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Why is my Equifax so low

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Razeus
Frequent Contributor

Why is my Equifax so low

I've been rebuilding my credit since November, 2011. I started with a score of 481 and now I'm up to 651. It should go a bit higher since I just sent in a large payment to bring my CU down to 20%, from 45%. Anyways, I just signed up for this site and I am on the 10-day trial. I know for a fact that my Transunion score is 651 (Privacy Matters 123 and Credit Karma are what I have been using to monitor my credit). To my surprise, myFICO is reporting my credit for Equifax to be 589!  Why were there be a 62 point difference between the to agencies? Both agencies appear to have the same information listed.

My Wallet:
AMEX Platinum | Discover It $20.3k | Chase Sapphire Reserved $16k | Chase United $12k | AMEX SimplyCash Plus Business $11.6k | AMEX Schwab $9k | AMEX BCEP $8.2k | Citi Costco Anywhere Visa $8k | Chase Amazon Visa $8k | Chase Sapphire Preferred $7k | Chase Freedom $5k | Citi Simplicity $5k | Paypal Extras Platinum $5k | Wells Fargo $5k | Citi Best Buy $4.2k | Citi Visa Signature $3k | Care Credit $3k
Message 1 of 5
4 REPLIES 4
MarineVietVet
Moderator Emeritus

Re: Why is my Equifax so low


@Razeus wrote:

I've been rebuilding my credit since November, 2011. I started with a score of 481 and now I'm up to 651. It should go a bit higher since I just sent in a large payment to bring my CU down to 20%, from 45%. Anyways, I just signed up for this site and I am on the 10-day trial. I know for a fact that my Transunion score is 651 (Privacy Matters 123 and Credit Karma are what I have been using to monitor my credit). To my surprise, myFICO is reporting my credit for Equifax to be 589!  Why were there be a 62 point difference between the to agencies? Both agencies appear to have the same information listed.


Hello there and welcome.

 

The Equifax FICO you get here is the Beacon 5.0 version and it what most lenders use when pulling an Equifax score so it is very accurate.

 

As far as Privacy Matters and Credit karma go none of those scores are FICO scores. Privacy Matters sells what are called TransRisk scores and no lender uses them. Credit Karma gives you both the useless TransRisk scores and what is called a VantageScore and although a few lenders actually use the VS they are few and far in between.

 

No one has been able to buy their own Experian FICO score since February of 2009. Creditors can pull Experian and also there is a CU (PSECU) in Pennsylvania that supplies that information to it's members only. You can only buy true FICO scores at a few places. One place is here at myFICO.

At one time you could also purchase your Transunion score at transunioncs.com but no more. Wal Mart now offers a TU08 score to those who have their store card and the Discover version.

Equifax will still sell you a FICO score found here: www.equifax.com/web-myfico-products/

Message 2 of 5
Razeus
Frequent Contributor

Re: Why is my Equifax so low

...The Transunion score I bought here, and the Tranunion Score that I get from Privacy Matters 1-2-3 and CreditKarma are the exact same - so I that's my reason I continue to use CreditKarma as it is free.  My Equifax FICO score that I bought here is the exact same as the one I have at Privacy Matters, so again, I have reason to beleive Privacy Matters is accurate and far cheaper.

 

Still, why would my Equifax score be so much lower than Transunion or Experian?

My Wallet:
AMEX Platinum | Discover It $20.3k | Chase Sapphire Reserved $16k | Chase United $12k | AMEX SimplyCash Plus Business $11.6k | AMEX Schwab $9k | AMEX BCEP $8.2k | Citi Costco Anywhere Visa $8k | Chase Amazon Visa $8k | Chase Sapphire Preferred $7k | Chase Freedom $5k | Citi Simplicity $5k | Paypal Extras Platinum $5k | Wells Fargo $5k | Citi Best Buy $4.2k | Citi Visa Signature $3k | Care Credit $3k
Message 3 of 5
MarineVietVet
Moderator Emeritus

Re: Why is my Equifax so low


@Razeus wrote:

...The Transunion score I bought here, and the Tranunion Score that I get from Privacy Matters 1-2-3 and CreditKarma are the exact same - so I that's my reason I continue to use CreditKarma as it is free.  My Equifax FICO score that I bought here is the exact same as the one I have at Privacy Matters, so again, I have reason to beleive Privacy Matters is accurate and far cheaper.

 

Still, why would my Equifax score be so much lower than Transunion or Experian?


If your scores from here and Privacy Matters and/or CK are close it is by pure coincidence. These non-FICO (we call them FAKO scores) can be much higher or much lower than your FICO scores. There is no way to compare the two. To try and do so is an exercise in futility.

 

It's not unusual for your FICO scores to be different even if the information is the same (very rare) or quite similiar. All three CRA's use slightly different formulas to look at our information so disparity in scores is quite normal. My TU score is over 50 pints less than my EQ score with basically the same data.

 

(With all due credit to long time member llecs for this):

"Virtually everyone sells scores, but they are not all FICO scores. If you got scores from the big 3, then very likely 2 or all 3 of them are not FICO scores. Experian and TransUnion do not sell FICO scores on their website. We call these non-FICO scores, FAKOs, and can easily be as much as a few points to 100+ points off your real FICO when pulled the same day. If it didn't say "FICO" next to the score, then it isn't.

Other companies (e.g. freecreditreport.com, freescore.com, truecredit, creditkarma, Equifax Credit Complete, Quizzle, and dozens of others out there) sell scores, but they are nothing more than gimmicks and lenders don't use them. They do this because they want to avoid paying any fees to FICO and when they say "credit score" people buy it anyway on the assumption that it is a FICO. The scores are off because the formula is different, factors in different things as compared to FICO, and score ranges are different than FICO's (e.g. FICO is 300-850, Vantage is 501-990, PLUS is 330-830, TransRisk is 350-850, and so on)."

Message 4 of 5
hateAshbury
Regular Contributor

Re: Why is my Equifax so low

My Equifax is more than 100 points lower than my TU score. I think this is due in part to (1) some of my inquiries hit only Equifax rather than TU, and (2) for some bizarre reason, Equifax isn't calculating my age of accounts (it says N/A or something like that), nor is it accurately reporting my credit limit.

 

So I now am writing a letter to Equifxax, saying, "Please calculate my age of accounts, and while you're at it, my credit limit too. Thanks so much."

 

 


Starting Score: 653 (11/1/2011 TransUnion)
Current Score: 719 (5/3/2012 TransUnion) 572 (3/21/2012 Equifax) 762 (4/14/12 VantageScore)
Goal Score: 700


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