USDA Direct... which FICO score???

[iv]

It sounds like you've got a good handle on the basics.

A few things you may want to consider:

Don't completely pay off the car loan before applying for the mortgage (or for the next car loan).  Just like you saw with the now-closed mortgage, having the account open is boosting your scores.  (Open, but almost completely paid off would be ideal.)

Make sure that the cards aren't all reporting with balances at once.  You've noticed the negative effect from all cards reporting 0... but 100% of your cards reporting a balance (even $1) is also a negative.  Pick one card to report a small balance on each month, pay the others off before the statements close.

If you have any negative closed accounts on your reports, investigate your options to improve or remove them. (A closed mortgage, open car loan, and a few open cards, all with 100% positive history should score better than the low 600s.)

See if you can find a real estate agent that does a lot of USDA transactions - they should be able to help both with the property requirements, and perhaps with finding a lender experienced in doing USDA Guaranteed loans (or with guiding you through the USDA Direct process).

Also consider going the FHA route, with downpayment coming from the sale of your current house.  (Getting the timing right on closing both your sale and purchase contracts at once can be a pain... but it is done every day.)

Good luck!

[Hoss_Delgado]

I was not aware of that on the cards. All of them report balances at a different time before a bill cuts so I usually just use them a little between 0-9% a month, let them report, then pay them back to zero balance. I will try just letting my gas card report a fill up and pay the rest off before reporting and see how that works.

I agree with you on what I have vs what my score is. I will tell you what I think it is. It's almost as if it is "the way" my closed accounts are reported. When I look at them and my paid off mortagage, some of them just appear CLOSED rather than reported paid in full and closed out in a positive way. This certainly seems to be the case with my mortgage too. What has happened to my credit history age or average account age seems to reflect that as well.

It shows up like 2 years... so it's the equivelant of being 20 years old again as far as credit is concerned. I think thats the big factor and I don't know how to fix that.

The other thing I am thinking is my account mix and the actual age of those other things besides my mortgage. I know it was an issue a few years back when I had went over 7 years after paying off everything but my mortgage. When I went to get new credit, I only had the mortgage reporting and they said that was an issue then.

Anyways, problem is my next stratigic move is to buy another house. So I can't go getting other credit at this point. I don't have the income for it. If I open new credit lines now I won't be able to buy a house with enough bedrooms. Kinda stuck there.