My husband and I are in the process of qualifying for a VA mortgage at our next assignment. My credit situation is better than his at the moment but we're working on it. My three scores are 640 or above and his are 578, 582, and 607 respectively. We have a loan officer willing to work with us once he reaches a middle score of 580 but we hope to boost his score above 600. We're waiting for approximately $1000 in credit card payments to update on his report which will hopefully boost it even more. The biggest factors influencing his score were deliquencies with student loans that he forgot to pay (that are now on autopay on a better payment plan) and high balances that have now either been paid down to zero or cut in half. I have one $270 collection on my report from 5 or so years ago for unpaid tuition for a class I never took, faught the college over, and ultimately said screw it and paid it anyway. Our current DTI is 14.5%. Am I forgetting anything that could potentially help or hurt our chances? Does anyone have recommendations for what I should be looking into before we get started on prequalification and preapproval?
