topic Re: Credit Inquries in Understanding FICO® Scoring

Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 22:51:40 GMT

Multiple inquiries for a home mortage within 20 days dropped credit score twice (by > 25 pts total). All oher changes were positive during that period (decreased debt and on time payments). I thought that all inquiries for a mortage within 30 days were considered as 1. Have I irreversibly hurt my credit by shopping for a better rate?

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 23:24:04 GMT

Pull the report directly from the CRA and look at the coding of the INQ's as I would agree 25 points is too many points for an INQ.

lc1 wrote:

Multiple inquiries for a home mortage within 20 days dropped credit score twice (by > 25 pts total). All oher changes were positive during that period (decreased debt and on time payments). I thought that all inquiries for a mortage within 30 days were considered as 1. Have I irreversibly hurt my credit by shopping for a better rate?

Re: Credit Inquries

llecs — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:39:05 GMT

All inquiries within 45 days now count as one.

Did you get that mortgage? Adding a new account could affect avg. age (assuming also you did have a mortgage listed before; adding a new mix of a mortgage could cause score to go up). If you paid down debt, were any accounts closed. Loans, especially, if closed, could cause your score to drop.

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 01:48:25 GMT

They simply show under theheading co"Inquiries that display to companies (may impact your credit score). I don't have the mortage yet, but was pre-approved. But that does not show on my credit report. I'm afraid that this could stop me from getting the mortgage, as we don't close for 2 weeks.

Also, the last inquiry was 3 days before my credit score dropped the last time. The inquiry happened on the same day I ran my credit report last (before I ran the report). The only other change that shows is that a credit card balance dropped by $250. I've made other payments to various accounts that don't show yet, but haven't closed or opened any accounts. I didn't miss any payments. I have a dispute on record for an old account that shows delinquent, but was paid in full and closed in 2003. The status or aging of this account or the dispute has not changed since the last credit report either.

Would it be prudent to call the CA directly?

Re: Credit Inquries

llecs — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 02:05:02 GMT

Even if there are multiple inquiries (mortgage-related) listed, there shouldn't be an impact on score as FICO does not count them separately.

That dispute may also play into the score. If you dispute a CA, for example, I believe, FICO won't count that account in the score until it comes back verified.

IMO, I'd send a DV to the CA ASAP CMRRR. Don't call them.

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 02:11:49 GMT

Collections and PR's are not excluded when in dispute.

llecs wrote:

Even if there are multiple inquiries (mortgage-related) listed, there shouldn't be an impact on score as FICO does not count them separately.

That dispute may also play into the score. If you dispute a CA, for example, I believe, FICO won't count that account in the score until it comes back verified.

IMO, I'd send a DV to the CA ASAP CMRRR. Don't call them.

Re: Credit Inquries

llecs — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 02:18:11 GMT

Thanks for the clarify!

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 23:05:31 GMT

I called Equifax today to inquire about the drop in my score. They said that since I got my score from myFICO.com, that they did not know how the score was calculated.

So far the myFico scores have matched dead on what my mortgage company has pulled.

I asked repeatedly that they make sure that the inquiries were marked as mortgage inquiries, but all they would tell me is that all mortgage inquiries within 45 days would only be used 1 time in their calculation. I know this, I just want to make sure that the inquiries are properly coded. I can't dispute inquiries on-line through Equifax, so I guess that snail mail is my only option?

They further warned me to be careful that hits from credit monitoring agencies, other than Equifax could result in hard hits to my report. Is this true?

I am really worried because this drop threw me into a lower group of credit scores. I am worried that it could impact my mortgage which is being processed now!

Also, I mispoke earlier in this thread. I asked about calling the CA, I meant CRA (I don't know my accronyms very well).

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 02:26:18 GMT

lc1 wrote:

They further warned me to be careful that hits from credit monitoring agencies, other than Equifax could result in hard hits to my report. Is this true?

No. This is no true at all.

Seems the EQ CSR was BSing you to try to get you to buy only their products.

Any time you pull your own report, it is always a soft pull, no matter which service you use to pull it. That's the law, by the way, not just some particular CRA's policy.

I can't believe they'd flat out lie to you like that.

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 04:49:27 GMT

Thanks!

Re: Credit Inquries

RobertEG — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 20:01:04 GMT

Here is what FairIsaac is currently posting in their Credit Information Center:

What to know about "rate shopping." Looking for a mortgage or an auto loan may cause multiple lenders to request your credit report, even though youre only looking for one loan. To compensate for this, the score ignores all mortgage and auto inquiries made in the 30 days prior to scoring. So if you find a loan within 30 days, the inquiries won't affect your score while you're rate shopping. In addition, the score looks on your credit report for auto or mortgage inquiries older than 30 days. If it finds some, it counts all those inquiries that fall in a typical shopping period as just one inquiry when determining your score. For FICO scores calculated from older versions of the scoring formula, this shopping period is any 14 day span. For FICO scores calculated from the newest versions of the scoring formula, this shopping period is any 45 day span. Each lender chooses which version of the FICO scoring formula it wants the credit reporting agency to use to calculate your FICO score.

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 05:19:37 GMT

So it is possible that if my mortgage company pulls my credit the will see a different score than I got via ScoreWatch?

Do you know what method FactualData uses? That's who has performed the majority of pulls for my mortgage (for different companies).

Re: Credit Inquries

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 05:33:48 GMT

In response to a prior reporting, on a call today with Equifax, I confirmed you can now report a dispute online without a credit report identifier. THanks for everyone sharing their knowledge. I feel I have company in my quest to improve my credit scores.