Utilization Percentage question?

[Anonymous]

It's for 10% combined.  But the best UT would be 1% reporting on one card.  Even 10% reporting on one card would work for a better score.

[vanillabean]

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@Revelate wrote:

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@Thomas_Thumb wrote:

Inverse, welcome to the board.

I suspect your tax liens are affecting your upward potential "glass ceiling". Once these drop off and your profile is clean, you should be in a better position to evaluate positive/negative response to various factors. Until then, responses may be muted if you are near the upper or lower boundry of a scorecard. Also, the data I have seen posted suggests responses to factors differ depending on whether a profile is clean or not clean.

I posted a hypothetical framework for a simplified Fico 8 model on another thread, Unfortunately, my proposed framework only relates to clean files. Nonetheless, it might provide some insights for you and constructive feedback is always welcome. I have not seen a structured Fico model presented publicly and thought it could be interesting to build one from the ground up based objective review of poster data sets where confounding of factors can be minimized.

A representative risk assessment model with publically open architecture would be a nice tool for planning strategy for people to build (or protect) credit worthiness.

Thanks for sharing your data.

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Sigh, are you seriously suggesting that because people have dirty reports that their data is useless?

Over and over it has been demonstrated previously and currently that the number of tradelines reporting a balance matters and every single time you discount it with some blahblahblah statement.

(Mod Cut)

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Ouch.

[Thomas_Thumb]

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@Thomas_Thumb wrote:

I purchased the one time MyFico 3B report for  $59  in late March and plan to purchase it again in August. I was surprised to see 19 different scores. It makes for an interesting, robust, comparison since the scores come from the same data sets.  

Short term, my plan is to let the one inquiry age off the EQ report, reduce spending to two cards and then see how all 19 scores are affected - assuming the report format does not change between now and August.

After that I likely will go back to reporting a small balance on 4 cards - with payment in full as always. This will allow me to look at the impact of: one inquiry with four cards reporting against no inquiry with 2 cards reporting. This isolates factors.

The expected outcome is no shift in Fico 8 score - maybe a few points in an industry specific one (likely the EQ ones), but a significant shift in Fico 4 (particularly EQ).

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I pulled my 3B report to evaluate impact of my EQ inquiry aging off on scores. I had also hoped to evaluate impact of dropping credit cards reporting a balance to just 2 of 6 but, AMEX reported a $1 balance - so 3 of 6 it is. During the months from March to July I unfortunately had a couple nice closed accounts reach 10 years and drop off the CRA reports (a 15 year mortgage with solid payment history and a high CL Chase CC card that had 20 years of monthly PIF history). 

Notes: I have 6 active cards (5 CC and one AMEX charge card, AAoA reports as 15 to 17 years depending on CRA, one active 15 year mortgage with 5 years of payments remaining. Oldest card 31 years, youngest 4 years.

VantageScore 3.0 dropped my rating for # accounts to poor from good - you need 11 to 20 open+closed counts for a good rating and 21+ for an excellent rating. What's up with that? Anyway refer to below table for results.

FICO 3B REPORT SUMMARY
Equifax credit report	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Comments
Fico score 8	850	850	Aggregate utilization 1% => 2%
Fico score 5	809	796	Lone EQ inquiry aged off 6/2015
Fico score 8 Auto	884	877	Lone EQ inquiry aged off 6/2015
Fico score 5 Auto	827	816	Lone EQ inquiry aged off 6/2015
Fico score 8 Bankcard	886	877	Lone EQ inquiry aged off 6/2015
Fico score 5 Bankcard	825	816	Lone EQ inquiry aged off 6/2015
CK VantageScore 3.0	829	830	# accounts 12 (good) => 10 (poor)
TransUnion credit report	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Comments
Fico score 8	850	850	Aggregate utilization 1% => 2%
Fico score 4	823	823	No inquiry on TU reports
Fico score 8 Auto	897	891	No inquiry on TU reports
Fico score 4 Auto	872	872	No inquiry on TU reports
Fico score 8 Bankcard	900	899	No inquiry on TU reports
Fico score 4 Bankcard	858	858	No inquiry on TU reports
CK VantageScore 3.0	830	831	# accounts 12 (good) => 10 (poor)
Experian credit report	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Comments
Fico score 8	850	850	Aggregate utilization 1% => 2%
Fico score 2	837	839	No inquiry on EX report
Fico score 8 Auto	889	889	No inquiry on EX report
Fico score 2 Auto	857	858	No inquiry on EX report
Fico score 8 Bankcard	898	898	No inquiry on EX report
Fico score 2 Bankcard	868	870	No inquiry on EX report
Fico score 3	830	830

December 2015 Update: Closed (2008) Cap One BB charge card no longer showing on CB reports. All CBs report a drop of one account on their reports. EQ and EX still list a (Chase Visa card (opened 1986, closed 1/2006) - TU does not. Went from 3 of 6 (July) down to 2 of 6 (November) cards reporting a balance. Aggregate utilization dropped from 2% to 1%.

