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gemntheholigram wrote:

Hard inquires do affect your credit score, approximately 10%. Yes you canwait out the two years but with the proper documentation you can dispute these and have them removed in a matter of 3 months (in my experience).

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Disputing inquiries runs the risk of a fraud alert being placed on your reports, as you are essentially asserting that somebody else applied for credit in your name without your consent. Be aware ...

+1  Plus the fact that multiple disputes can cause problems with you CR in some instances.

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The only legitimate basis for disputing a credit inquiry is an assertion that the inquiry was made without permissible purpose.

If they can meet any of the stated permissible purposes set forth in FCRA 604, I have no idea what basis for a dispute would be.

Coding as a so-called hard vs soft inquiry is an administrative coding process, and is unregulated under the FCRA.

If you dispute, you must dispute through the CRA.  The direct dispute process specially exempts all disputes relating to credit inquiries.

When the party made inquiry for the credit report, they provided a statement of permissible purpose to the CRA, who has it in their records.

Not having seen that certification, I am unsure as to how a consumer could assert that it does not provide a permissible purpose.

Inquires only count in FICO scoring for one year, so by the time a dispute process runs its course, which will place a dispute flag in your file and thus render your FICO score essentially useless until the dispute is concluded, it is not, in my opinion, usually worth the effort.