topic Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically? in Rebuilding Your Credit

Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:35:21 GMT

Hello,

I am new here. I have been trying to fix my credit for a couple years now but admit I haven't been very proactive in that endeavor. I have never seeked advice from others who have a lot of knowledge on the topic. So here I am. Here's a little about myself first. I am a newlywed mother of newborn twin girls. My husband and I have lived in a tiny house for 3 years but with the addition of our (surprise) twin girls we are needing to upgrade to a larger home.

My husband and I both have full time jobs and make decent money. Especially him. His has decent credit but has a lot of accounts financed. While he can afford to pay it all it seems to look bad when we tried our hand at getting a home loan. My credit on the other hand is terrible. My TU is 624 and EQ is 632. Those are just numbers I pulled off of CreditKarma so I am unsure of the accuracy.

Here is a little info on my CL's:

One credit card through my FCU with a $500.00 CL (Balance is $185.00)

$200.00 Personal Line of credit through my FCU.

One credit card through Credit One with a $1000 CL (Balance is at $725.00)

Fingerhut $600.00 (no balance)

I have a 100% payment history on all the accounts I currently have open.

Heres the bad stuff:

I have 5 derrogatory accounts. All of them medical in nature. I was stupid( and broke) years back and couldn't afford to pay them. I took the wrong route and let them go to collections. I regret this tremendously. The amount in collections total $1705.00 I also have a couple of CHARGE OFF accounts. on my Credit Karma report it states my credit age is only 1 year and 7 months old.

With all that being said....I have a couple medical issues and was going to check into Care Credit. I tried reading through the forums and it looks like they approve at a lower amount but with raise the CL if needed quite a bit. I know they do HP on credit. Is this something that will impact my scre dramatically and is it something that will take forever for me to recover from? Will it help my credit in the end?

I have several credit goals at this time. I am breaking them down so they feel more attainable. First, I'd like to be 650 acroos the board. Then over 700 and eventually onto a credit score from all three at over 800.

Any help and advice is welcome and appreciated!

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:39:39 GMT

Welcome to myFICO!

It's hard to predict, but I do not think it will. The effect of an HP is over stated in my opinion. I am pretty sure the collections are holding your scores back the most. A credit inquiry may ding your scores by a couple of points, though things will be pretty much the same.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:53:05 GMT

Thank You!

I have a question about collection accounts. It may be an extremely stupid question but I'll admit I am new and pretty ignorant to credit.

If I am to pay off my collections accounts in full would it be reported and improve the credit dramatically or has the harm been done already?

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:53:46 GMT

No question is stupid on myFICO.

That depends: have the collections been reporting monthly? If so, paying them off will not hurt you, but doing so may not dramatically help you either. Have you ever heard of PFD? For your scores to really rebound, you want to try get the collection agencies to delete the account when you offer full payment.

If you have never heard of PFD, I will be more than happy to help you understand it.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:54:46 GMT

I have no idea what PFD is, LOL. Help!

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 13:56:55 GMT

Check this out: https://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/pay-for-delete-shady-credit-report-cleanup-1264.php

Basically, it's when you agree with the collections agency to pay them in full if they agree to delete the collections from your credit report.

It's not illegal, and people do it all the time.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 14:00:11 GMT

I will check it out! My balances in collection isn't too outrageous so paying them off is definitely attainable for me. I will have to look into if they report monthly too.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 14:04:11 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I will check it out! My balances in collection isn't too outrageous so paying them off is definitely attainable for me. I will have to look into if they report monthly too.

Cool! If the collection agencies will not agree to delete your collections from your reports, just pay them off in full. A paid collection looks good to other lenders in a manual review because its shows that although you were severly behind, no one took a financial loss with you. You paid back your debt in full despite the long-term damage.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 14:06:33 GMT

Thanks again for the help!

Anyone in here have Care Credit can speak from experience on the effect on your score when approved?

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:00:39 GMT

Just wanted to mention that Credit Karma and other non Fico scores do not count closed accounts into your average age of accounts. This can significantly impact your AAoA (Average Age of Accounts) if all of your open credit is new despite having older (5+ years) closed accounts.

