most recent 40. And their rates of payment usually run at a similar percentage rate, which means that, usually, the share prices have advanced, as well. If you look at any financial paper, you can see the symbol that the stock market uses to designate each stock, and the prices that each is selling at currently, plus, usually, report of their recent earnings, and the dividend that they pay. If you go to a financial section on the internet, e.g., I use Yahoo, and if you go to www.yahoo.com, near the top of the page is a box with a number of topics. Click on "Finance", and when that page comes up, it offers a substantial amount of info on the general market. There's a box that says, "Get quotes", and if you enter the symbol for a given stock (e.g. "F" is Ford, "GE" is General Electric, it will give you the range of prices that people paid today for that stock. At the right there is a chart that shows the various prices today, and below it you can click on "5d" to find a chart showing the prices over the most recent 5 days, "1y" to show the price ranges for the most recent year. Above the box there is a choice that lets you choose "Line" (which is likely the one that shows), showing the closing price of the stock over a given period. Or, you can choose, "Bar", which will show the high, low and closing prices daily for whatever period that you choose. Over at the left, near the top, is a choice, "Historical prices", and you can choose daily, weekly, etc. for what length of times that you choose. You'll get a list of open, high, low and close prices over a length of time ... and dates and amounts of dividend payments (most pay quarterly). EnCana (ECA.TO for pricing in CAD in Toronto, ECA for pricing in USD on NYSE) is, long term, a good stock, mainly involved with natural gas ... I don't know whether investing in it just now is a good idea (nor do I mean to imply that it isn't), but if your time horizon is several years, I'm pretty sure that you'd be happy with it. I hope that this gives you some ideas of how to begin your adventure of learning about your investments. Learning how money works ... an interesting hobby ... *that pays well*!! ole joyful

davidandkasie, so you're saying that my credit scores on Providian and the CRA (or even myfico.com) would change by 30 points in three weeks with absolutely no change to my data in those three weeks? That's doesn't make sense to me. I understand what you are saying, but it just doesn't add up. If Providian pulls it on the 1st and let's say it's the same score as TU/CRA, then when it's posted by Providian 3 weeks later, it's up or down by 30 points, that means that something happened with my credit in those 21 days to change the score (up or down) by 30 points. That's a lot of points in 21 days if I haven't opened any new accounts, haven't closed any, haven't used my cards at all or even made a large payment on what I do owe and haven't fallen behind in any payments. So if the scores equaled on 1st day of the month, why not 21 days later if I did NOTHING at all to change anything on my credit report? I could understand a few points difference, but not the large gap I was seeing. I realize scores can change daily and your balances, etc. affect everything, but again, that's a large difference. I've had the almost the same myfico.com score (or within ten points) for a full 12-15 months usually. Just curious. This whole credit scoring system is a mess. They finally allowed the "public" to see our own scores, and now there are so many different versions, we really don't know as much as we want to.

The credit report says "Too many open accounts", as 'househunting' has stated. (well something like that) I have about 7 open, 3 with balances. I don't remember my fico - at least 760 but under 800. Thx for all the info here. I haven't read it ALL yet, but I will certainly look into reducing cr limits rather than closing...altho, there is one I know I can close. The 'average' history time is something to keep in mind. My credit report looks really messy and confused. I've found that ONE of my cc accounts 'appears' on report like 3 or 5 times! So, it looks like I have more than I actually do. This is due to banks/financial mergers/buyouts, and the company changing the cc accounts #'s for one reason or another. For example: I had cc 'A' several years back which I had used and paid off. Then another company took over bank "A" - The company sent a new card with new company name on it. which is now cc 'B'. (cc 'A' is no longer valid) Then company "B" upgrades my account after some time, sending me a new card with new acc't # (cc "C" - "to REPLACE existing card". (I never used bank "B" or "C" cards.) Another company takes over company "B", sends me new card with *their* name. Now I have cc "D". After awhile, company "upgrades" my account, "to replace existing card". Now I have cc "E"...which I have used. So, my credit report reflects 5 cc's, but in reality only ONE cc has ever been valid. It's not like I 'applied' for all these. They just kept sending them automatically to REPLACE another. This also happened recently with a major bank cc...I had had the same acct # for over 25 years, and suddenly they sent a cc with a new acc't #. When I called about this, they said they were changing ALL customers' account #'s. SO, my credit report reflects TWO accounts, when the card is actually the same. (And it really IS the same. I can call and enter my OLD acc't # and the same exact info is reflected...such as balance, pymt rec'd, etc. Well, I paid that one off Nov...so I don't know now. For two cards and two accounts, my report LOOKS like I have/had SEVEN different accounts. (Which I DID, but, not really....does that make sense?) OK, now I'm really mad since I've written this out LOL! It never occured to me how updated/replacement cc's could mess up one's cr report! I wouldn't be able to rent from 'househunting', because it appears worse than it really is! HA! OK, then I have another problem with old Dept Store CC's showing up...The stores have merged or no longer exist, yet they are still on report. (An example would be *like* Robinson's/May...I had a Robinson's card, and I had a MayCo card. I only used them each once for work gift exchange!, and I've never had a 'Robinson's/May' card.) I haven't used many store cards for at least 15 years! I have used Penney's and Mervyns', but closed those out years ago (when I found out they also accept visa/mc) Guess it's going to take a lot...