AAoA and amount owed on loans scoring points?

[masscredit]

I know AAoA makes up 15% of our scores. Is there a rough idea of what average age points provide us with a few extra points? CK lists the following -

<2 year
2-4 years
5-6 year
7-8 year
9+ year

Don't know how accurate this is.

When it comes to loans, I've seen my reports note that the amount owed on accounts is too high (auto loan $19,400 / $24,995.). Is there a cutoff point for this? I believe I've read that under 66% is good but I could be wrong. Can't find the post. 

Thanks! 

[Anonymous]

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@masscredit wrote:

I know AAoA makes up 15% of our scores.

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Hello MC!  That's not exactly true.  AAoA is just one of a group of age related factors.  That group is called "Length of Credit History" and all those factors together constitute 15% of your score.  Below is a list of all the factors. 

"Age of your oldest account" is an example of a factor that is different from AAoA and is part of this group.

Length of credit history (15%)

In general, a longer credit history will increase your FICO® Scores. However, even people who haven't been using credit long may have high FICO Scores, depending on how the rest of the credit report looks.

Your FICO Scores take into account:

• how long your credit accounts have been established, including the age of your oldest account, the age of your newest account and an average age of all your accounts
• how long specific credit accounts have been established
• how long it has been since you used certain accounts

Taken from http://www.myfico.com/CreditEducation/WhatsInYourScore.aspx

[Anonymous]

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@masscredit wrote:
 

When it comes to loans, I've seen my reports note that the amount owed on accounts is too high (auto loan $19,400 / $24,995.). Is there a cutoff point for this? I believe I've read that under 66% is good but I could be wrong. Can't find the post. 

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A number of people here have been trying to test this for the last year or so (Revelate especially).  Let's call what you are describing "installment utilization" (IU) for lack of a better phrase.  I.e. amount currently owed / original amount of the loan = __ %. (Ignoring all closed loans.)

I believe that their research suggests this:

*  Total installment utilization is vastly more important than the IU for each loan considered seperately.  (Total is where you count all the open loans together.)

*  Mortgages are considered an installment loan just like Auto, Mortgage, Personal, etc.  Thus if you have a new mortgage, that will almost certainly make your total IU a very high number.

*  If the IU > 90% then you get no extra scoring points for having paid down your loans.

*  If the IU < 8.99% (but greater than zero) then you get all the available points.

*  Between 90 and 9 there may be a couple more breakpoints where you get more points.

The number 90 I give above is just an example.  The actual first breakpoint may be 80.  I haven't followed their research very closely because my personal IU < 8%, so it doesn't affect me (I am already getting the most points I can).

Thom Thumb, Jamie, CreditDunce, and others may be much more up to date on what Revelate & Co. were able to to discover.

[masscredit]

Thanks for the info!  CK lists my AAoA at 4.4 years for EQ and 3.1 years for TU. I haven't done the math myself but that seems to be right. There is an older account reporting on EQ. 

As for installment utilization, it would be nice to get some other data points in the mid-range. I've read threads about people getting a share secured loan from Alliant then paying it down to under 9% so the IU is low but it's still listed as a loan on their reports. I can understand the reason for this. 

I'm approaching the middle ground for a lot of things (IU on my auto loan and AAoA). So I'm wondering if there could be some more points available at some point. Or, I'll end up being rebucketed. Then that will go either way. Everything has been good after my BK in '09 so I hope that would have a positive outcome.