Joshua Heckathorn

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Joshua Heckathorn

Joshua Heckathorn is a credit expert and has been featured on CNNMoney, FOX Business, Yahoo Finance, The Street, and many other national publications during the past twenty years.  He received a Bachelor of Science in Management (Finance) from Brigham Young University's Marriott School of Business and earned his MBA from Seattle University.

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Recent Blogs

Capital One, Chase and Citibank Warn of Email Breach

April 4th, 2011 by Joshua Heckathorn

Did you receive emails from credit card companies over the weekend that read something like the following? "Recently, we were notified of a system breach at Epsilon, a third-party vendor that provides marketing services to a number of companies. The information obtained was limited to the customer name and email address of some credit card customers. No account information or other information was compromised and therefore there is no reason to re-issue a new card."

Keeping Cash on Hand for Emergencies

March 31st, 2011 by Joshua Heckathorn

The earthquake in Japan scared the crap out of me, and I was simply sitting in the comfort of my home nearly 5,000 miles away. I would find myself up late at night watching video clips on CNN over and over again thinking, "Did this really just happen?" The footage looked like something straight out of an apocalyptic movie. Really scary stuff!

Short Sales and Foreclosures Have Same Effect on Credit

March 25th, 2011 by Joshua Heckathorn

Are you confronted with a possible short sale or foreclosure on your home? If so, you may be wondering how long it will take your FICO scores to FULLY recover after one of these bombshells hits your credit reports. It's a great question, and it happens to be one that we receive emails about every day. Well, now we have some hard data from FICO that finally helps clear up all the confusion around FICO scores, short sales, and foreclosures.

Ask Creditnet: Should I Cut My Credit Limit?

March 18th, 2011 by Joshua Heckathorn

Dear Creditnet: My wife and I have excellent credit scores, but we used to only have one no annual fee credit card with a limit of $10,000 (balance is paid off each month). I recently opened another credit card with better rewards and it has a $20,000 credit limit.

I've been told not to close out our first credit card account, but should I lower the credit limit on it to somewhere around $500 since we won't be using it? Or will our credit scores be negatively affected by lowering our available credit limit from $30,000 to $20,500?

Will St. Patrick's Day Break the Bank?

March 15th, 2011 by Joshua Heckathorn

But that's not to say that St. Patrick's Day isn't mighty. March 17th is about celebrating a nation's heritage as much as it is to indulge in a pint or two (or three). St. Paddy's is often overlooked in favor of such blockbuster boozing holidays as New Year's Eve and the 4th of July. But does it deserve to be stuck in the minor leagues of spending?

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