Fico dropped 11 points in 11 days due to inquiries

[Anonymous]

it is probably something like an old positive tradeline falling off, a slight change in utilization (overall credit utilization increase of just 10% could hit you for 11 points in some circumstances), or even as accounts have aged you got dropped into a different scoring "bucket".  THe drop almost certainly has nothign to do with the inquiry unless it was coded wrong and that does not happen that often (unless you are applying through some fly by night broker or something), but it does happen. 

Have there been any other inquiries (home owners insurance often does a credit pull), new credit cards, requested credit limit increases, new banking accounts or activity?)  IF it is based on new inquiries, it is quite possibel for 1 inquiry to hit you for that many points.  The reality is that the lender will have to pull credit before closing in most cases, and as long as the inquiries were legitimate, you will get point hits for them prior to closing on the loan 90% of the time.  So, if you are shooting for a lona that requires a 660 score, you need a higher score than that due to the fact that scores have a tendancy to drop a few points when the mortgage inquiries hit.

Anyway, good luck with it all. 

[Duke-of-Earl]

---

@Lel wrote:

---

Please note that I have specifically referred to "mortgage inquiries".  In some cases, a lender might not properly code an inquiry as a mortgage inquiry.  If this is the case, then the FICO formula cannot differentiate the inquiry from a non-mortgage inquiry, such as for credit card applications.  Check to see how your initial inquiries are classified.  If they are clearly defined as mortgage inquiries, then they shouldn't affect your score, and you should check your credit reports to see if there are any other changes that might exert negative pressure on your score.

---

How do I determine whether inquiries are "properly coded"?  Should the word "mortgage" appear somewhere, for example?

I applied with three different mortgage lenders a couple of months ago.  These were fairly well-known financial institutions, which offer many products other than mortgages.  The inquiries that appeared on my EQ credit report subsequently all show "creditor contact information" entries with names like "XYZ Credit Services", however.  They certainly are not clearly defined as mortgage anything.  All three (actually four, as discussed in another thread) do include identical 10-digit numerical codes, "::074...".  Is this perhaps the coding you refer to?  (I've omitted the last 7 digits in case it's some lightly-encoded version of my SSN, for example, but will include the whole string if you can confirm it's safe.)  Appreciate any info.

[Anonymous]

I'm in the same situation as Duke-of-Earl in that I applied with three different lenders for pre-approval starting at the end of July. The last lender ran two credit checks within 3 weeks of each other, and the last one which was greater than 30 days from the first lender's inquiry caused my score to drop on myfico from 726 to 711. According to the last lender using their credit scoring system she says it only dropped 2 points.