New to the Forum and i see all the cards attached to your messages

[sparklerd34]

 I am rebuilding and new to this but everyone has provided some very helpful informaton.  I appreciate it.  I have one stupid question i see everyone with the colorful cards in their posts is that because you subscribe to the monitoring?   I have another service through experian from all three every month for 12.95 and was wondering which is really better.  They all seem to have different scores especially credit karma that is very different.    Which is better and more accurate?

[coldnmn]

Here is the link if this is what your talking about.

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/SmorgasBoard/THIS-IS-HOW-YOU-ADD-CREDIT-CARD-PICS-TO-YOUR-PROFILE/m-...

[Revelate]

Welcome to the forum!

A short answer is that if it's not a FICO score (neither CK nor Experian's service are) then it's not accurate.

A better answer is that there's a slew of FICO scores as well, so the odds of the lender pulling the same ones you know, isn't especially high (with few exceptions, some lenders we know explicitly what they pull at least for a given time based on available comparisons or their telling us).  

In reality I just focus on my report data rather than any instant in time score; I would suggest picking up a credit card that offers a free FICO score (there's a bunch out there, and more all the time) and using that for a fairly easy and consistent benchmark.  If you want something more detailed and FICO specific, then one of the credit monitoring solutions which offers a FICO score either through here or Equifax isn't a terrible idea.

Of your services I use CK pretty extensively: the report data is simply excellent (possibly best in industry though I haven't been paying much attention lately), but I absolutely ignore the scores as it really has little to no basis in reality when it comes to FICO scoring.  The Vantage 2.0 Score there possibly excepted, but even that's out of date.

[sparklerd34]

Thank you!!!

[sparklerd34]

Thanks now after all the effort i believe i have to wait a while after my new member status changes.

[coldnmn]

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@sparklerd34 wrote:

Thanks now after all the effort i believe i have to wait a while after my new member status changes.

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Your getting close the spam filter prevents adding html and the magic number of posts isn't shared by management.

[takeshi74]

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@sparklerd34 wrote:

They all seem to have different scores especially credit karma that is very different.    Which is better and more accurate? 

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Accuracy of a score depends on the intended target.  All scores are accurate but only for their own scoring models.  In other words, you can't rely on a score generated by one scoring model to determine a score generated by an entirely different model.  Most creditors use FICO's but there isn't only one FICO model used by all creditors -- see also the Understand FICO Scoring subforum, its stickies and its discussions as well.

CK's older site design still uses the TransUnion New Account model which is a FAKO.  The redesign uses VantageScore 3.0 which is yet another FAKO.

If you want to know what score a creditor will pull for you then you need to know the scoring model and CRA that they use.  Scores are based on the data in a report so the data source and the data itself also matter.

A number of creditors do use scores based on the 08 model which is what myFICO provides but, again, not all do.

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@sparklerd34 wrote:

I have one stupid question i see everyone with the colorful cards in their posts is that because you subscribe to the monitoring?

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Two different things.  People have the cards in their signatures so others know what they have in their wallets.  It does not have anything to do with monitoring.