FICO 3B REPORT SUMMARY
				Ag UT 2% => 1%, 3 of 6 => 2 of 6
Equifax credit report	12/3/2015	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Accts 11 => 10, AAoA 16 yr, 5 mo
Fico score 8	850	850	850
Fico score 5	809	809	796
Fico score 8 Auto	884	884	877
Fico score 5 Auto	827	827	816
Fico score 8 Bankcard	886	886	877
Fico score 5 Bankcard	826	825	816
CK VantageScore 3.0	831	829	830	Updated 10/28/2015
				Ag UT 2% => 1%, 3 of 6 => 2 of 6
TransUnion credit report	12/3/2015	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Accts 10 => 9, AAoA 14 yr, 9 mo
Fico score 8	850	850	850
Fico score 4	815	823	823	Reason for drop accts 10 => 9?
Fico score 8 Auto	897	897	891
Fico score 4 Auto	864	872	872	Reason for drop accts 10 => 9?
Fico score 8 Bankcard	900	900	899
Fico score 4 Bankcard	850	858	858	Reason for drop accts 10 => 9?
VantageScore 3.0	832	830	831	Updated 10/28/2015
				Ag UT 2% => 1%, 3 of 6 => 2 of 6
TransUnion credit report	12/3/2015	7/28/2015	3/28/2015	Accts 11 => 10, AAoA  16 yr, 5 mo
Fico score 8	850	850	850
Fico score 2	837	837	839
Fico score 8 Auto	884	889	889	Reason for drop?
Fico score 2 Auto	857	857	858
Fico score 8 Bankcard	900	898	898	Reason for increase 3 of 6 => 2 of 6
Fico score 2 Bankcard	865	868	870
Fico score 3	830	830	830
VantageScore 3.0	833	832	833	Updated 10/28/2015

[EW800]

Very interesting thread.  

Based on info within this thread and all that we have collectively learned, may I ask for input in regard to what I might experience if I were to allow a second card to report a balance?  I currently only allow one card to report a balance of about $5 each month.  For the past several months, it has been the same card.  

AAoA is about 12 years.  Newest account is about one year.  Oldest is about 25 years.  

I have about 10 open TL's.  7 are visa, MC and Discover.  I believe two would be store-type cards (Dell and Care Credit), and one is a LOC that basically acts as overdraft protection for a checking account.  Several closed accounts include 3 paid-off auto loans, and a couple of old credit cards.  As noted below, I have a foreclosure from about three years ago.  Inq's are rather minimal - 2 over 1 year old on TU, 0 on Eq and 1 on Ex that is very near one year.  

Based on what we know, if I were to allow a second account to report a balance of just a few dollars, would likely experience much of a drop, if any?

[Thomas_Thumb]

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@EW800 wrote:

Very interesting thread.  

Based on info within this thread and all that we have collectively learned, may I ask for input in regard to what I might experience if I were to allow a second card to report a balance?  I currently only allow one card to report a balance of about $5 each month.  For the past several months, it has been the same card.  

AAoA is about 12 years.  Newest account is about one year.  Oldest is about 25 years.  

I have about 10 open TL's.  7 are visa, MC and Discover.  

Based on what we know, if I were to allow a second account to report a balance of just a few dollars, would likely experience much of a drop, if any?

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In general it is probably best to rotate which card(s) report a balance. Given you have 10 cards, I believe allowing two or three cards report a balance is unlikely to have a significant negative impact on your score as long as aggregate utilization is held low. My suggestion is allow up to three cards to report in a given month. This increases flexibility and makes it easier to rotate through cards. Key point is PIF more than reporting a tiny balance.

Reporting a balance across a few cards helps build credit payment history. Change things up a bit for six months. A card or cards that have not reported a balance for a year or more may trigger something the 1st time it/they report so let things settle in.  You can always revert back to the one card approach if results don't meet your expectations.

It does not appear you are planning to apply for new credit in the near future so this is probably a good time to evaluate some alternative payment strategies.

[Revelate]

I don't take a drop on any of my FICO 8 scores with 2/9 cards reporting a balance.

I do take a drop at 3/9.  Hard to say 3/10 without someone's being willing to test