Your credit score means everything - and nothing
Your credit score will nose its way into nearly every major milestone in your life. At every turn - buying your first car, leaving your parents' cellphone plan, moving to a new apartment with a partner - you'll need good credit. Without scores of 690 or higher on an 850-point scale, you'll generally pay more than you need to. But people with bad credit are not bad people. Even the companies that dole out credit scores know this. "The credit score is not a reflection of who you are as a person or how accomplished you are," says Jeff Richardson, a spokesperson for VantageScore, one of the two main credit scoring models. "It is not passing any judgment." You might, however, be judging yourself for the choices that sunk your score, or the fact that you've been too overwhelmed to think about it. The best way to get your credit score back on track is to loosen its hold on your self-worth. Don't be afraid to look: You'll need to know whe