Poor financial management

If you regularly go overdrawn, miss payments and are not saving much, this is unlikely to affect your overall score (but see opposite on missed payments). Lenders will want to see evidence of your income and expenditure commitments, and as long as these show that your books balance overall, you should be OK.

Missed or late payments

If you miss one payment on a credit card, loan, utility or telecoms bill,it’s known as going into arrears. Whether this impacts on your credit score will depend when you missed the payment: if it’s within the last 12 months it would have to be declared to lenders and will definitely impact on your credit score.Some lenders will not touch you as a result, but a lot of lenders are generous about the odd late payment.

If you miss several payments, you will be considered to have defaulted on your loan or debt, in which case lenders will not consider offering you a mortgage.

Unplanned overdraft or going over your overdraft limit

If you regularly go into an unplanned overdraft or go over your overdraft limit, this may affect your credit score; this stays on your credit rating for the next three months, so may show up when you submit your mortgage application. But if you have a deposit of 10% or more, it is less likely to effect which products are available to you.

County Court Judgements

A County Court Judgement ordering you to repay a debt stays on your credit history for six years, unless you pay it off in full within 30 days of receiving it. It can be for anything from not paying a parking fine to failing to pay for goods or services. If you have defaulted on a County Court Judgement (which can result in your creditor asking the court to enforce payment of the debt), you will find it hard to take out a mortgage