adding husband as AU to CCs

zelle1 · ‎10-23-2016

Will adding my husband as an authorized user to my credit cards help raise his credit score? Mine is excellent at 810 but his is not so good due to little history and no credit cards at the moment.

Thanks.

RobertEG · ‎10-23-2016

Even if it improves his score, the new score will no longer be based only on his own accounts history.

That could create an issue in a manual review if a creditor wishes to see a score that represents only his own credit history.

Will he be applying for credit that will likely result in a manual review of his credit report?

Revelate · ‎10-23-2016

@zelle1 wrote:
Will adding my husband as an authorized user to my credit cards help raise his credit score? Mine is excellent at 810 but his is not so good due to little history and no credit cards at the moment.
Thanks.

Well to add what Robert states: an AU would help your husband's score (if it is counted, FICO anti abuse might whack it as we haven't pinned down what precisely triggers that) if he has no credit cards... so what I would do is add one or two pretty tradelines (OK's across the board, the longer the history the better) and then establish an account or two of his own.

There's always rumors AU's are going to go away, the lenders would like that and FICO tried it... while there are mortgage lenders that will accept any score as valid, there are some as Robert suggests which may try to toss out the AU's, so it's better to have individual history too. AU's can shortcut the process though in establishing him a useful credit card or to, so I'd do it personally just keep in mind they're not 100% useful in terms of credit building by themselves.