Do your own research about your credit score! The mortgage company isn't always 100% correct.

[teachag89]

A few months ago, my husband and I started the mortgage process.  My husbands credit needed a lot of touching up.  His AAoA was short, he had high balances and small limits, and had a couple of late payments.  The mortgage company used a credit analyzer program that went something like this... "Pay Discover down to $230 and your score will go up 14 points, Pay Student Loan down to $1500 and your score will go up 20 points, etc."  It had suggested balances for each account and estimated score improvement with each action.  His score had a 101 point improvement potential.  I took a couple of months and paid down each account as suggested and his score did not improve half as what was expected.  No, they do not guarantee anything, that is why it is called "potential," but it was still a major let down.

Now, my advice to those of you who are like my husband and I-(young, trying to buy your first home and learning along the way) do you own research!  My Fico Forums have helped me so much.  I wish I had started right here for step one. As soon as I started utilizing the information and tips that I learned from these forums, his score started making major jumps.  I also understand why I was taking certain actions of each account and I watched his score improve from each action through Score Watch.  With that said, purchase Score Watch.  Our scores from the mortgage company have always been in line with Score Watch.  I use another program that I pay for and it is always way off.  

I hope this can be helpful for some of you.  I have gained so much knowledge from other members and I wanted to throw this bit of information out there.  Good luck!

[jadeite788]

A student loan for one is an installment loan.  Paying it down might not help your credit score.  I have been paying off my student loan like crazy and I have not received a boost in scored.  I even paid off my car loan, which decreased my score to , and that is an installement loan.  Credit Cards is considered revolving credit and they are based off of utilization.  You will hear most on this forum talk about getting your credit cards under 9% utilization.  However I have found out other wise the magic number to increase the score is between 1-4%.  I have only 2 cards, however I have heard the real boost is when you have 3 cards.  

[teachag89]

Agreed about the student loan.  However, when I first started polishing up our credit, I trusted the mortgage company and their "credit analyzer" and followed their advice.  You live & you learn.  The loan is minimal and in all honesty is probably balancing his accounts out being it is an installment & not a revolving account.  I'm still learning