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Hello Rookie. The first post on this thread has enough information to answer the question about whether this would likely help you.
Do me a favor and read through it again and then tell us if you still don't understand it.
Best wishes...
It looks like you have four accounts on your credit report. (Two of these may need another month to appear.) Is that right?
Capital One credit card (in your name)
Capital One credit card (AU on husband's)
NFCU credit card
Westlake Financial - auto loan - paid and closed Dec 2016
Some mortgage lenders require at least three accounts, but you have four, so you should be set as far as the issue of "thickness" goes.
As far as the possibility that an SSL could improve your mortgage scores, here is what the guidance says in that first post:
I am preparing to buy a house soon, Will this technique help my mortgage scores?
The technique is really intended to help a person with his FICO 8 scores, not his mortgage scores. But... if you have no installment loans of any kind, including closed ones, then it's worth doing. Also, if getting a 20 point boost to your EX mortgage score would change the value of your "middle" score, then again it is worth doing. Otherwise it does not appear to help a person's EQ or TU mortgage scores.
Your mortgage scores are
541 EQ 555 EX 609 TU
in the order of low, middle, high. Suppose the SSL raises your EX score by 20 points. Will that change the value of your middle score?
Final note:
Regarding your credit cards, you and your husband will benefit most from paying all cards to $0 and then each having exactly one card reporting a small positive balance, like $10. For your husband's report, the card reporting $10 should be a card in his name; and for your report it should be a card in your name. Also, you need to wait until all the credit cards you mentioned are appearing on the report -- at least two are not there yet.
I'm really enjoying this thread and am excited about trying out the approach! I've already signed up for the Alliant savings account and am getting ready to apply for the loan but wanted to mention something. When I was signing up to join the credit union, instead of immediately donating the money to the charity, I took a look at the "qualifying organizations"... because who knows...and...actually, I am a member of one of them - the Freelancer's Union. I've actually been a member for quite a long time and was pleased that it qualified me to join the credit union. That being said, it's easy and free to join the Freelancer's Union and you don't have to actually be a freelancer, just someone supportive of the group - just go to their website and sign up - just pure number of membership helps them out, so there's not a fee or anything (and there are also some nice discounts for members). Of course, it's also nice to donate to the charity but just wanted to offer up another route to qualifying for the credit union in case anyone wanted it.
Hey stakknchpz! Thanks for that kind word. Really made my day.
No data on what you describe, but that's because it would involve a lot of volunteers with detailed descriptions of their profiles, willing to be divided into groups of people who take out a $500 loan and those who take out a $3000 loan. I am not holding my breath that all those people are going to raise their hands. I am mildly skeptical that there is a scoring advantage, but some people like having a larger buffer after they pay the loan down to 8.99%. With a $1000 loan you could pay it down to $89 and be fine.
I will tell you the three things I do very much want to see tested.
(1) Does this technique benefit a person who (a) has open student loans and (b) all his open installment accounts are student loans and (c) all his student loans are in deferment
(2) Same question as #1 but (c) at least one of his open student loans is NOT in deferement and is having payments made on it.
(3) What kind of benefit does this technique give to a person's FICO 9 scores?
Questions #1 and #2 were raised by two different reports a year ago (not on this thread) that were challenging to explain except by the hypothesis that SLs were scored completely separately from auto and personal loans -- in which case a person with > 95% installment utilization on his SLs might still conceivably get a strong benefit from the SS loan technique. The orthodox view is that there would be zero benefit (since his installment U would be virtually unchanged) but it would be good to know that this is mistaken (if true).
Question 3 I have been hoping to see people post about but thus far people almost exclusively report the bonus they get on their FICO 8.
@Anonymous wrote:Hey stakknchpz! Thanks for that kind word. Really made my day.
No data on what you describe, but that's because it would involve a lot of volunteers with detailed descriptions of their profiles, willing to be divided into groups of people who take out a $500 loan and those who take out a $3000 loan. I am not holding my breath that all those people are going to raise their hands. I am mildly skeptical that there is a scoring advantage, but some people like having a larger buffer after they pay the loan down to 8.99%. With a $1000 loan you could pay it down to $89 and be fine.
I will tell you the three things I do very much want to see tested.
(1) Does this technique benefit a person who (a) has open student loans and (b) all his open installment accounts are student loans and (c) all his student loans are in deferment
(2) Same question as #1 but (c) at least one of his open student loans is NOT in deferement and is having payments made on it.
(3) What kind of benefit does this technique give to a person's FICO 9 scores? <-Good Question!!
Questions #1 and #2 were raised by two different reports a year ago (not on this thread) that were challenging to explain except by the hypothesis that SLs were scored completely separately from auto and personal loans -- in which case a person with > 95% installment utilization on his SLs might still conceivably get a strong benefit from the SS loan technique. The orthodox view is that there would be zero benefit (since his installment U would be virtually unchanged) but it would be good to know that this is mistaken (if true).
Question 3 I have been hoping to see people post about but thus far people almost exclusively report the bonus they get on their FICO 8.
This is a great question CGID that hopefully some new details might soon come to light for us.
I would assume the transition over to FICO 9 might finally begin to gain some real traction the deeper that we get into more quarters this year (or next?).
At least one of my card accounts are already FULLY measuring with FICO 9 and i also look forward to see how the SSL is directly affected or not.
Just thought I'd add that as of today (and most likely for the forseeable future), Alliant does not do a hard credit pull for the shared secured loan. This was confirmed by 2 different representatives, who both checked with their supervisors and reported back that they don't even perform a credit check.
Hopefully this clears up anything in case someone is worried about a potential HP.
I have a question regarding the effect of this process. I currently have an open installment loan (car loan) with a small local credit union. I found out that they're only reporting to EX and TU, but not to EQ. I have closed installment loans on my EQ report, but nothing open. Will I see the typical 30ish+ point increase in my EQ score if I do this? Will the EX and TU scores be moderate to light increases?