Seasoned tradelines are credit accounts that have been established for a substantial length of time, or have been "seasoned" in the financial vernacular, and which also have an excellent payment history and which maintain a relatively low balance in relation to the amount of available credit.

There are a number of financial services companies now that offer to make arrangements for people to use these seasoned tradelines for credit boosting and credit repair purposes. Adding such trade lines to your credit history can result in a quick increase in your credit score, from 50 to 100 additional points within 35-60 days, according to these services.

This approach is said to be the fastest way to improve a credit score because it essentially allows the person wanting to add seasoned credit to their report and "piggy back" on someone else's established track record. There is great interest in improving credit scores, especially when someone is planning to get a mortgage or other large loan, because an increase of even 30-50 credit score points can mean a fairly significant decrease in interest rates and monthly payments.

This score improvement is accomplished by adding seasoned tradeline credit to your history by making you an authorized user on the seasoned credit accounts, which in turn results in the line of credit being reported on your credit report as well.

However, it needs to be noted that you do not receive access to the credit line, and you do not receive a credit card attached to that account. But, you do benefit by your association to seasoned tradelines when the monthly reports are sent from the credit issuer to the credit bureaus, which in turn will find it's way on to your credit report.

While this sounds like a great plan and a wonderful way to prop up your ailing credit score, this service does not come free, or even cheap. Offers from these companies range from a couple hundred dollars to have one seasoned trade line added to your record, to thousands of dollars to have multiple lines added.

But, you'll be expected to pay upfront for the service and you won't know for at least 30 days, and probably closer to 45-60 days if the promised trade lines show up on your account and what, if any, positive effect they have on your credit score. While there are probably well established and reliable companies out there that offer this service, there are also fly-by-night con artists who will use this as a way to fleece people who are already desperate for help with their credit.

While it may be tempting to try to take a short cut and buy seasoned credit, procuring seasoned tradelines are not a sure thing and if you decide it is something you want to undertake, you should do plenty of research, talk to people who have used such services, search the forums for good and bad experiences of others and then make an informed decision.