Multiple Loan Accounts, to improve your credit score

[Anonymous]

Thanks ALL, for your quick responses.

I would stay with one installment account. I have Capital One of my own. I have Discover as an AU. I still have few hundred left to get a secured credit card. Let me know if you had good experience with any other banks easy on secure credit cards. Or else I will ask my mother, to add me in as a AU in her card.

[Anonymous]

I think you can have multiple Capital One cards - I dont have any secured cards, but I know if you apply for a Discover card and are denied, sometimes they offer you a secured card.  They graduate you after a year.

I read here that the BofA card is similar. 

[Anonymous]

Bank of America, denied my application for secured credit card, even though i was putting $1000 in security deposit. Not sure why, and I dont even had or have any accounts with them, in my entire life.

Discover I had a charged off in 2011, but was able to get added as an AU. Not sure applying with them will reset the SOL and trigger any past due balances or simply reject based on my history with them.

Capital One, i have secure credit card, started with $500 and they themselves increased the limit to $900.

[Anonymous]

Have you tried the Capital One prequal site?

See if you can prequalified for another Cap1 card - that might help!

I know you can probably get a sum-prime card - like from Merrick or Credit One.

The thing about secured cards from banks is that its a hard inquery.  I think First Progress and Open Sky are guaranteed-approval secured cards. 

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

Bank of America, denied my application for secured credit card, even though i was putting $1000 in security deposit. Not sure why, and I dont even had or have any accounts with them, in my entire life. BofA is picky even with their secured cards.

Discover I had a charged off in 2011, but was able to get added as an AU. Not sure applying with them will reset the SOL and trigger any past due balances or simply reject based on my history with them. They will just deny you with an unpaid CO. I don't know if they blacklist of not.

Capital One, i have secure credit card, started with $500 and they themselves increased the limit to $900. Apply for a second Cap One card.

---

[dethkultur]

I'll tell you my experience. I had scores around 600-610, and opened 2 seured loans at a credit union. They were the only installment loans I had, and the only ones on my report period.

They did nothing for scores. They show up as "secured" on your report, and probably get significantly discounted by the FICO model. I paid the last one off early just a few months ago, and had no score increase, or decrease for that matter.

I would skip this, and do whatever you can to get an unsecured line of credit, no matter how small, revolving or not (or a car loan). If you can only get secured products, a secured card will give you a path to an unsecured card. Get some "toy cards" and use them, get some CLIs. They will do much, much more for your scores than a secured installment loan. Once you are above 600 test the waters with Cap 1 or another lender known to like rebuilders, and your scores will imporve more, then keep paying your bills and work your way up.

I had high hopes that a secured loan would help me (one $4500, 3 yrs, another 3500, 2 years.) They never did, from beginning to end. Now getting cards, reducing my util, getting a few big limits... that helped me a lot.

[Anonymous]

Yes, I guess, based on all your inputs, i would rather open another Capital One secured credit card, with a limit of $500.

Regarding Installment Loan, i am staying with one, I will monitor the difference by next month. Will defintely keep you guys updated.

My capital one score was 610 on March 11, 2015, I went to Lender few days later for FHA mortgage loan, they pulled the real FICO score, I was shocked it was 557, not even close to 600. Not sure how to compare, or how much difference to add in, but then after started monitoring on daily basis with 3 credit bureaus.

Below is a small tracking I am doing from 3 bureaus almost daily, but at high level, this is how it looks: 

I have 4 charged off accounts from 2011, 2 active CC on time payment: one individual and another one AU, 3 mortgage inquiries in Mar 2015.

On April 22, 2015

EX560/EQ596/TU643

On May 1, 2015

EX571/EQ600/TU644

On May 11, 2015

EX581/EQ611/TU649

Just to add in, I had disputed few errors with Credit Bureaus, and one paid collections with them in last 3 weeks. 

[Anonymous]

Do you participate in monitoring all three bureaus offer for $20/month on each of the bureaus websites?

Do you find that better then myfico.com monitoring? 

[Anonymous]

I purchased individually from each bureau on April 21, 2015, not even a month, for me and my wife. These helps a lot, especially if you are in process of repairing and disputing. I like the EQ very much. Other two are OK.

Regarding MYFICO, i was planning to use that, since they might provide score to what lenders are looking at. As i said earlier, I was excited that I am at 610 and went for FHA Lender, to my surprise it was in 550. I might buy myFICO, after having some cleaning done at 3 bureaus. I am not sure, whether they offer tracking score and update reports on daily basis. But yes i pay the regular charges on all the 3 bureaus.

[Anonymous]

That is interesting...I'm wondering if I should switch because myfico is not daily update like I thought it was. Are the 3 monitoring not services live and updated daily?