Hello friends and welcome to Money Girl, a podcast that helps you master your money so you can live rich and love the journey.

My name is Laura Adams. I'm a personal finance expert and

award-winning author of several books including Moneygirls Smart Moves to

Grow Rich. You can learn more about me at Laura D Adams.com. I'm really excited

about today's show. You're going to hear my interview with Rod Griffin, who is

experienced director of public education.

If you're not familiar with Experian, they're one of the three nationwide credit reporting agencies in the United States.

The other two are Equifax and TransUnion.

So Rod brings an insider's view about how the National Credit Reporting Agencies work and also

the rights that we have as consumers.

He's even had his own personal credit challenges, like

becoming the victim of tax fraud. He tells that story in the interview and gives lots of

advice and resources to build and manage your credit the best way possible.

We covered a lot of ground.

This is a much longer podcast than I normally do.

I thought about cutting the interview down, but then I said, no, this is great stuff, so I want to give it all to you.

We talked about what to do if you're just starting out or building credit from scratch.

We discussed how to manage credit utilization and whether you can game the system by making early payments on revolving

accounts. We covered no preset spending limit credit cards and how those affect your credit.

You'll also get the scoop on credit repair companies

and how to protect yourself from any bogus claims.

You'll know what to do if you suspect or know that you've been the victim of fraud.

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