How long will it take me to reach a 620?

[Anonymous]

Trying to get my score to 620 so we can do a rehab loan(203K) on our house, would prefer a 640 for more FHA options, but will at least look when at 620..

 Current TU and EQ are both 565..

 Had a really tough patch about 4-5 years ago, showing many 30, 60 and 90 day lates...

 More recently, in Jan-March, ended up with a few 30 and 60 day lates (had the money, we switched who was paying bills, failure to communicate)

 High utilization, around 74%... $28K balance/$38K limits... currently able to pay down by about $500/month so utilization is decreasing by about 1.5%/month

 Only other negative is a paid collections on TU from May 2010

 Without getting anything deleted, can we get there in 6 months? 12 months??

[Anonymous]

Two pieces of good news:

--you're in the right spot for the credit rebuild

--FHA options don't vary between 620 and 640 with most lenders

I had a really good friend, I did his loan on a standard FHA 203(b) in January.  He was a 570 late last summer, maybe August?  His problems sounded similar to yours---all the problems were old and the present problem was utilization.

He had less money owed, but a higher utilization.  His took a few months to go from start to finish.  Yours might take longer, but he didn't leverage these forums.  Some of these moderators are FICO wizards. 

Good luck!!!

[Anonymous]

paying the utilization down is going to help, but at 28K in debt and only 500 to pay towards it, it will take you a couple years to get it under a reasonable amount and see any large boosts of score (assuming 500 is the amount you are paying, not 500 plus the minimums...).  Fico gives you some point increases for paying the balances down.  The key % areas seam to be around 50%. 30% and 10%.  To get from a 565 to 620 my guess is you are needing to get  down  to at least 30% utilization as well as let the lates age out a bit.  Any lender is likely going to want to see those lates at least a year old (and depending upon the rest of the history, maybe a bit more).  If they see a pattern of lates throughout the credit history, they may want to see longer clear history to make sure that the good payment history is more the rule than the exception now as well as some extra reserves.   

[Anonymous]

I am paying it down by about $500-$600/month, last month my total payments were $820 and the finance charges were $197... Not sure if we can currently go any more, right now I am unemployed so we are a single income family right now (income $75K), once I get a job we can obviously increase our payments..

My goal is to be able to do this home project as soon as I get a job and our score hits 620...

[Anonymous]

Utilization is about 30% of your score.  Payment history is about 35% of your score. 

Post details of that May 2010 collection on the Rebuilding Your Credit forum and see what your options are - also search the forums for peoples' experiences with that collection agency. 

It really wouldn't hurt to send GW letters.

If you purchase a report from here, you can see what kind of jumps you can expect (a range, though) given how much of your balances you pay down - I'd search for a discount code to make it a little cheaper.

Speaking for myself, I moved from 583 to about 620 with paying balances down - but that was paying down from like 30% util to less than 10% util. 

[Anonymous]

I did the simulation... In 6 months with all payments on time, the range was 565-595.. in 6 months and paying down $500/month, the range was 565-595..

But obviously no way of seeing what the range would be if we did both..

[Anonymous]

I was able to move my scores pretty quickly in the beginning just with disputes and paying down my debt. Since then, however, it's been pretty much stagnant.

[Anonymous]

 So in about 7 months... utlization has gone from about 74% to currently reporting 66% and should drop to 61% once my current payments report..

 Scores of EQ and TU have gone from 565 on both to EQ of 621, TU of 659.. still needing 19 pts on TU so I don't have to worry what EX is.. should I expect a jump this month as my Target card with a $4500 CL went from a balance of $4563 to around $3350, statement on that account is cut 3/20..

[MBOhio2]

Thanks for updating... it's great to see how people's progress are going.

I'm in a similar position of paying down my util % on a higher total revolving debt amount (about $14K) slowly over many months. In my experience (and I'm sure you've seen this too), my scores increase with every little change in my util %. While the major jumps are at 50%, 30%, etc... I've seen jumps from 100% to 85% and from 85% to 78%, etc. Therefore, I definitely think you can expect a jump in your score for continuing to pay down the balances, but it's tough to say how much it will be.

Are you shooting toward a 640 for your middle score?

[Anonymous]

Yes, looking to do a FHA 203K refi on our current home..

Really haven't seen gradual increases on EQ as we paid down balances, was completely stuck at 591 for about 5 months even though we paid down ultilization by about 1.7% each month.. then out of nowhere took a jump from 591 to 618, then a few days later to 621.. anxious for the recent payments to report so I can see effect, maybe within 2 months we can get there and get the application process started.