Understanding FICO® Scoring

[nileshraj]

I wanted to see if anyone on this board has paid collections and still have a credit score of 700.  I have 3 paid collections for medical form about 1 year ago.  I am only using 20% of my credit.  I have had a credit history for over 15 years.  My mortgage and car payment has been on time.  Only a couple of 30-day lates from 6 months ago.

Is it still possible to get into the 700 club with collections or once you have a collection, you will always be in the low 600 club?

Thanks.

[smallfry]

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nileshraj wrote:

I wanted to see if anyone on this board has paid collections and still have a credit score of 700. I have 3 paid collections for medical form about 1 year ago. I am only using 20% of my credit. I have had a credit history for over 15 years. My mortgage and car payment has been on time. Only a couple of 30-day lates from 6 months ago.

Is it still possible to get into the 700 club with collections or once you have a collection, you will always be in the low 600 club?

Thanks.

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I have 2 public records. Scores are 706-717-731. Watch your scores go up after the baddies age and you get the utilization under 10%. You are in good shape.

[cheddar]

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nileshraj wrote:

I wanted to see if anyone on this board has paid collections and still have a credit score of 700.  I have 3 paid collections for medical form about 1 year ago.  I am only using 20% of my credit.  I have had a credit history for over 15 years.  My mortgage and car payment has been on time.  Only a couple of 30-day lates from 6 months ago.

Is it still possible to get into the 700 club with collections or once you have a collection, you will always be in the low 600 club?

Thanks.

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First, keep in mind that paid vs. unpaid makes no difference as far as FICO is concerned.  The only thing that matters to FICO regarding collections is how recent they are and how many you have.  The older they get, the less they hurt.

I had one collection that was 6.5 years old and had low 700s on EX.  TU was stuck at 696 until it dropped, though, and then it went to 744 overnight.

Message Edited by cheddar on 06-09-2008 02:05 PM

[nileshraj]

Does it make a "Big" difference between a 10% utilization versus 20%?  I saw a significant score increase when I saw it drop from 90% to 50%.  It was about a 50 point jump.  But just wondering if there is a big difference once you get it down to about 20% and if going to 10 makes that big of a difference.

[MidnightVoice]

Score can be over 700 with one paid collection - 2 of my three were

[marty56]

Big difference between 9% and 10%.  11 points on TU 16 points on Ex

[haulingthescoreup]

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marty56 wrote:

Big difference between 9% and 10%. 11 points on TU 16 points on Ex

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Good illustration of why we keep harping on "under 10%, not at 10%." Lots of people miss the distinction.

[maddog]

I'll even go as far and say that you might get a nice bump if you get it under 5%.  It's worth a noticeable amount of points for me at least.

[The1]

I wasn't so lucky. this is from a thread that I started yesterday: I’ve recently had 2 major collection accounts removed from my credit report. I have all of my alerts checked, but I haven’t received any alerts showing an increase in my score. I checked with the 3 credit bureaus individually and they show that the removals did take place and my score has increased. I ordered today’s score through MyFico and it did show that the collections were removed, but my score hasn’t changed. This is a little disheartening because if this is the means to where the majority of creditors base their decisions, they’re not getting an accurate up to date score. For instance, the score that was given to me directly from Experian and TransUnion is now approx 30 points higher than what’s being shown in MyFico. Does anyone know why that is? Please Help! I'm trying to do get a refinance, and the lender told me that my score had to be at least 680 to qualify. Well my middle score is 649 and my high score is 673. I thought with the collection removals, it would surely take me closer to my goal. Those removals didn't increase my score not even (1) point.

[debtisgood]

The1 - I don't know why you arent gaining points for getting them removed. Do you have other accounts in bad standing?

What I can tell you is that the reason your scores are higher when you pull from the bureaus is because they are FAKO scores, not FICO scores. FAKO scores are not the product most lenders use. About 90% of major lenders use FICO and thus those scores are bunk.