Book Review: David Bach's Debt Free For Life, Chapter 8

Earlier this week, I offered my impressions of chapter 7 of Debt Free For Life, the latest in a series of personal finance books by David Bach.  I have also been asked to take a look at Chapter8 of the same book; Your Credit Report And Score: What It Is And How To Fix It Fast.

In this chapter, Bach hands out the basics of credit scores, as the title would suggest. He really is not covering any new ground.  Most people should know this information, but there is a huge number out there that do not. He informs readers that credit scores not only affect people’s ability to borrow money, but can cause people to be turned down for a new job or a promotion. This is all true, but I was surprised that Bach failed to mention the growing role that credit scores are having in the insurance industry.  People are getting charged different rates depending on their credit scores, further bolstering his argument that his readers should know and care what their score is.

From there, he discusses the nature of FICO scores and the scores from other agencies.  He presents the formula that is used to determine your credit score, as well as a 12 step program to improve your score.  The advice he gives is commonsense, but not groundbreaking by any means.  His target audience is clearly people who have had trouble paying their bills in the past, so many of them will probably be able to soak this information up and make good use of it.  As with the previous chapter I looked at, there is a healthy dose of self help style encouragement here as well.

Those already versed in the function of credit bureaus and the nature of credit scores will find little new information here, but if you are new to the subject, this is a pretty good place to start.