@Anonymous wrote:Yeah, Trudy's was an answer I was looking for. I do have the EX app + TU from Discover + EQ from CK/Citi. I'll probably be good for now. I may actually use one of the subscription services when it gets closer to actually buying a house. Thanks everyone!
When you get close to buying a house you should get the expensive MyFICO product, or at least monitor your EX mortgage score in real time with Creditworks.
@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:And in fact, the very best way to prepare for a mortgage is to huddle with folks here (which costs you nothing) and get advice well in advance. I realize that buying a house might be a long way off, but if you had to make the roughest guess, when di you think that could be? E.g. six months from now? 12-18 months? Three years?
Probably a good 1.5+ years. I'm set to graduate next May, so it won't be before then.
Good. So the key things to remember are:
1. It's not good to add new credit, running up to a mortgage. The best thing you can is garden. The older your accounts the better.
2. When you get within 3 months of your mortgage application, go into AZEO mode if you haven't already... i.e., let one card report a small balance, while the others report a zero balance. Stay in AZEO mode until after the closing.
Those are the 2 best things you can do, which are under your control, leading into a mortgage... other than of course the usual -- paying your bills on time 