I think cheddar works for FICO so I would take his response with a grain of salt. Here is what I know.
1. There are a ton of different scoring models out there - Each bureau has their own and then each financial institution has their own (and most of the times more than just one). The reason being is that BofA may determine credit worthiness for an auto loan in a different way than they determine credit worthiness for a home loan so therefore they would have two different scoring modules.
2. No matter what scoring model is being used the data is the same. this means that no matter what the scale of the score or what factors the scoring model takes into consideration the data that is used is from one of the three bureaus and sometimes they look at all three. The data on your credit report may change from bureau to bureau but the data in the report you get at my fico is the same because they are getting it from the bureau. Remember, FICO is just a reseller - they do not own the data like the bureaus do.
3. Instead of focusing on your actual score focus on what is in your credit report. Make sure it is accurate and dispute any inaccuracies directly through one of the bureaus. I use FreeCreditReport.com which is owned by Experian and I have found their online dispute process to be simple and quick. If you do know your score then pay attention to the risk level and not the actual score. I don't know if TU or EQ provide risk level explanations because I have not tried their services but I know FreeCreditReport.com has it.
4. Last but not least, I would recommend signing up for a credit monitoring product while you are in the process of buying a home. Because it does get expensive to pull your report I would look for a service that comes with free reports like FreeCreditReport.com (but you only get the free report when you sing up and then not again until you become a paid member which I think is after 30 days). Especially if you are in dispute mode it's nice to get alerts when your score changes and then you can also pull the report to see if the information has been removed. Of course you also want to be notified if anything unexpected hits your report during this time because slight changes in your score can really affect what you can afford.
Hopefully this is helpful and good luck!
