Ask about your marital status if you’re applying for a separate, unsecured account. A creditor may ask you to provide this information if you live in community property states, Arizona, California, Idaho, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and Washington. A creditor in any state may ask for this information if you apply for a joint credit account or one secured by property.

Request information about your spouse, except when your spouse is applying for credit with you. Note: your spouse will be allowed to use credit account. You are relying on your spouse’s income or on alimony or child support income from a former spouse; or if you reside in a community property state.

Inquire about your plans for having or raising children.

Ask if you receive alimony, child support, or separate maintenance payments, unless you’re first told that, you don’t have to provide this information if you won’t rely on these payments to get credit. A creditor may ask if you have to pay alimony, child support, or separate maintenance payments.

A Special Note To Women

A good credit history, a record of how you paid past bills often is necessary to get credit. Unfortunately, this hurts many married, separated, divorced, and widowed women. There are two common reasons women don’t have credit histories in their own names: they lost their credit histories when they married and changed their names, or creditors reported accounts shared by married couples in husband’s name only.

If you’re married, divorced, separated, or widowed, contact credit bureaus to make sure all relevant information is in a file under your own name.

To find additional rights you have, what a creditor may not do: when deciding to give you credit or evaluating your income for credit and what to do if you suspect discrimination visit: http://www.creditandyou.com/yourcreditrights.html it’s a free information website!

5. Consider whole picture. Suppose a bank will loan 90%, and is okay with you taking back a $5,000 second mortgage, allowing buyer to get in with what cash he has. If you're getting $6,000 more than you expected by accomodating buyer's needs, where's loss? You're okay if he never pays $5,000, right?

6. Talk to a lawyer. Maybe in your area it takes two years to get a foreclosure on a mortgage through courts, and only six months to foreclose on a "contract for sale." Knowing these things can help you sell in safest way.

Offering seller financing makes it easier to sell, and to get a higher price. Just be safe about it. Have a real estate lawyer review your paperwork, and use tips here.