Need a quick boost... suggestions??

[Anonymous]

I am currently working with a lender to get a mortgage. My mid score (TU) is at 613 right now and I really need to get it to a 640. I recently paid off a CC that was maxed out at $1700 ($1500 credit limit) and I am awaiting a rescore on that. Any idea how much that might raise my score?? I have two other secured cards with $0 balances. The lender advised me to use those and pay them off every month but keep balance very low. I'm worried that any balance on them is going to hurt my score and I can't afford a drop. Any advice on using them or not using them?? I also have two charge off's that are scheduled to fall off my report this year (one in July and one in September) but other than that no other negative accounts. I also have one auto loan in my name with a balance of $26,500 (just got it in December 2010). If anyone has any other suggestions based on this info to bring my score up please let me know! Thanks

[Anonymous]

http://scoreinfo.org/Your-Credit-Future/Estimator/

Check that out.

Ideal scoring for revolving accounts (which is what credit cards are) is achieved when you have a balance on less than half of them reporting, and the one(s) that do report are reporting a balance of less than 9% of your credit limit.  Going from overlimit to paid off can boost your score in the vicinity of 100 points, and that should happen at the point when it's reported by your credit card company.  A lot of them report when they cut a new statement, some at a specific time every month.  To manage 3 cards for ideal scoring, I would make sure that all but one are paid to $0 by the time the statement cuts, and on the other I would not allow more than, say, 5% of your CL report.  I personally have 3 cards that I use - two, I have bills that automatically go on them every month and the third I use for most of my purchases all month long.  I monitor them through mint.com at least 5 days a week, and when a balance posts to the 2, I pay them off immediately.  The third card I pay about every 2 weeks in full (when I get paid), and if the balance isn't low enough before the due date to be less than 9%, I pay it off then, too.  Charges that haven't posted yet (I use this card really regularly) will get me to a small balance that I need it to report by statement time. 

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the response. I tried the score simulator on here and it showed it could go up to 623-650... which is a pretty broad range lol. The new balance should be on there by Wednesday of next week (paid for a rapid rescore). The problem is, one of my old debts that is suppose to fall off in September of this year is showing as a revolving acct. So I think that's messing up my utilization ratio. Not much I can do about that I guess. It has a limit of $3000 and the balance is $2879... not good... but it's a 7 year old debt and I can't see paying it at this point. I will try what you suggested with the credit cards and hopefully that will help some.