1. You have a short credit history. ?

[jamie123]

Okay...I'm tired of seeing this message as to what is hurting my score. When will it go away?

My oldest account is: 5 years 10 months

My AAoA is: 3 years 5 months

I have 3 open CCs that will turn 6 years old this year and my AAoA will turn 4 years old this year.

My 3 youngest CCs are turning 1 year old this month and I don't have any plans of adding anymore CCs this year.

Will the "You have a short credit history." message go away when my oldest account turns 6 years old or my AAoA turns 4 years old? Any chance that I might see a score bump from this?

[HeavenOhio]

I have that statement splattered all over my scores on all three bureaus. My AAoA is between six and seven years, and my oldest account is 16.4 years old. I think that statement might hang around for a while.

[Anonymous]

For me, 10 years. I remember waiting and waiting until about the 10 year of credit history mark, it finally went away. 

[Thomas_Thumb]

I have received the reason statement: "you have not established a long installment credit history". on multiple occassions. The last time I had this statement my open mortgage showed over 11 years payment history. It's a 15 year mortgage. History may still be too short when it reaches term and is fully paid off. Oh well.

I have also received the reason statement: "You opened a new credit account relatively recently". When I last saw this statement my newest account was 4 years 11 months. Perhaps "relatively recently" goes away at 5 years.

[pipeguy]

Not that it helps, but frankly I think they just pick random "reasons" from a list. I get a kick out of seeing things like "declining Mortgage amount balance" (it's still over $120k) and short credit history (my oldest card is an AmEx dated 1978). I wouldn't put too much weight on the "reasons" - if it's a yes it's a yes if it's a no you can always recon and at least get an actual answer.

[Anonymous]

Interesting OP, as my AAoA and AoOA are nearly identical (within 6 months) to yours and I don't recall ever seeing that negative reason code at any point in the last 2 years.

How many total accounts do you have on your credit report?

[jamie123]

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wrote:

Interesting OP, as my AAoA and AoOA are nearly identical (within 6 months) to yours and I don't recall ever seeing that negative reason code at any point in the last 2 years.

How many total accounts do you have on your credit report?

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These are the accounts on my report:

• 10 open credit cards with a total CL of about $100K (3 turning 6 years old, 3 turning 1 year old)
• 1 closed CC
• 1 mortgage (1 year old)
• 1 auto loan (1.5 years old)
• 2 closed installment loans (Old SSLs)

The "You have a short credit history" message is usually followed by the "High credit usage" which is followed by the "High revolving balances" messages. I'm using the 0% offers on 2 of the new CCs so I am reporting about 78% usage on those 2 cards. My total UTI for CCs is running about 28% at the moment. I will be paying these cards off by the end of this month and hope for a substantial score boost and that should eliminate 2 of the 3 messages that have been following me around this year. The only one that could stick around, and that I can't seem to do anything about, will be the short credit history message.

My reports have become totally clean since August of 2017 (Tax lien dropped) but with running the high balances on the CCs I haven't been able to see how high I can actually get my scores. I'm dying inside waiting to get back to AZEO!

[Anonymous]

Perhaps it's somehow related to your two open installment loans being very young.  I know installment loans that are less than 2 years old are considered new.  I'm wondering if in 1 year when your mortgage hits 2 years old if that reason code would go away.

[jamie123]

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wrote:

Perhaps it's somehow related to your two open installment loans being very young.  I know installment loans that are less than 2 years old are considered new.  I'm wondering if in 1 year when your mortgage hits 2 years old if that reason code would go away.

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Yeah, you are probably right about the installment loans. I will occasionally get the "Installment loan balances are too high" message.

I did really put my credit reports through the wringer in the past eighteen months. 1 auto loan, 1 mortgage and 3 credit cards. That's about 1/3 of the accounts on my report started within a 6 month period fom August 2016 through February of 2017. That's why I want to stay in the garden until at least 2019. Just chill out and watch my scores climb.

[Anonymous]

     Thomas_Thumb you said, “History may still be too short when it [your mortgage] reaches term and is fully paid off.” I can tell you that you are most likely right. I had a mix up with my son a while ago (it’s a long story and maybe one day I’ll post it and explain what happened and what I did); but, my CR has been straight for the past many months. Nevertheless, I still have the “You have a short credit history” red down arrow. My oldest account is 24 years 3 months and my AAoA is 5 years 4 months (as of Jan 2018). My oldest account is my mortgage, and while it was a 30 year fixed, I paid it off in just under 17 – that was August 2010. That will drop off my CR in 2.5 years and I expect my score to drop profusely since my next oldest account is a 15 y.o. Amex card. Even as my other accounts age, I’m sure the AAoA will drop.

     I’ve resigned myself to the fact that this down arrow will always be with me (and I will never hit the 850 like you) because every 5 to 7 years I buy a new car for my wife or I. Of course I expect the “You opened a new credit account recently” hit for a couple years, but TT if I remember correctly, that usually goes away after a couple of years. The last time it happened I didn’t have the benefit of myFICO online reports (hard copies).

     I think the red hits are related to something else. Is it possible that FICO always has to have something negative listed? Is it like the kid that gets a 100% on the final exam? The professor is required by the Department Chair to give some positive feedback to the students to “improve” their performance. So I write, “you could have made your fours more legible in problem #2.” Maybe the worst thing FICO can find on your CR is that you opened an account just under a half decade ago?

     If someone has a steadily clean negative column maybe they could chime in and provide some feedback. In the grand scheme of things, for me, if I could keep all my scores consistently above 800, it really doesn’t matter.

Y