How will removing authorized user effect their credit score

[Anonymous]

Thanks for any assistance.  When my wife's credit was limited I added her to a couple of my credit cards as an authorized user to help give her some more history.  Since then she has built up a good bit of positive credit history and the only negative thing on her profile shows to be high utilization and it's based off of the balances of those cards.  She has much older accounts so this doesn't effect her overall account age much but maybe a little.  If I remove her as an authorized user it'll eliminate about 30% of her existing utilization.  My question is does taking someone off like this hurt their credit the same way closing an account does or does the account just disappear as if it never existed?  I don't want to do anything negative now that she has a good credit score.  Also does this seem like it's worth it generally?  I don't think the account age negative will outweight the balance positive but I'm not sure.  

[FireMedic1]

Your score will go up and hers down per say. She'll have a high aggregate util % with that 30% and yours not knowing where you sit will raise your scores if your below that. She'll lose some total CL amounts. Choice is yours. Main goal. Get the util down. Comes down to total CL limits.

What will your aggregate util go down to if you cancel the AU's?

[thornback]

Am I understanding correctly that the high util is on the AU cards, not her primary cards? If so. Then removing her as an AU will help in reducing her util and increasing her scores.  So long as the util on her primary accounts is in check, losing the AU credit limits won't affect her.

Most AU accounts remain on credit reports for ~10 years post-closure, give or take. During this time they continue to age and factor into age metrics for scoring - so no points will be lost in the immediate future.  Few lenders delete the tradeline entirely after an AU closure. 

FYI - Closure of primary accounts works the same.  The only immediate loss is the credit limit which will only negatively impact scores if the loss of said limit causes utilization to spike.  Otherwise, accounts closed in good standing will remain on reports and continue to age.  The loss of age and possible drop in score happens down the road when the tradeline finally does drop off.