Is the members score simulator accurate?

BuffaloBoy · ‎09-09-2015

Anyone have any expereince with it?

It says if I pay off all my credit cards, my score will go up over 100 points. Curious if thats true.

Anonymous · ‎09-09-2015

Maybe this link will help. Don't pay it all the way to $0. Pay it to the amount where the simulator stops increasing. Make sure it is all on one card. If you are doing this for mortgage score reasons only, you may not get what the FICO 8 simulator is suggesting.

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/General-Credit-Topics/Simulator-pay-down-revolving-test/m-p/4146154#...

Anonymous · ‎09-09-2015

Credit simulators are not accurate and shouldn't be used for anything other than VERY general ideas of what MAY happen.

Anonymous · ‎09-09-2015

I don't think it considers your personal situation at all. I think it makes very limited use of the data in your report and relies entirely on summary information like score and utilization, MAYBE account age.

It doesn't simulate things like inquiries dropping off as time goes by. More like, "on average people with your score see X rise in points if they pay their bills for Y months". I think it also has some basic understanding of utilisation, but nothing detailed.

I say that because for me it always projects an increase in score every three months or so. Next month, it still thinks the increase comes after three months, not two.

Overall on average it is likely not far off, but it is not basing its predictions on details, rather on averages.

Anonymous · ‎09-10-2015

If you have extremely high utilization like 70-80% upward, then it's not unfathomable to see a score increase around that high and very much possible depending on where your score is at right now. While not exact, they do tend to give solid estimates in general so I don't think it's really fair to say they're useless.

Keep in mind though the simulator on MyFico is using the data from your most recent report on here which could potentially be weeks or months old and if that's the case then the simulator could be way off. By comparison, on Experian Credit Tracker the simulator uses the data from that day's credit report giving far greater accuracy to the estimates.