topic Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops in Understanding FICO® Scoring

Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

mbla — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 17:23:29 GMT

When I started rebuiling last year I opened two secured installment loans. One with Alliant CU and one with USAA. I paid of the Alliant loan eariler this year and the terrm of the USAA loan ended last month and I paid it off.

When USAA Updated the Secured Loan as paid my EQ08 score went from 716 to 684 and my EX08 went from 723 to 694. I do have somewhat short AAoA due to the rebuilding process but I have been geting approved for prime cards with multiple 15k limits recently.

I have no other installment loans (my car is paid for) or real estate loans.

Do I need to open another installment loan (secured or otherwise) to improve my account mix (I really don't need to borrow any money)?

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

Revelate — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 19:46:19 GMT

@mbla wrote:
When I started rebuiling last year I opened two secured installment loans. One with Alliant CU and one with USAA. I paid of the Alliant loan eariler this year and the terrm of the USAA loan ended last month and I paid it off.

When USAA Updated the Secured Loan as paid my EQ08 score went from 716 to 684 and my EX08 went from 723 to 694. I do have somewhat short AAoA due to the rebuilding process but I have been geting approved for prime cards with multiple 15k limits recently.

I have no other installment loans (my car is paid for) or real estate loans.

Do I need to open another installment loan (secured or otherwise) to improve my account mix (I really don't need to borrow any money)?

Pretty much; you're not alone with the score drops after an installment loan updates to paid, and we've seen people's score recover by opening another. Until I get a mortgage or similar long-term installment tradeline on my reports, I'm simply going to roll my 2 4+ year secured installment loans forever. Reindeer games.

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

Anonymous — Sat, 04 Oct 2014 12:34:04 GMT

@Revelate wrote:
@mbla wrote:
When I started rebuiling last year I opened two secured installment loans. One with Alliant CU and one with USAA. I paid of the Alliant loan eariler this year and the terrm of the USAA loan ended last month and I paid it off.

When USAA Updated the Secured Loan as paid my EQ08 score went from 716 to 684 and my EX08 went from 723 to 694. I do have somewhat short AAoA due to the rebuilding process but I have been geting approved for prime cards with multiple 15k limits recently.

I have no other installment loans (my car is paid for) or real estate loans.

Do I need to open another installment loan (secured or otherwise) to improve my account mix (I really don't need to borrow any money)?
Pretty much; you're not alone with the score drops after an installment loan updates to paid, and we've seen people's score recover by opening another. Until I get a mortgage or similar long-term installment tradeline on my reports, I'm simply going to roll my 2 4+ year secured installment loans forever. Reindeer games.

I might be experiencing this same situation soon when a 2 year unblemished installment loan is fully paid. However I do have a car loan with perfect reporting. Since I do, do I still need to seek a new installment account?

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

pizza1 — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 15:35:47 GMT

I'm safe in the sense that I have 3 years and 7 months on my car loan, and I've got 2 federal schools I'm also paying on that counts as installment. Once the car loan is paid off, I'll still have my 2 fed school loans that I'm gonna pay for like the next 25 yrs to keep it on my reports as open lol!!!

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

CreditMagic7 — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 18:57:13 GMT

Quality thread here. Over the course of this entire year even when being approved for some cards and keeping Utility acceptably low i noticed EQ + EX Scores have consistently struggled to climb ever so slowly until i delved into the CR's and finally noticed that only one of my 2 open installments (auto+personal) are reporting on 2 bureaus. EX reports the auto (i think) and not the personal while EQ reports the personal but not the Auto, effectively and in essence making it a single installment reporting on each. Whereas on TransUnion, BOTH! installments have been reporting for quite some time and that CRA Score has remained consistently and drastically higher the EX & EQ which i believe now explains and confirms without question to the 2 reporting installment accounts supporting a somewhat but very noticable higher scoring return.

In the future i suppose it best to make absolutely certain that ANY new installments report to all 3 in order to prevent my current scoring limitations on the 2 particular bureaus and maximize FICO across the CRA board.

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

FocusedAndDetermined — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 19:16:10 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Revelate wrote:
@mbla wrote:
When I started rebuiling last year I opened two secured installment loans. One with Alliant CU and one with USAA. I paid of the Alliant loan eariler this year and the terrm of the USAA loan ended last month and I paid it off.

When USAA Updated the Secured Loan as paid my EQ08 score went from 716 to 684 and my EX08 went from 723 to 694. I do have somewhat short AAoA due to the rebuilding process but I have been geting approved for prime cards with multiple 15k limits recently.

I have no other installment loans (my car is paid for) or real estate loans.

Do I need to open another installment loan (secured or otherwise) to improve my account mix (I really don't need to borrow any money)?
Pretty much; you're not alone with the score drops after an installment loan updates to paid, and we've seen people's score recover by opening another. Until I get a mortgage or similar long-term installment tradeline on my reports, I'm simply going to roll my 2 4+ year secured installment loans forever. Reindeer games.
I might be experiencing this same situation soon when a 2 year unblemished installment loan is fully paid. However I do have a car loan with perfect reporting. Since I do, do I still need to seek a new installment account?

You are fine - auto loans fall under installment loans.

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

Anonymous — Sun, 05 Oct 2014 22:16:06 GMT

Thanks for the reply FocusedAndDetermined.

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

Anonymous — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 02:30:35 GMT

I have installment loan from my local CU to rebuild my credit and added goody to my TL, I am curious if I paid off early it will drop my score as well. This mean I need to open another small installment loan to keep my score up from not droping?

Re: Installment Loans Paid off Major FICO Drops

Anonymous — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 06:33:47 GMT

My score just drop 16 points on Ex. Boy am I hurt. I had my installment loan report today as Paid and the status updated as closed. Do you guys think my score will recover in 6 months or so without having to take out another installment loan? I do still have my auto loan that will be 6 months old on the 25th of this month still reporting. Any recommendations will be great.