@ezdriver wrote:
@merlinflex wrote:I just built a house this past year.
I applied with 3 different lenders via my work relocation program and went with Discover Home Loans and Discover Home Real Estate, that was 1/31/2014
Got a call a little while later and was approved based on the initial application. Gathered 3 years tax returns and W2's and 3 months current bank statement, go the pre-approval a few days later.
Decided on a new build here in D.C. and put $25K down to start in mid-march (took some time looking and closed on the previous house I was selling). In the end I had put down 23% on a $665K new build and financed the rest.
Due to weather and such, we did not close until 9-30-2014, so six month process from start to finish.
During that 6+ months, I charged ZERO/NADA and locked all my credit reports and charged nothing at all....not one dime and opened no accounts.....no HPs at all.
Since I was in a corp housing with no mortgage, I paid myself down to 3% utilization across the board.
When my old mortgage reported as closed, no change to my FICO, but when a truck I had reached its loan end, my score dropped 5pts.....go figure....(i had three car loans and still had two active). but rebounded back a month or so.
Then at the start of Sept, they pulled my CRs to lock me in and we went from there. My scores were very good across the board as had paid everything down pretty quickly in April so that it would catch up to my credit reports and that can take up to 90 days. So I was right on time when I went to close.
Just be ready to lock yourself down and such and do nothing to afffect your FICO scores......Good luck!
That is music to my ears! Perfect way to handle one's credit during the home-buying process. wish that all my buyer clients would be so proactive and diciplined.
Congratulations on your new home.
Thanks! yeah, I had been working on my credit long before the house thing and move came up, prob 2 years and change. Nothing really wrong, but got serious about paying to get my utilization down, at that time it hovered around 25% across the board.
When I sold our house I took the profit that we made and earmarked it towards the down payment and then we had about 6 months of no mortgage/rent payments, so I took a nice chunk of change from my personal savings account, not joint, and made massive payments across the boards. so it went down fast and I knew it could take a few months for it all to catch up to my CRs and then level out. I didn't want to wait to the end when we were close to closing to do it, as CRs can take awhile to update.
From there, I just put back into my savings what I normally would put towards mortage, insurance, property taxes and bills.....our apt was all utilities included (company paid for it all) except cable/internet, so my savings account balance rebounded pretty quickly.
I heard and read about horror stories of people doing dumb things, like opening new loans for cars, or getting new credit cards and/or making large credit purchases and things like that.
The builder and the mortgage company were both in unison in telling me to NOT do ANY of that!!
So I heard and obeyed and lived off my debit card or just cash and charged NADA!! I brought all my cards across the board down to 3% utilization and just paid regular things and did nothing out of the ordinary and did not do large cash deposits or anything dumb.
When I came time to close, gave them several months worth of new bank statements and pay check stubs and the underwriter said, good deal, nothing unsual from Feb to Sept, you good to go.
The night after we signed and closed at the title company, we went to diner and used a credit card for points! 
The next day, I went out and traded in both my cars for cars with AWD/4WD and got 1.99% from Chase and PenFed on new ones. Cars worth more than owed, but both rear wheel drive. Approved on the spot. Got a Ashley card to get some new furniture and take advantage of the 12 month financing offer and got two new credit cards, a black card and the recent Amex BCE. Locked up our CRs and gardening till Jan 2016!
