If there's one thing that I've learned over the last 9 months, it's that you might be able to predict a rough estimate of your scores, but ultimately what the bank ends up with will vary. The credit bureaus do not provide scores to the banks, they provide the information held within your credit report. The banks use a scoring system (like OP said, there are over 40 models) to process the report information and give them a score. You could go to two banks on the same day and you will most likely see them "pull" different scores.
Also, in October I had a 649 TU score (not the greatest!) and my CREDIT UNION (NOTE: NOT BANK) gave me a $15,000 loan with a 4.24% rate and 60 month term for a total of $285 monthly payments. I bought myself a kick a** 2010 Mercury Milan Premier with 33,000 miles. If you are trying to get approved for an auto loan with less than perfect credit I can't stress using a credit union enough. You may still have to look around a little; we were rejected by the first one (although this was using an online application) but we showed up in person to the second one and they were fantastic! HOWEVER, the opposite is true for a mortgage.. CU's typically have strict guidelines with mortgages and I had great success using a referral to a mortgage broker who can shop around for your loan.
These are obvoiusly my experiences and will not necessarily be true for others, but I wanted to share what I've learned.
And yes, as the OP said --- DO NOT LEASE. Leasing is for nitwits and people with too much money.
@summerhunny11 wrote:I'm sorry. You missed some previous posts about why my lender pulled my score. I didn't have him pullit for fun. He is doing a rapid rescore for me and I am getting an auto loan withing two weeks. So, I will be fine with the mutiple pulls.
I have two negatives on my report and we are not sure why my husbands exp and tu are not reporting a score.
We're working on it.
sorry 
Carry on then 
