A man can break your heart and he can break your credit score too.

Men don’t care about their credit scores as much as women do, which is probably why on average, women have much better credit scores than their male counterparts.

What is a credit score?

A credit score is how lenders measure your “lendability”. If you pay your bills on time, haven’t applied for too many loans in short succession and don’t have debt collectors chasing you then you’ll have a good score. The black marks against your name eventually time out so it is possible to improve your credit score over time if you’ve got a bit of a dodgy financial history.

The benefits of having a good credit score are that you are more likely to have your credit applications approved, be offered better deals when applying for loans including lower interest rates and you can even use your score as leverage to have fees waived.

On average, women have better credit scores than men, scoring 778 which is in the “very good” category compared to men who stand at 766. Veda also surveyed both men and women about their credit scores and found that men are less concerned with their score than women.

Belinda from Get Credit Score who are partnered with credit agency Veda says this can be explained by a shift that is happening in Australian households.

Kochie and Libby from Kochie’s Money Makeover share their tips of managing your money. Article continues after this video.

Here’s where it gets interesting.

“Traditionally the household finances have fallen into the male domain but more women have really taken this on and what we found is a lot more women – 52 percent of women – are more ambitious with financial goals and more focused on financial goals.”

Get Credit Score also found that overall, men care less about their credit score than women.

“What we found was that less men care what’s in their credit history.”

That means the most dangerous stage in a relationship can often be that time when you go from getting serious to moving in together and merging your lives. From managing your own finances suddenly you are having to manage them jointly.

Repeat after me: Romance is dead when it comes to financial management.

Women should be wary of having joint bills and joint loans with their partners. You don’t want to “catch” bad financial habits. Remember, when it comes to money, romance is dead.

Be cold. Be ruthless. Stay on top of your finances and leave nothing to chance. When making a budget schedule all of your bills to be paid automatically so your credit scores stays as high as possible.

When it comes time to start a family, if you are the one stepping back from work to care for your child, you still need to keep your eye on the finances. Just because you are taking a break from working or working less, doesn't make the money any less yours.

You are raising his child. That is the role you have in the family while he earns the money. "If you think about a traditional female looking after budgets and you might have kids, you are conscious you are clothing the kids and feeding the kids," Belinda said.

Belinda from Get Credit Score says women often become more cautious with their spending when they have kids but if their partner is working long hours, he may become worse. "24 per cent of men said they overspend because they work hard, they earn plenty and they feel they deserve a good life compared to 13 per cent of women."

So can it be said that women are better with money than men?

"Well, if you were looking at the VEDA score then you can say women are more credit worthy than men which is a really important thing."

Coincidentally I checked my credit score just a few days ago and I scored in the "very good" category. I hope to improve my credit worthiness by taking all of Belinda's advice on keeping my credit score healthy. I did score much better than my husband but he's a discharged bankrupt, so that wasn't hard.

He also just spent $3000 on a new exercise bike. But that's a story for another time.

The only real power we have over how we live is how we manage our finances. If you stay on top of them you can enjoy your life without any guilt or any stress, knowing that your credit score is healthy so that when it does come time to buy a new car or your first home you are in the best possible position to do it.

Check your credit score for FREE at Get Credit Score.