Understanding FICO® Scoring

[lolla]

Hi, My husband and I are new to the boards.  I find all the replys interesting.  We have a question of our own.  We want to build a home but our FICO scores are as follows:

TU

[Tuscani]

Welcome, Lolla. What are your scores?

[lolla]

TU= 552    575

EX= 595    593

EQ= 550   633

We talked with a mortgage lender he said we would have to have atleast 660 before we can get a construction loan.  Our question is how can we get our scores to increase.  I have become a FICO junky. And it seems as though they never change. How much would a cc increase our scores or would this hurt?

[Tuscani]

Have you read the Scoring 101 thread? We also need more info about your overall credit picture. Any baddies? What TLs do you have? What is your util?

[SlowScore]

Well that's not true.  Try going to a local bank(a small one), I got a construction loan with a middle score of 645.  But when I called another lender (Quicken Loans/Country Wide) they told me I would have to put 20% down prior to. I got my construction loan with no money down. But dont forget you need to have the income to support the credit score.

[lolla]

Okay I'll try and be brief.  I have bk filed 1998 and 1-state lien (paid in full).

My husband has 5 liens which we still owe $800. He also has a judgement $11k filed in 6/01 chysler.  We tried making a settlement offer with the lawyers office who is handling said they will only except $9k.

And just recently we received a bill from Asset Acceptance about a collection 17yrs old that is not on his report.

I have one cc open my husband has none.

We want to start our house early March. We have saved $7k so far.  Should we use this to pay down our debts we really need our scores increased? or continue saving? 

Thank you inadvance for your comments!

[4dtough]

My husband & I are also shopping for a construction loan.  All of the creditors that we have talked to require a 640.  We've been working with American Home Partnesrs & they are wonderful.  Thier credit criteria is a little more relaxed then most banks

[chaparritaboricua]

I'm new to the forums so Hello to all,

I have a question or a few!: In everything that I have read it states that it will take at least 12 months to see your credit scores change enough for my husband and I to buy a house. But as I was looking at other posts I have see people say their scores have jumped at least 35 points in weeks instead of months. So my first question is with the scores that I have:

TU: 575

Eq: 551

Ex: 613

Is that truly possible? These are my scores and I'm the one trying to buy the house without help of my husbands scores (which are probably worse than mine right now). I pay all of the bills some late but not 30 days late and I have a bankruptcy that so far has been on my report for 7 years. And tons of student loans, If I keep paying everything on time at least the CC's would that help?

My other question is since this is my second go around with Suze Orman and FICO - would it be best to  check my scores every 3 months or should I wait longer and what other steps do I need to take besides disputing info on my reports (which I just did)?

Any help would be appreciated. And I apologize if this isn't the right thread.

Thanks

chaparritaboricua

[Noah_Bodie]

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chaparritaboricua wrote:

I have a question or a few!: In everything that I have read it states that it will take at least 12 months to see your credit scores change enough for my husband and I to buy a house.

...

I'm the one trying to buy the house without help of my husbands scores (which are probably worse than mine right now).

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Big score jumps are possible. But, as with all things, it depends. Since your primary interest is a mortgage, start a new thread in the Loan Issues forum. Post your scores, your husbands if you have them, and the baddies on both yours and DH's CRs.