Accuracy of myFICO mortgage scores

Anonymous · ‎07-25-2017

I've done a search throughout the forums and the threads seem to be old so I thought I would ask for any recent experience.

How accurate were your myFICO mortgage scores vs when a mortgage lender pulled your credit report?

Thanks!

Anonymous · ‎07-25-2017

It's very accurate. The same mortgage scores you see through the FICO 3B reports are the same your lender will see. Just remember that the score you see is/was the score you had at that very moment you pulled your report. If you pull your scores today and the lender pulls next month, they may get a different score if you've had balance changes or negatives update on your credit report.

Anonymous · ‎07-25-2017

Ok, awesome. Thanks for the quick reply! I've been monitoring our scores through here and we plan to pull our scores next week. We're gonna try First Financial Bank here in Texas so I hope they use the same scoring models as myFICO mortgage does.

Anonymous · ‎07-26-2017

I always wondered why can't you call them in advance and ask what scoring model they use?

Anonymous · ‎07-27-2017

The mortgage industry is much more monolithic than (say) the auto lending industry is, or the CC issuing industry. With the latter two groups the scoring models could be loads of different things -- varies hugely according to lender.

The mortgage industry is controlled in practice by Fannie and Freddie, so assuming you are going for a basic home mortgage the chance that they will be using the "mortgage" models you see here is about 99.99%

I am curious.... since you have not yet pulled your scores with the lender, have you got your mortgage scores optimized with respect to CC balances? That would mean having all cards reporting $0 except one, with the remaining card reporting a small balance.

Anonymous · ‎07-27-2017

Right now my utilzation is at 58% (3 Cards, 2 cards at zero balance) and my wife's is at 90% (1 card).

We are just trying to get pre approved now so our builder can start building our home and by the time we are ready to close we'll have our CC's paid down.

Our mid scores (according to myFICO mortgage scores) are 624 and 621 and plan to do a VA loan.

Anonymous · ‎07-27-2017

I wouldn't go for the pre approval until that utilization is down. 9% or under. Not zero though. That will give you a nice bump in your scores and better rates possibly. What is the cut off between fair and good scores on the FICO mortage scores? I'm sure someone knows off the top of their heads.

Anonymous · ‎07-28-2017

@Anonymous wrote:
Right now my utilzation is at 58% (3 Cards, 2 cards at zero balance) and my wife's is at 90% (1 card).

We are just trying to get pre approved now so our builder can start building our home and by the time we are ready to close we'll have our CC's paid down.

Our mid scores (according to myFICO mortgage scores) are 624 and 621 and plan to do a VA loan.

You are doing the same thing we are doing for our new construction house, but we are going FHA. At the time of the application, my scores BELOW a 580, but with the help of these boards I'm in the 600 range on scores! In our case, our preapproval is in my husband's name only and when we go for the final approval next month, it will be both of us now that I have my credit in order. We signed our contract in February and our home will be ready in October.

Depending on when your home is ready, your preapproval will expire so the lender will need to run your credit again. If you're able to get the preapproval now, you will have time to pay down your cc balances.

Anonymous · ‎07-28-2017

@Anonymous wrote:
I wouldn't go for the pre approval until that utilization is down. 9% or under. Not zero though. That will give you a nice bump in your scores and better rates possibly. What is the cut off between fair and good scores on the FICO mortage scores? I'm sure someone knows off the top of their heads.

Hi Joesef! For a conventional loan, the cutoff for best rates on the mortgage itself is 740 and for the PMI it is 760.

Note, however, that our OP is going for a VA loan. For those loans the cutoff is much lower, I am told. I think it may be a 620. That's why our OP is implying that his scores (just over 620) will be enough for the pre-App. I am no expert on VA loans (not sure I am an expert on anything actually) so our OP can get advice about score cutoffs from some of the VA loan experts who hang out in the mortgage forums.

Davis9508 · ‎07-29-2017

A lender gave me my scores today and they were the exact same scores that I got on my 3B report last Saturday