Maxing out?

[kroberts67]

What is maxing out according to FICO vs FAKOs?  90%?  I've also heard 75% sometimes.  Does it vary? 

[DaveSignal]

your score drops as util increases above about 10%.   It doesn't have to be fully "maxed out" to cause your score to drop.  75% severely hurts your FICO score.

[fabadvice]

+1 with DaveSignal said

[kroberts67]

Actually I'm going to other direction, I transferred a balance and am paying it down.  I saw a good bump when I went from just over 90% to below 90% and wondered if the bump was due to taking it out of being "maxed out" at 90%.  I imagine taking it below 75% then below 51% will also be good bumps compared to taking it from 70% to 60% and so on.  I'm wondering if there are thresholds that give greater score bumps when you hit those UTIL numbers.

CLARIFICATION: I should have said my PLUS scores had a bump, I'm wondering if FICO would have a bump from going under the 90% threshold also.

[john398]

There should be a better bump below 20% and a fantastic bump below 10%

[Bay_Area_Joe]

And and even better bump in score when less than 2%, and only one card reporting a balance.

I noticed a difference from 7% to 5%, and from 3 cards reporting to 2 cards reporting.

[Pilotdude]

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@Bay_Area_Joe wrote:

And and even better bump in score when less than 2%, and only one card reporting a balance.

I noticed a difference from 7% to 5%, and from 3 cards reporting to 2 cards reporting.

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+10,000,000,000,000

[p-]

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kroberts67 wrote:  I'm wondering if there are thresholds that give greater score bumps when you hit those UTIL numbers.

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My sweet spot for the most possible points seems to be only 1 card with a balance, utilization total of 2 to 3 percent, and it drops from there.  The chart posted here by distantarray shows utilization tiers of different reports.  These are actual numbers sampled from real credit reports, and for all of them the sweet spot is somewhere under 10%.  

[kroberts67]

This is an awesome graph!  I've seen this before but didn't know what thread.  Thanks!  

[knoregs]

I lost 119 points on EQ (FICO) going from <10% UTIL to >90%.

~kn