StellarFi is a bill management tool that improves the most important factors that make up your credit score. Here’s a detailed look at exactly how StellarFi improves credit scores and overall financial health through on-time bill payments.
StellarFi supports all factors that positively impact your credit score. Most notably, StellarFi improves your positive payment history through its bill payment platform, then automatically reports these payments as a line of credit to the major credit bureaus every month. StellarFi also supports your debt-to-income (DTI) ratio through a low credit utilization, and credit age as it is a new credit account in your profile. The best part? StellarFi uses members’ existing bank accounts and bills to build their credit scores.
First, we’ll walk you through how to become a StellarFi member. Then, we’ll explain what happens behind-the-scenes as we pay bills on time and improve your credit score.
Step 1: Create a StellarFi account and pick a membership plan
It takes just a few minutes to signup for StellarFi, and you can do it entirely on your phone. Since your StellarFi account is a new credit account, we’ll ask for details about you throughout the onboarding steps. Then, we’ll give you your current credit score so you can see where you’re at before you choose how to start building!
StellarFi credit building plans start at $4.99 per month and include everything you need to build your credit score. Our Prime plan has a 30-day trial, then a monthly price of $9.99 per month after that. Additionally, Prime plan members will grow their reported credit limit through their bill payments, growing to a maximum of a $25,000 reported credit limit.
Step 2: Connect your bank account
We use a secure third-party platform to connect to your bank account to StellarFi and enable super-smooth bill payment transactions. Make sure your connect the primary checking account that you use to pay for your bills. The funds in this bank account are used to pay for your bill payments.
Step 3: Add some monthly bills
Next, you’ll need to add the bills you’re going to pay with your StellarFi card to the StellarFi app. This will help automate your monthly bill payments, and, since we pay your bills on time, it will help prevent late payment fees and overdraft charges.
You’ll choose the bills you want to add in your StellarFi dashboard (this will centralize all your payments in one place!). Commonly added bills include streaming services, gym memberships, subscription boxes, car insurance, and even rent payments. Then, we’ll give you your StellarFi Virtual Bill Pay Card number.
To finish adding your bills, just replace your current debit or credit card number with your StellarFi Card number in your biller’s payment settings. You can use your StellarFi Card to pay for almost any recurring bill that you pay online with a credit or debit card.
Note: We won’t be able to report your bills as a line of credit unless you switch your payment method to your StellarFi Card! You can always reference this card number after adding a bill in case you need to.
Step 4: Bills are automatically paid with your StellarFi Card
When your bill is due, we’ll pay for it using your StellarFi Virtual Bill Pay Card.
Once the bill is paid, we’ll process the pre-authorized payment from your linked checking account for the same amount of the bill. The funds will leave your bank account within 2-5 business days of the bill payment being made. This “repays” the amount charged to your StellarFi Virtual Bill Pay Card.
StellarFi will build your payment history, credit usage, and more with your existing bill payments and bank account. Additionally, StellarFi helps you track and manage your bills by keeping them all in one dashboard and automating on-time bill payments.
Ready to build your credit score now? Click here.
Curious how it works behind the scenes? Here’s exactly how StellarFi builds your credit:
StellarFi impacts your credit score in 5 key ways
- Builds your payment history
Your payment history makes up 35% of your credit score. Lenders like to see lots of on-time payments to show that you’re great at managing your budget.
With StellarFi, your bill payments are reported to the major credit bureaus.
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Optimizes credit usage with your StellarFi Limit
Your credit usage (also called credit utilization ratio) tells lenders how much debt you owe vs. how much credit you have available. Credit usage makes up 30% of your credit score.
StellarFi pays your bill on time then pulls the funds from your connected bank account. Since you won’t carry an ongoing balance on your payments, your credit report will reflect low utilization from your StellarFi Limit.
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Enhances your credit mix
Your credit mix makes up about 15% of your credit score. Your credit mix is determined by the types of credit accounts you have.
Lenders like to see a mix of loans (like student loans) and lines of credit (like credit cards) to show that you’re an experienced borrower.
Using StellarFi adds a line of credit account to your credit report, which can diversify your credit mix and improve your credit score.
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Improves your credit age over time
Your credit age shows lenders how long you’ve been using credit accounts, and makes up about 10% of your credit score.
By keeping your StellarFi account active, you can improve your credit age over time.
We offer the option to pause your account if needed, so you can take a break without removing your StellarFi account from your credit report.
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Doesn’t pull credit inquiries
Credit inquiries can be added to your credit report when a potential creditor looks at your full credit history.
Multiple inquiries in a short period of time can make it seem like you’re about to incur a hefty chunk of debt. For that reason, inquiries can lower your credit score.
StellarFi does NOT perform a hard inquiry on your credit report.
The bottom line
StellarFi impacts the factors that make up your credit score, and reports to the major credit bureaus that lenders use most often to make credit decisions.
StellarFi builds all VantageScores® and FICO® scores, which means you can stop worrying about your credit and start conquering your goals; like homeownership, buying a new car, starting a business, lowering your interest rates, and more.
