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You just applied for a loan and the loan officer mentions that they need to run a credit report and will provide you with a copy of the report, but this is your first time and you feel a little apprehensive.

Not to worry, a credit report is a gathering of all of your credit history that is obtained from the consumer reporting agency (CRA). There are three main consumer reporting agency's, Equifax, Experian and Trans Union.

They are referred to by the name of credit bureaus. They store your financial activities items such as loans, credit cards, any outstanding balances, if you make your payments on time, actions against you (if any), errors, disputes and other pertinent information in a huge database and sell your information for a fee. Your credit score will be based upon the information stored in your credit report. Your detailed credit report may be up to twenty-two pages long.

Most credit bureaus list information typically in the same format, but may vary slightly. The first component of your credit report will be all of your personal information. It will contain your name, social security number, your age and or date of birth, any names that you are known by (past and present), your current and previous addresses as well as the date of those addresses, any other forms of identification that you have used, your employment history, any alerts (such as fraud alert) and if you have a consumer statement on file.

The second component of your credit report is a summary listing of your credit account activity. This component contains information such as types of accounts, number of accounts and balance of accounts. For example, if you have a mortgage, installment, revolving, or other accounts, their total and the balance remaining. It also lists how many accounts are open and how many you have closed. It also contains information of if the accounts are in good standing, and how many are past due. It tells if you have any negative account history and how many inquires that you have had about your credit in the past year.

The third component is the actual detail of your credit account information. This is a detailed list of all the credit cards and loans that you have outstanding. It lists the name, such as Sears, the type of account, such as revolving, your account number, when you opened it, balance of the account, date reported and amount past due, negative account history, your account status and the credit limit. It also gives a detailed list of your mortgage

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