Building credit for mortgage - 6-12 month time horizon

[Anonymous]

My wife and I are buying our first apartment in 6-12 months. She is 34 and has very little credit history - she has a Equifax score of 680 and has built credit through a credit card she has with her mom (she's been on it for 10 years) and a Delta Amex that has a $1300 monthly limit.

She's never missed any payments nor had any derogatory marks, she just has very little credit history.

What is the best way for her to build her credit in a short amount of time?

Would it be advantageous if I added her onto one of my cards?

Also, I am a member of Navy Federal Credit Union. We might use the credit union to apply for a mortgage. Should we open up a joint account there or should I help her become a member and open a checking account?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

[Anonymous]

Where are you getting her credit score from?  Make sure it is a FICO score, not just a generic "credit score".  Also, mortgage lenders use a different version of FICO scores, so you may want to buy your mortgage FICOs for both of you.

Amex provides a free Experian FICO8 on their login, I believe, so check that as well.

Does she report any utilization to her Amex?

[Anonymous]

ABCD will be a big help to you.  He knows a lot.  He'll be able to help you more if you tell him:

* The Date Opened, the current balance and the credit limit of each of her two cards (the AU and the card in her name). 

He'll explain something called AZEO (All zero except one) which will involve seeing if her mom can keep the AU card at $0 while your wife keeps her own card at a small positive balance.

There may be a big advantage to getting the balances reporting right first and THEN pulling her true mortgage scores, since the pull of the mortgage scores will cost money.

Something she can do ASAP is get her three credit reports (EQ, TU, and EX) and go over those with you and perhaps a helpful member of this community.  She wants to look for any "negative" marks (like lates, collections, chargeoffs, etc.) as well as getting the CC information I mentioned about.

ABCD is knowledgeable and helpful and can likely guide you further.

PS.  You mention the possibility of adding your wife as an AU to one or more of your cards.  This is a nice idea if you can find 1-2 cards of yours that are old (Date Opened of long ago), zero balance, and no lates.  Also you'll want to do some research and see how the specific issuer will report the Date Opened on her AU tradeline -- will the issuer report a Date in 2018 (not good) or the much older date you opened it (good)?  Folks on the CC forum here may know.

[sueblue34]

I don’t think you should acquire any more debt until you close. This account will be to new for lenders and they will be checking to see if your going to rack up more debt.

[Anonymous]

1- she should have her own NFCU membership. You can still have joint accounts.

I know people will disagree, but I suggest she open 1 or two store cards (or 1 store & 1 gas) - where you purchase things. These will be lower limit and should not hurt your ratios too badly.

[Anonymous]

Hi Sue and SKSH.  I don't think we are likely to hear from the OP again.  He hasn't responded to any of our posts and it's been a month.