Help with mortgage scores?

[Anonymous]

Looking to buy a home in Jan 2019. Here are my current mortgage scores, pulled on 1/28

Experian - 712

Equifax - 692

TransUnion - 715

I would really like to purchase using Conventional 95. Here is my credit situation:

Have a 3 % credit utilization rate 

1 derogatory mark - BK discharged 1/2015

23 total accounts

7 years 2 months average age of credit history

1 hard inquiry, over a year old

100 % on time payment history

6 student loans totaling $60,000. Plan to pay off two of them this year worth $15,000.

can someone advise me if my mortgage score will jump up assuming no negatives or additional debt this year? im hoping i can get it above 720 or 740 so as to lower my PMI and interest rate but im not sure how feasible that will be since it seems there is nothing else i can pay off? would the BK aging an additional year help increase my score? Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Of your 23 accounts, how many are open?

Of the open accounts, how many are cards?  Loans?

Of your open cards, how many were reporting a positive balance?

Would it be possible for you to not pay off any of the loans, but instead keep them all open while paying the balances down?  That tends to be a better scoring strategy than paying loans off.

[Anonymous]

3 cards, only one reporting a balance of $150 

7 installment loans. Yes, i can pay them down across the board. my strategy was to pay off the private student loans by Sallie Mae due to their limited repayment options and then work on the DOE loans. I could change that strategy i suppose.

[Anonymous]

What is the credit limit of the card that is reporting $150?  What is your total credit limit (all three cards together)?

[Anonymous]

Carecredit $1500, bal of $150

NFCU $4500

Chase $5000

[Anonymous]

The loan payoffs could actually cause one or more of your scores to drop.  Whereas keeping them open (while paying them down) will certainly avoid the drop and might give you a small boost.

With exactly one card reporting a fairly small balance there is nothing you can do to improve your score from a CC balance perspective.

You mention that you had a BK in 2015 but that you have a 100% ontime payment history.  That strikes me as unlikely.  I would guess that you have late payments from 2014 or 2015.  These will not have dropped off of your report.

Aging of your bankruptcy might help -- the folks in the rebuilding forum might know.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your input!

To clarify, I have had 100% on time payment history since the BK which was filed in Oct 2014 and discharged on 1/2015.

Last late payment on my report is from 9/2014 and all those accounts were included in the BK.

[Anonymous]

Only carry a balance on 1 card.  And keep utilization on the carecredit below 8.99%.  That's the only improvement I see as far as CCs go.

Best of luck!