tips and tricks or time and patience?

[Anonymous]

Hello all,

I've lurked for a long time and decided it was time to post. This forum has taught me so much already, but I'm hoping to make sure I glean any other insights I can. So my ultimate goal is to buy a home, but I'm not sure what's feasible. I have a family member who is a realtor (who doesn't? lol) who is insisting I buy this year - but I'm happy to take their insistence with a grain of salt. I don't fully understand much about real estate, tbh, but my family member has made it very clear they'll do stuff on their end (something about credits, commissions, etc?) to get us the lowest payments/best deal they can.

Situation: currently renting, lease ends July, landlord said we can give notice by end of June if we plan on leaving. So we either need to lock something in for June 1 OR we need to commit to another year.

Financial info:

-I make 70k and have worked full time with my company for 8+ years

-TU - 585, Equifax - 607, Experian - 639. My mortgage guy pulled to check the other day and the mortgage score came in at 599. He said their "floor" for mortgages is 600 and told me we should pull again in June; I was hoping to hit 640 at minimum.

-No collections.

-82% payment history (I know, ouch - we had some medical issues that put us behind)

-15% utilization

-1 derogatory: ch 7 bankruptcy discharged in 2016 (medical debt - got it under control since)

-avg age of credit: 3 yrs

-total accounts: 11 (car loan, 1 auth user credit card, 1 care credit card, 1 synchrony card, 2 capital one cards, 1 comenity card)

-2 closed accounts (both were paid up and closed when the companies went out of business)

-I did request limit increases on the cards and all of them came back "no" and reminded me about the bankruptcy, credit payment history

What I've been doing: first thing was to check the reports - I found a couple things to dispute (all were legitimately incorrect and were removed), I've been paying my credit down religiously and haven't missed any payments in months, mortgage guy said not to even think about opening anything new - so following that advice. I signed up for alerts so I know what's up pretty much all the time with my credit now. I don't know what else I can be doing other than just keep on top of payments and wait...

What I'm asking: is there anything I can do to put some jet fuel into this tank and see some quicker gains? Is trying for the mortgage this year a stupid move? I just feel like there's not really anything I can do that I haven't already... it's especially frustrating because my realtor/family is absolutely convinced this is going to happen in the next couple of months and I feel like this year is unattainable and I'd be lucky if I could manage to qualify next year...

[OmarGB9]

It appears you may be stuck in a bit of a holding pattern for a while. But first, can you list out all your positive accounts specifically with their respective limits and balances? There may be a few points you can squeeze out still.

[Anonymous]

Unless you have found the home that you know is "IT" then time and patience. Never follow someone else's insistence but your own gut feeling! If you have found "IT", pay utilization down to 1-5% if possible, is one place to start.

[Anonymous]

Sure-

Comenity: 0/100
Cap 1: 40/750

Cap 1-rewards: 10/300

Paypal Credit: 200/1500

CareCredit: 0/1000

Synchrony: 393/600

Car note: payments are 399 and current principal balance is 11,313, but CK shows 12,065 owed.

auth user: 1561/26,500

[Anonymous]

A home actually just got listed that I couldn't even believe........ it looks like it was built for me. It checks every single "need," and all of the "wants," too. But it's on the high end of what I'm confident I can afford so I'm sure it'll get scooped up soon and probably for more than I could have offered anyway. That's part of the problem. The market is insane right now. I used my budget to figure out what I'm comfortable paying (taking into account increased utilities, extra savings, etc.), so I am pretty confident I know what I can afford... and it doesn't really matter anyway because my mortgage guy said we should wait until June to check again, so I'm sitting tight either way I guess... I just want to make sure when we check in June his answer will be "heck yeah, go for it," and not "ooh, that's a nope" or "well, i guess we can try..."

But that paying down advice is helpful, thanks - is it worth it do that anyway and keep utilizations at that level?

just venting here - if something like utilization going from 15 to 5 percent is the difference between having or not having a house... blaaah this whole thing just feels ridiculous. I mean, I have never missed a rent payment and my place is in beautiful shape after nearly 10 years here, I have a really stable job where I've done nothing but progress (and I've more than doubled my salary since starting there - but I could more than likely make at least twice as much again if I went to work for a larger company - obviously not gonna try to change jobs before going for a mortgage tho)... you'd think that would count for more. I paid down a chunk of my cards two months ago and my score went DOWN like 20 points. I was actually in better shape in February when I owed more??

[Anonymous]

Doubt pay down was reason for drop. Yes maintain 1-5% level, better yet have no more than 40% of all active accounts close with balance.  Pay all credit cards off except one and let that one close with a balance between $5 and $95 every month. Mortgage scores react differently than some others.  

@Anonymous  has really great DP's on this, as well as others

[OmarGB9]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Sure-

Comenity: 0/100
Cap 1: 40/750

Cap 1-rewards: 10/300

Paypal Credit: 200/1500

CareCredit: 0/1000

Synchrony: 393/600

Car note: payments are 399 and current principal balance is 11,313, but CK shows 12,065 owed.

auth user: 1561/26,500

---

Hmm yea there is not too much to be done here, but yes, if you can bring as many balances down to zero as possible and keep them there, you'll gain some points. Preferably all zero except one (AZEO). Mortgage scores love zero balances.

On the car loan, I believe the thresholds are under 60%, under 20%, and under 9%. @Anonymous will correct me on those thresholds more likely.

[Anonymous]

Yeah paydown was not the cause for the decrease. Unfortunately the mortgage scores are not very reactive to loans. However if you will implement AZEO, you'll see a difference.

(but the major recognized thresholds are at 10% and 65%.)