Credit drop disqualified me for mortgage- help please!

[fishbjc]

WHATEVER you do...do NOT apply for any loans, cc, installments, car loan or A N Y T H I N G ! ! !

I hope that by paying the cc, you will quickly regain those points.

[webhopper]

I think you will be fine!   Those two cards being maxed out is what hurt you most!   Once the balances are updated with your Credit reports, you should see a nice jump.

[Sha80]

If Cap 1 reports on the 7th then your account bills on the 6th. Your due date should be around the 3rd. I'd suggest you have all payments made by the 31st and not make any charges until your statement cycles. 

[Anonymous]

fishjbc- noooooooooooooooo... not doing anything like that until i HOPEFULLY get out of these woods.. as the kids say "straight cash homey"

webhopper- that's encouraging.. I really hope you are right.  I never thought i would ever even prequalify, and after I did, i got so close.  i really didn't mean to ruin my credit again- I thought i was doing the right thing using the card while it was 0% interest, and settling personal debts, so I could buy a home with peace of mind.  i really thought i was doing the responsible smart thing.. hopefully it works out.

Sha80- damn close.. due date is the 5th.  But through borrowing (from the family member i finished paying off, while maxing out the cards) i have my UTIL (learning) at 9% already, so i'm there now.  

Thanks again, all.. 

[Anonymous]

to add on... i ran across this article while trying to find peace of mind (which i'm sure most of you have seen, but it really made it simple for a n00b to understand!)--

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2007/pf/0705/gallery.credit_score/index.html

The #2 credit affector is balance.  REALLY wish i knew that.  Hopefully since that factor is corrected, so will the score.  This infographic breaks it down in pretty simple terms- hopefully someone can learn from it.

till Jan 7... good luck all..

[Anonymous]

To update this, and to ask some more questions-

Capital One (which is my larger credit line card) informed me they report my information to the credit bureaus after the 7th of the month- could be as long as 1-2 weeks however.  Orchard Bank (my smaller credit line card) informed me they report on the 10th of the month.  The credit bureaus informed me scores are automatically updated when they receive new information.  I passed all this along to the mortgage broker, who said they are going to wait to the end of the month to run the score again, so it should have the most recent information by then.

Now some questions- 

I received a letter dated Jan 7, 2013 from Capital One informing me they upped my credit limit from $3,000 to $6,000.  I never asked for this, but I assume this can only help my score?

In September 2012, my scores were EX- 644, EQ- 637, TU- 664.  My UTILs were $699/$3,000 and $296/$300.

In December 2012, my scores were EX- 621, EQ- 623, TU- 654.  My UTILs were $2,997/$3,000 and $295/$300.

When they run the report at the end of January 2013, my UTILs will be $0/$6,000 and $0/$300.

Can I reasonably expect my scores to return to September 2012 levels?

Finally, I'd really like to ease my mind and check my own scores late next week.  Will this negatively affect my score in any way?

Thank you very much in advance for any help.  I'm very anxious.

[Mike_B03]

That's great that you got the credit increse from $3,000 to $6,000, that can definately help for a couple of reasons. If the average credit line on your accounts is over $2,000, that is a positive. Previously, your average was $1,750, not it will be $3,150. Seccondly, it gets your utilization down, though it looks like you are paying off the cards anyway.

Speaking of which, it is actually a better idea to have a little bit of use on the cards. On my TransUnion credit report, one of the negatives counted against me is "No recent credit use" and that is becuasee I paid the balance down to $0. I would suggest to keep a 2-3% balance on there, so around $150. Keep it on the Cap One card and leave the Orchard card paid off.

In my experience, with my own Cap One cards, the updated payment info shows up on the credit reports 5 days after the statement closes. You can certainly check for yourself here on MyFico.com and it won't hurt your score. You can also sign up at CreditKarma.com for free and you can update that report daily and see if the balance has updated. I'd probably do that first, and once you see it reports on Credit Karma, then pull a report on MyFico.com. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

You want to carry a balance of around 9% to maximize your FICO score. For you that will be around $567. I had a heavy revolving balance (over 50%) a month ago. My FICO Equifax was 640. I paid down just about everything and my score is now 689 as of yesterday. I had a charge off come off too but I don't remember exactly when so it may have already been factored in the early score. Utilization is an important factor in your FICO score.

[Mondavi]

You will see a score increase with your Util going down so much however FICO seems to like you keeping at least one of your cards with a Util between 2-9%. One month I had 0% Util on my cards and my score went down 11 points. So the next month I made sure to keep a 3% util on one of my cards. Score went up 19 points.

Since your Util was so high and you paid off the balance you should be just fine.

Where will you check your scores?  If you were to get them from here I would only buy your EQ Fico report. This is the same one that your lender will be using. The TU Fico report however will not be the same. The one used here is TU 98 and most lenders use TU 04. Score can be much different.

Checking your own score will be a "Soft Pull" it will have no effect on your credit score.

[Mike_B03]

Hmm, I just re-read the reply and saw that your Cap One card already closed out the statement for this month? And it's already paid in full?

When does your  Orchard Statement close? If it hasn't closed, I would make a purchase on that to show some utilization, though I don't know if the transaction will post in time to show on this statement. 

Either way your score will go up by going from almost 100% util to 0% but I think your biggest boost would be from going from 100% to 3%.