topic Re: FICO score question in Understanding FICO® Scoring

FICO score question

pat0812 — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 23:40:35 GMT

I always have under 10% UTI reported every month

is it true that if I have 3 cards, to obtain the highest FICO score is better to

report a balance on 1 card and the other 2 cards report as $0 ?

now my question is like that

if I max out on the card I want Ito report a balance, but on the other 2 I have $0 balance

and I'm still under 10% UTI will that hurt my score? Or the FICO system doesn't look at card by card and only care about the UTI % ?

Re: FICO score question

Epcot — Fri, 02 Nov 2012 23:42:02 GMT

I am not so sure on the first part of your question. But I do know that if the balance on one card exceeds 90% of it's limit that is a big negative.

Re: FICO score question

jsucool76 — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 00:42:41 GMT

I'm not quite understanding your question entirely, but it sounds like you want to max out a card, which is NEVER a good idea.

Re: FICO score question

GregB — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 02:05:21 GMT

I believe you are referring to score hits from "too many accounts with balances". There seems to be a point for most people where having a balance over a certain percentage of their accounts results in a lower score than if the same amount of total debt was spread on fewer accounts. I can tell you that I lose several points when I have balances on 13 CC accounts instead of 12 out of my 25 total accounts. It is usually a few points for me.

I don't think this happens for 2 accounts but it might for 3 or 4 total accounts.

You can try and have all of them report a balance, pull a EQ FICO report and see if the "reason" of "too many accounts with balances" appears under "Items hurting your score". If it does, drop it to 2 and see if it helps.

It will NOT be the same for everyone.

Re: FICO score question

Shogun — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 02:07:57 GMT

If you hit max on the card, you might want to be careful about it. Sometimes they balance chase you as you pay it and sometimes they close to cut their losses.

Re: FICO score question

bettercreditguy1 — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 02:18:41 GMT

If you do get to or near the maximum credit ceiling on one of your cards, it will not hurt long term IF you pay it off in full at the end of the first statement cut. However, you do NOT want to accrue or carry balances at or near the top as this indicates to the cc company you are having CASH FLOW problems and are very likely to DEFAULT.