“I’m sorry, Elias,” his mortgage broker, Sarah, said with a sympathetic wince. “Your application was flagged. There’s a series of late payments on a high-interest retail card in your name. Your score is in the basement.”

Elias shrugged. “I thought you had to pay for those. I didn't want to spend forty bucks to see a bunch of numbers I wouldn't understand.”

Do you have any specific or character types you would like to see included in a follow-up story?

Sarah leaned forward. “When was the last time you checked your credit report?”

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Elias Thorne lived by a simple philosophy: if you don’t look at a problem, the problem doesn’t exist. This worked reasonably well for his messy kitchen sink and the blinking “Check Engine” light on his 2012 sedan. However, when Elias decided it was finally time to trade his cramped studio apartment for a modest townhouse, his philosophy hit a digital brick wall.

By the following spring, Elias sat back in Sarah’s office. She pulled his fresh file and smiled. “Clean as a whistle. That townhouse is yours if you still want it.”

Elias took the keys, but he also took a new habit. He set a recurring alert on his calendar for the same day every year. He realized that while the report was free, the peace of mind it provided was the most valuable asset he owned.