topic Re: My wife is bringing me down!! in Rebuilding Your Credit

My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 13:55:31 GMT

Well its been a while since ive been on here after this forum helped me get my CS back in shape to close on our first home!

I just recently went over my CH and was shocked to find a couple of things. After we bought our house (2011) my wife added me as an AU on 2 of her credit cards, one being a Macys AMEX card and a Discover card. CLs for both is $1200 for AMEX a $7200 for Discover (my biggest credit limit on my report). And I believe these were helping my credit until after the beginning of this year when we had a child and had medical bills up the wahzoo. Needless to say all the work we put into maintaing the Discover card was put to waste. Now with 2 kids, a mortgage and all sorts of bills trying to lower our balance is becoming futile. The Macys card has been fine with balance being paid off every month until i just found out the last 2 months havent been paid leaving us with a 60 day deliquency of $135 balance.

Heres my question, should I jump ship as an AU on one or both of the cards. I did the math and my current utilization rate is 86% (the balance onf the Discover is $7000), now if I removed myself from the Discover it would drop to @ 50%. My overall available credit would drop significantly as well from $9700 to $2500, but I feel the lower util percentange is more important. I think Ill keep the Macys going the deliquencies are the only thing on the account over the past 5 years.

Just in case you were wondering I have a pretty nice mix of installment loans (mortgage, car lease), revolving accts, low inquiries and 1 collection account that was paid off and is paid status and just sitting there for the next 3 years but was paid 3 years ago. So everything is pretty good except for the account that i am an AU on.

My second part to this is will removing myself just remove the whole history of the Discover account or will just stop collecting data? Are there any potential negative effects of removing the card(s)?

Thanks for taking the time to read all this. This is truly a great place to get pure information.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 16:12:06 GMT

USUALLY when you remove AU it removes ALL the info from the report since it wasn't your card/account/liability. Now if she defalted and it went to collections then you'd bet they'd keep it on there as long as you didn't dispute it as not yours...

when it works for you, they don't want it, when it works against you they try with all their might to have it hurt you more it seems.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 16:18:25 GMT

Agreed!

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

novabama — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 17:48:26 GMT

I was an AU on an account with discover that was charged off. I actually just called the CC co and told them to remove me and they deleted from my CR the next day.

If it were me I would jump ship on both as long as you have revolving credit lines of your own... it's weighing your util down and a very recent 60 day late can tank a score.

Good luck!

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

novabama — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 17:50:09 GMT

also it's not like you couldn't become an AU again later, after you have been able to pay down the debt.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 18:27:15 GMT

Well heres the dilemma with getting off of both, the CL for Discover is $7200, the CL for Macys is $1200 so my over CL on all my ccs is $9750. I jump ship off bother my CL drops to $1350 and my balances would total $1260, that is a 93% utlization rate!! If I kept the Macy card my CL drops to $2550 and my balances would be $1395, which is 55%. So what is the lesser of the 2 evils? High utilization of 60 day late that has paid off now. Keep in mind I'm not trying to improve my credit for a certain purpose, but i would like to keep it trending up and honestly I have no idea how much my mortgage is helping. We've had it for 18 months with perfect payments but Id rather be using that benefit not as a crutch but as a foundation.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 18:28:32 GMT

She hasnt defaulted just 60 day late and high utilization on the credit card

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 19:19:10 GMT

you have to remember, as long as your an AU the current info will be on your reports as if its yours.

If your not in the market for new credit right now, then why do you care what your utilization is?

If your in garden mode all you really have to worry about is keeping negative info off your reports and/or getting rid of negative info so that when your ready to apply for new credit (either a card, or a loan or whatever) you can just drop your utilizaito and get the instant boost.

So if your report is 100% spotless (not including this 60 day late) even if your at 99% utilization, you could easily pay it all off and next month BAM instant score jump due to the major drop in utilization and thus you look more appealing to creditors.

Don't forget her having a 60 day late on the card even though paid back is still a negative that is now on your report. I'd say drop the one that has the late now... its alot easier to bring your utilization down than it is to fight a 60 day late (even if its paid).

whenever your ready for new credit, add yourslef back on an AU they usually don't add on back info - although they might if you were an AU and then stopped and re-added again. But still worth a shot - would give you back that age as well as the CL without showing the negative info.

Either way if you just keep it on the 60 day will hurt more than high utilization down the road. You can always pay down a balance and it magically goes away, you can't always just tell a ccc to ignore a 60 day when apping.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Tommy5746 — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 19:20:42 GMT

Divorce my friend... Dddddddddivorce! haha Jk!

