How long to get excellent credit?

[Anonymous]

How long did it take you guys to obtain excellent credit?  Let's say, credit score of 720+.  Heck while I'm at it, how long did it take anybody to get over 800? Just curious and trying to stay motivated! 

[Anonymous]

It's kind of "when it rains it pours".  But before that it is a slow trickle.

"Excellent" credit takes several years for most from what I have read.

"Good enough" credit can be done within a year to a year and a half.

It took me about 1 year (580 score) to get to "good enough" of 680 or so.  Then it slows down where breaking the 700 barrier seems to take awhile.\\

680 is good enough to get a decent number of cards.

I'm currently stuck in the "just under 700" mode waiting for a tax lien to fall off in February which should push me over 700.

[Anonymous]

It takes a couple years as long as all of the baddies are falling off. otherwise it takes 5 years. Excellent credit comes in time. most of us will never reach that level, but credit with scores around 690 or so is fine. 

[MarineVietVet]

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@Anonymous wrote:

How long did it take you guys to obtain excellent credit?  Let's say, credit score of 720+.  Heck while I'm at it, how long did it take anybody to get over 800? Just curious and trying to stay motivated! 

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Welcome to myFICO.

I'm not sure if there is a definitive answer to that. I can only speak for myself.

I've used credit for over 40 years but for most of that time I had no idea what I was doing. Like many people I had no classes in school that taught credit and debt management. So there were sooooooo many mistakes over the years. Heck I still make lots of mistakes.

My miscues finally led to a bankruptcy and after that I was determined not to ever let that happen again. I was still clueless for the most part about how to achieve and maintain good credit but I knew that I could never be late on any payment ever again. And to my knowledge I've kept that pledge to myself.

About 10 years ago I finally began to see the light (I'm not saying it will take you 10 years though) and got really serious about all of it.

In 2009 I stumbled upon these forums and it was quite the eye opener. I've learned so much more here than I could possibly give back. By the time I got here all my negatives had died of old age.

If you do all the boring things necessary to repair/rebuild/achieve/maintain you will get higher scores. Hard work and determination will get you there.