Understanding FICO® Scoring

[dhb1313]

Can anyone help me make sense of this?

As long as I can remember, I've gotten this as a "hurting your credit score" item:

"You have a short credit history."

Then Suze's Platinum kit provides these details:

Your oldest account was opened
39 Years, 9 Months ago

FICO High Achievers opened their oldest account 19 years ago, on average.

Average age of your accounts
7 years

Most FICO High Achievers have an average age of accounts between 6 and 12 years.

what's up with that?

Deb

[haulingthescoreup]

My guess would be that the formula thinks that for someone with such a long overall history, your AAoA ought to be higher.

I get the same thing: 19y 10m for longest, but something like 4y 10m AAoA. It doesn't like having my history so weighted toward the new stuff.

[dhb1313]

Thanks for the reply, Hauling.  My scores are just below 680, meaning every crazy formula thing really makes a difference.  Could I possibly be better off removing the ancient account -- an AmEx account my parents put me on as an authorized user when i was 13 or something for emergencies -- from the TransUnion account?  

Do i even have the option of removing an account in good standing from my account because their formula penalizes me for it?

oy vey!