Having a good credit score is critically important these days, not only will determine if you can get a loan it will also determine how much that loan will cost you. In addition potential employers, landlords and a whole host of other people will check your credit. Making sure that you have a good credit score is not all that hard you just have to make sure that you use your credit in a responsible manner.
Far and away the most important thing that you can do to keep your credit score intact is to make sure that you pay your bills on time. Every late payment will hurt your credit and if you go a few months without making your payments your creditors will write off your debt. When this happens your credit has been seriously damaged. Paying your bills on time is very important if you want to preserve your credit and it is something that you have to strive to do.
Besides paying your bills on time you need to make sure that you use your credit responsibly. This is especially important when it comes to using your credit cards. A credit card is what is known as revolving debt and if you aren't careful you can hurt your credit without realizing it. The credit bureaus don't want to see you using the maximum amount of credit that you have available. Doing so is taken as an indication that if they gave you more credit you would use it until eventually you reach the point where you are borrowing more than you can afford. As a rule you should not be using more than half of your credit limit.
The other thing that you really have to be careful about is having too much credit. Again this sends a message to the credit bureaus that you may be borrowing more than you can afford. You want to avoid having too many credit cards and even applying for a card can hurt your credit. Ideally you should have just a couple of credit cards, that should be all you need. If you do have more cards than that don't just run out and cancel them, closing a whole bunch of accounts at once can hurt your credit, as can closing accounts that have been open for a long time.
It is also important to make sure that you check your credit card report on a regular basis. There are a surprising number of credit reports that have errors on them. You can get a free copy of your credit report once each year, make sure you do this. Also make sure that you get a copy from all three credit bureaus since a mistake on one of them can do your credit serious damage. If you find any errors make sure that you get them corrected right away.