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 20:45:33 GMT

I understand what you are saying but I can't just wait till I want to get credit for something and just pay off my ccs. That's 10k, which if we could pay off we would.
And if I got rid of only the 60 late then my utilization would go up to 97%. That just sounds kind of crazy. So it's 60 day late more negative than carrying a 97% utilization rate? And let's answer that question for short term and long term(like 1 year from now)

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 11:39:55 GMT

So I was just on Credit.com and using their credit score estimator. I played out the different scenarios and here are some of the results. In my current situation it gave me a score of 547. Now if I removed myself from the Discover but kept the Macys with the late payments my score would be 607 (better but not great). If I got rid of the Macys and kept the Discover with the high utilization my score would be 651 and if I got rid of both which still leaves me with a high utilization my score would be 672. Then I played out a scenario in which I got rid of the old collections (again, I dispute it goes away then year later shows back up) and got rid of the AUs, even if my total CLs are $1000 and my balance is $900 it says my score would be 714! Now keep in mind those collections are 2 years old.

Has anyone used this credit score simulator before? How innaccurate is it? I know its not close to reflecting my true score and probably inflates and deflates scores to make sign up for either a credit card or credit score saving programs. But I think it gives me the idea with what the best result I would get from doing certain things. If I get rid of both the AUs my score may not be 672 but I think it at least tells me getting off of both is more beneficial than get off of only one, which did surprise me. Should I feel confident in that deduction or does this calculator give me no true direction?

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

llecs — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 12:11:59 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
So I was just on Credit.com and using their credit score estimator. I played out the different scenarios and here are some of the results. In my current situation it gave me a score of 547. Now if I removed myself from the Discover but kept the Macys with the late payments my score would be 607 (better but not great). If I got rid of the Macys and kept the Discover with the high utilization my score would be 651 and if I got rid of both which still leaves me with a high utilization my score would be 672. Then I played out a scenario in which I got rid of the old collections (again, I dispute it goes away then year later shows back up) and got rid of the AUs, even if my total CLs are $1000 and my balance is $900 it says my score would be 714! Now keep in mind those collections are 2 years old.

Has anyone used this credit score simulator before? How innaccurate is it? I know its not close to reflecting my true score and probably inflates and deflates scores to make sign up for either a credit card or credit score saving programs. But I think it gives me the idea with what the best result I would get from doing certain things. If I get rid of both the AUs my score may not be 672 but I think it at least tells me getting off of both is more beneficial than get off of only one, which did surprise me. Should I feel confident in that deduction or does this calculator give me no true direction?

Credit.com is a great site for credit advice, but ignore the scores, score-related advice, and their simulator. All FAKO-related and lenders don't use those scores. Sometimes their advice will harm FICO, and FICO's advice harm their FAKO. In other words, don't assume that if the simulator increases for a FAKO that FICO would too.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

Anonymous — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 12:41:00 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I understand what you are saying but I can't just wait till I want to get credit for something and just pay off my ccs. That's 10k, which if we could pay off we would.
And if I got rid of only the 60 late then my utilization would go up to 97%. That just sounds kind of crazy. So it's 60 day late more negative than carrying a 97% utilization rate? And let's answer that question for short term and long term(like 1 year from now)

I'll do just that:

Short term - start paying off your credit cards - you should be doing this NO MATTER WHAT. When I say pay off the balance when you need credit I meant, if your nomal monthly spending is say 1000 and you PIF every month, just make sure that when you go to get new credit your utilization is low. It doesn't matter if your CC balance is at 1000 or 1 million all that matters is that when you go to app for credit THATS when it matters what your utilization is at. So short term, work on paying down those balances. Every month you float a balance your throwing money away - we all have to do it from time to time but in the end you need to work on bringing those balances down. So yes if you dropped the AU on those accounts, in the short term your score would drop because you'd be at a much higher utilization, but you'd also be dropping a recent 60 day late - so in essence you'd probably stay the same, or maybe go a little bit higher.

Long term - start paying off your credit cards ANYWAYS! Long term your utilzation NOW will have NOT ONE OUNCE of influence on your score later if its paid off later. So lets say 1 year from now you've paid off most of the 10k in cc balances, your utilization is lower but if your still AU on those cards, you'll STILL have a somewhat recent (albiet a year) 60 day late.

I stand by my answer drop the AU with a 60 day late....its doing you no good now or later with it being a recent late. Drop the AU and then in a year if you need the help with utilization add it back on as they SHOULDN'T be adding past info to your report, only info from when you have the card.

Re: My wife is bringing me down!!

atarvuzdar — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 12:51:32 GMT

I agree.

The 60 day late will show on your credit reports for 7 years if you don't get rid of the account. It's not "just" a 60 day late. It's a derogatory mark that will affect your score negatively for years even assuming perfect payment history from here on out. Getting rid of that account is most important. Also, maybe you want to broach the subject of the late payment with your wife, as well, if this is the first you're hearing of it? In my opinion, finances are not a subject a couple should keep silent about!

Lastly, congrats on the family.