Hi guys, very happy to have stumbled upon this site. Seems to be a wealth of information and full of some very helpful members! Glad to have joined up
In the coming months my girlfriend and I plan to purchase our apartment together to live in (both first home owners)
We plan to spend about 430k on a 2 bedroom unit in the Hills District of Sydney. We currently have 43k genuine savings over last 18 months. We plan to have over 50k before we apply. We also expect the 7k FHOG. I currently earn over 60k and rising (although 9k is car allowance, hopefully this is irrelevant as car is fully owned). My partner is on 47k.
Where I am concerned is the debt I am currently paying off. The highest my debts ever reached were about 16k from being young, buying cars, and being foolish with my hard earned money. Currently have about 5k left to pay off which is currently sitting on a balance transfer 1.99% credit card and the credit card has never been used once to make a purchase.. purely was for debt consolidation and low interest pay-off
I recently obtained a copy of my credit report, and I have a total of 7 credit inquiries dating between Nov 2008 and July 2010.
-4 were for personal loans (only 3 I actually went ahead with, all for car purchases)
-2 were for credit cards (although one I backed out of)
-1 for a measly optus phone contract that is through my work and not even private!
Also there was one more inquiry I was expecting to see for November 2010 for my balance transfer card, my report is dated 7th of December, so perhaps it takes longer for an inquiry to show up and maybe if I'm lucky the NAB never did an inquiry on me.
My day-to-day banking has been with ANZ for about the last 6 months, our home savings account with ING, and my credit card with NAB (which will soon be payed and CLOSED)
By the time we apply for our loan in a few months, we both will be 100% debt free (except my 18k Uni HECS loan). No cards, we'll own both our cars, and have an excellent record of collaborative savings. Is it possible I'm worrying too much about my previous credit inquiries? Or is there something I can do to alleviate any risk here
I never understood about credit inquiries previously, and would apply for a credit card on the drop of a dime purly for a lower interest rate.. damn my parents for not educating me better in these issues!!!
My history kind of makes it look like I love bouncing between credit cards and loans a little, although atleast for the 6-12 months before loan application there will be no inquiries.. Also, should I wait 2-3 months once my NAB card is payed, or as soon as we are totally debt free is it a good time to start looking??
Sorry for the essay guys, but I'd love to read some feedback!