If you only had 2 accounts 1 closed 5 years old and 1 open today with Fico your AAoA would be 2.5 years with Credit Karma it would be 0.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:03:15 GMT

Care Credit can be a generous credit line. Mine is $7,000 although it started lower maybe $2,000 I can't remember.

Anyway adding a new account with a $7,000 limit and $0 balance would lower your utilization and therefore improve your score on that front.

The downside is it's affect on average age of accounts and even if not a major impact to your credit score many lenders do not like to see too many new accounts. For example I have seen people post that Chase doesn't like more than 5 new accounts opened in the last 2 years.

the hard pull shoudl be a negligible hit but just like the AAoA lenders may not like to see more than X number in 6 months.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:15:27 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Just wanted to mention that Credit Karma and other non Fico scores do not count closed accounts into your average age of accounts. This can significantly impact your AAoA (Average Age of Accounts) if all of your open credit is new despite having older (5+ years) closed accounts.

If you only had 2 accounts 1 closed 5 years old and 1 open today with Fico your AAoA would be 2.5 years with Credit Karma it would be 0.

I was curious about that! Thanks for explaining. WHen I got my equifax free report for this year it stated 11.5 years of credit. So, this makes sense to me now.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:16:37 GMT

Whoops, I meant 11.5 years of credit but cant remember the average age of credit. Still should be above 1.7.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:22:53 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Care Credit can be a generous credit line. Mine is $7,000 although it started lower maybe $2,000 I can't remember.
Anyway adding a new account with a $7,000 limit and $0 balance would lower your utilization and therefore improve your score on that front.

The downside is it's affect on average age of accounts and even if not a major impact to your credit score many lenders do not like to see too many new accounts. For example I have seen people post that Chase doesn't like more than 5 new accounts opened in the last 2 years.

the hard pull shoudl be a negligible hit but just like the AAoA lenders may not like to see more than X number in 6 months.

I didn't even think about that at all. It's going to look bad on my average age of accounts if I apply for another account right now. Yikes!

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:32:42 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
Care Credit can be a generous credit line. Mine is $7,000 although it started lower maybe $2,000 I can't remember.
Anyway adding a new account with a $7,000 limit and $0 balance would lower your utilization and therefore improve your score on that front.

The downside is it's affect on average age of accounts and even if not a major impact to your credit score many lenders do not like to see too many new accounts. For example I have seen people post that Chase doesn't like more than 5 new accounts opened in the last 2 years.

the hard pull shoudl be a negligible hit but just like the AAoA lenders may not like to see more than X number in 6 months.
I didn't even think about that at all. It's going to look bad on my average age of accounts if I apply for another account right now. Yikes!

If your average age of accounts (AAoA) is high, a new account won't decrease your scores by much. Say if your AAoA were 2 years, a new account would probably decrease it to roughly 1.8 years (this is just a guess). A lot of new accounts can do damage to your scores, though. YMMV.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:27:11 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Whoops, I meant 11.5 years of credit but cant remember the average age of credit. Still should be above 1.7.

OP, what's your AAoA according to Fico?

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 15:58:16 GMT

Ok, Yall...call me crazy but arent we suppose to be abkle to get our scores for free once a year? I got the free report but not seeing my score.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 16:03:06 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Ok, Yall...call me crazy but arent we suppose to be abkle to get our scores for free once a year? I got the free report but not seeing my score.

You do not get a free score. I thought so too.

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 16:10:24 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
Ok, Yall...call me crazy but arent we suppose to be abkle to get our scores for free once a year? I got the free report but not seeing my score.
You do not get a free score. I thought so too.

WELL CRAP. LOL

Re: Will Care Credit HP effect my score dramatically?

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 16:11:26 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
Ok, Yall...call me crazy but arent we suppose to be abkle to get our scores for free once a year? I got the free report but not seeing my score.
You do not get a free score. I thought so too.

WELL CRAP. LOL

Check this out: https://www.creditchecktotal.com/