free credit report dot com is NOT FREE. It will also spam the hell out of your email and sell your name everywhere. Luckily a friend of mine told me about it before I tried it. She, however, has had a lot of problems from them. Annual credit report is the one to do. It really is free but print out everything you can because if you try to look at it a 2nd time within a year, it won't do it.
Luckily, I have been able to maintain really good credit through everything. I've had to hold 3 jobs at a time sometimes, but the last time I went into my bank for a car loan, she printed the check,
then checked my credit (she forgot to at the beginning but she knew me since I was 16) and asked me if I wanted to buy a house while I was there.
I'm so glad I don't have to hold down that many jobs anymore to get by. It really sucked.