Debt ration

[Anonymous]

As part of my divorce settlement my x has been granted possession of the house. However, the loan is solely in my name. Her name was only on the deed, she has a specified amount of time to refinance the mortgage into her name, but I know this will not happen soon because she has a low FICO score. So she is renting from me and has been making the payment on time. But maintaining two households has lowered my FICO adversely because of my debt ratio. Can I advise the credit reporting agencies that this loan payment is being made by my x wife? Will this lower my debt ratio?

Thanks for any advice,

Z

[llecs]

Unfortunately the only way around it is to refi.

Installment utilization is a very tiny part of FICO scoring that it isn't worth worrying about. It is setup this way so that way you won't get penalized for adding a $300k mortgage, as an example. In fact, I bet if you paid off one of your mortgages to $1 and it reported, you would not see an increase. Now that isn't to say you shouldn't worry about it. Do what it takes for the refi. Your debt-to-income ratio, which is not a part of FICO scoring (because FICO doesn't know your income) is taking a hit. It doesn't impact your score, but lenders would see that you have two mortgage payments and that can impact your credit and how lenders view you.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the information, one more question please. What monitoring service do you recommend?

I use Transunion and Experian currently, but notice a large difference in scores for all three between

the  two services.

Thanks,

Z

[llecs]

Be sure to check out Credit Monitoring Service (CMS) Guide . I don't have any recommendations because everyone's goal is different (some only need to see their reports annually and some need ot see it daily). But know that 99.9% of the services out there offer scores, but none of them are FICO scores. They are a non-FICO we call a FAKO. The Guide above shows which offer FICO scores and which do not (there are only 3-4 services out on the web you can pay for that offer FICO scores; any service from TransUnion or Experian do not offer FICO scores).

[Anonymous]

Thank You for the information.

Z