- Principal: amount borrowed
- Interest: amount paid to lender for using money
- Loan fees
- Revolving loans
- Fixed rate loans
- Variable rate loans
- Sometimes initial rate is lower to entice borrower
- Amortization table
- Part of payment goes to interest
- Interest changes monthly because beginning loan balance changes and gets smaller each month
- Credit report: summarized accounting of your credit history
- Lender requests to determine creditworthiness
- Actions
- Credit bureau: company that maintains credit files on consumers
- Primary national credit bureaus
- Equifax
- TransUnion
- Experian
- Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO): nation’s leading credit-scoring company
- Payment history 35%
- Amount of credit 30%
- Length of credit 15%
- New credit 10%
- Types of credit 10%
- Secured loans: backed by collateral
- Unsecured loan