This Company Wants You To Rent Your Credit History

Forbes

When a woman who once bore the title “Financial Applications Product Owner II” at an insurance company, starts a TikTok with “this is the sketchiest thing I’m doing to make extra money,” you might think she’s playing it up for drama. But Amber Smith, a 27-year-old from Des Moines, Iowa with an MBA, is dead serious. She’s swapped insurance for the influencer business (focusing her content on reselling clothes), and she’s been picking up $40 here and there with a scheme that sounds pretty shady.  “I’ve started selling tradelines on my credit cards,” Smith says in the video that has since garnered millions of views across the social mediasphere. “Essentially what this is, is if a person has bad credit, but they know that they need to get a mortgage or a car loan or something, they pay money to this website,” she says, referring to Tradeline Supply Company, a San Diego based broker. “This website matches them up with me based on what they’re looking for and I add them as an authorized user to my credit card.”  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/brandonkochkodin/2024/05/07/this-company-wants-you-to-rent-your-credit-history/?sh=58ff759f20e5  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00 Here's your Forbes Daily Briefing for Friday, May 10.

00:05 Today on Forbes, this company wants to rent your credit history.

00:11 When a woman who once bore the title "Financial Applications Product Owner 2" at an insurance

00:16 company starts a TikTok with "This is the sketchiest thing I'm doing to make extra

00:21 money," you might think she's playing it up for drama.

00:26 But Amber Smith, a 27-year-old from Des Moines, Iowa with an MBA, is dead serious.

00:32 She's swapped insurance for the influencer business, focusing her content on reselling

00:36 clothes.

00:37 And she's been picking up $40 here and there with a scheme that sounds pretty shady.

00:43 In the video that has since garnered millions of views across the social media sphere, Smith

00:47 says "I've started selling trade lines on my credit cards.

00:51 Essentially what this is, is if a person has bad credit, but they know that they need to

00:56 get a mortgage or a car loan or something, they pay money to this website."

01:01 The website she's referring to is Trade Line Supply Company, a San Diego-based broker.

01:07 Smith continues, "This website matches them up with me based on what they're looking

01:11 for and I add them as an authorized user to my credit card."

01:15 A trade line, for the uninitiated, is what the credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian, and

01:22 TransUnion, call each credit card account listed on an individual's credit history

01:27 report.

01:28 Algorithms turn the information in credit reports into a credit score, most often a

01:32 FICO score ranging from 300 to 850.

01:36 Incredibly, individuals like Smith with strong credit histories can make money by adding

01:41 total strangers as authorized users on their credit cards.

01:45 These buyers don't actually gain access to the card.

01:47 Instead, they get a trade line, paying for the benefit of the card's favorable characteristics

01:52 — its long account history, high credit limits, and impeccable on-time payment record

01:56 — to appear on their own credit reports.

02:00 The richer the card's history and the larger its credit line, the higher the fee it commands.

02:05 After a few months, the seller removes the buyer from the card and opens up the spot

02:09 for the next customer to piggyback off their sterling credit profile.

02:14 On TradeLineSupply's website recently, a 3-year-old Capital One card with a $5,000

02:20 limit was listed at $322.

02:22 Meanwhile, a 19-year-old Chase card with a $69,700 limit was priced at $1,955 — almost

02:31 as much as the average American household spends on housing each month.

02:35 There appears to be quite a big markup involved.

02:38 Capital influencer Smith says she earned $40 from a sale that TradeLineSupply priced at

02:43 $275.

02:46 Darren Eba, TradeLineSupply's chief operations officer, wouldn't discuss the company's

02:50 revenue or markups, but did take pains to point out that the company isn't promising

02:55 buyers results.

02:56 He says, "Many consumers make the mistake of thinking that trade lines arbitrarily boost

03:01 credit scores.

03:02 However, this is not necessarily true."

03:06 Forbes reached out to two other trade line selling sites — competitors Boost Credit

03:10 101 and Superior Trade Lines — but both didn't respond to requests for comment.

03:16 Despite Eba's disclaimer, TradeLine buyers obviously believe it's a quick and effective

03:20 way to hack their credit scores, getting a temporary boost that might qualify them for

03:24 credit lines and loans — or for lower rates — than they could get otherwise.

03:29 And there's some evidence it can work.

03:32 There are also plenty of critics.

03:34 Beverly Harzog, a credit card expert and the host of Your Personal Economy podcast, says,

03:39 "I don't think this is a good idea for buyers or sellers.

03:43 It's not technically illegal, but whenever you have to say that something isn't technically

03:47 illegal, there's something else wrong with it.

03:50 There's a lot of risk involved.

03:52 You could break the terms and conditions of your credit card.

03:54 You could be helping someone commit fraud."

03:58 For sellers, the main risk is getting their card canceled if the issuer catches wind of

04:02 the trade line selling.

04:04 Then there's the slim chance — albeit a scary one — that a buyer might finagle

04:08 their way into actually charging purchases on the account, even without a physical card.

04:13 They could, in theory, pull some tricks using the details that pop up on their credit report.

04:19 Online chatter suggests it's unlikely, but Amber Smith admits you probably wouldn't

04:23 hear someone confess they got duped like that.

04:26 A blog post on Experian's site suggests TradeLine buyers could be at risk of becoming

04:30 victims of identity theft if the personal information — including social security

04:35 number — they provide to get added as an authorized user is misused.

04:40 The post also raises the specter that a TradeLine buyer applying for a loan or credit card with

04:44 an artificially boosted score could be in danger "of committing bank fraud" by

04:49 falsely representing their creditworthiness to lenders.

04:54 For full coverage, check out Brandon Kokodin's piece on Forbes.com.

04:59 This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes.

05:01 Thanks for tuning in.

05:03 [MUSIC]

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