Adding an installment loan -- the Share Secure technique

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:
Wanted to update to say that my first payment paying off 92% also appears to have cancelled the first autopay and bumped it to 2021. I checked on the website and the app and both moved the payment date to 2021 for the autopay.

Not sure if this is new or if it will still autopay on May 30.

---

The guidance answers your question.  I give the relevant part of it below, with key parts highlighted in blue.

========

STEP 4: PAY IT DOWN.

To start with, you will want to make sure you locate where the new loan account is on your online banking portal.  Just log in to the Alliant portal with your username and password and you will by default be taken to the Account Summary page.  You will now see your Share Secure Loan as a new account, along with the Savings account that you are used to seeing.

You will see a DUE DATE and PAYMENT AMOUNT for that loan.  For example, the due date and payment amount might be May 9 and $9.19.  Write both of those down (whatever the date and amount are).  Hopefully you chose a date that is maybe 7-10 days from when the loan was approved.  Later is fine too. 

Next you want to locate the Autopay that was set up by the loan officer.  To do that, go to the TRANSFER MONEY tab at the top of the page.  Then look to the far right margin.  You will see several links.  Look for the one that says Scheduled Transfers.  Click on that.  You will be taken to a page that shows an automated transfer from the Savings account to the Loan account.  That's a way of automatically paying the amount due each month.  Do not try to delete it or change it.  You can't do that -- yet.  The test cases we have done so far seem to indicate that you need to pay it ahead a good bit AND also wait for the first transfer to go through before it will permit you to delete the transfer.

Next pay off a good chunk of the loan.  Personally, I would start with something really simple.  Like pay off $420 of the loan amount ($500).  Your eventual goal is to get it down to just under 8.99% (i.e. a loan balance of $44).  But more than one person has reported that it can take a few months to get the autopay turned off and then confirm that it is really turned off.  So if you start with $420 you should still have a good buffer if a few more autopayments go through.

The way to make a payment (whether big or small) is to go to the TRANSFER MONEY tab.  Just set up a one time transfer of $420 from your savings to the loan.  Simple. 

When you have executed that, go back to the Account Summary page.  You will see that the Current balance is very low -- around $80.  You will also see that the Due Date has been pushed out way WAY into the future.

The next steps are easy. 

(a)  Wait for the first autopay to go through.  If the autopay has changed so that the next "scheduled transfer" date has been pushed way ahead in time, ignore that.  It is likely that your autopay will still go through on the first date that you agreed to.  Wait until a couple business days AFTER that date.  Then look in your savings account.  You should see that the payment still went through.  Your loan balance is now smaller, maybe $71 or so.

(b)  Now go back to that recurring transfer that your loan officer set up.  If you try to delete the autopay before it has gone through once, most people report getting a big red error message.  So now that you have waited till after the first autopay, you can delete it.  Just click DELETE.  It will ask you if you are really sure.  Say yes. 

Your autopay should now really be deleted. 

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

Quick update: loan has been reported to transunion and equifax. It doesn't appear on experian yet. I used the $1 offer to check my scores on creditchecktotal. My transunion score did not change and equifax went down by 10 points. So currently I have:

753 EXP

759 TU

757 EQ

So far, it doesn't seem that the installment loan is treated differently from my student loans.

---

This is really important news.  You have (I think) definitively ruled out any possibility that the SS loan technique could ever be of help to a person with student loans (all of which are in deferment).  The conjecture was: maybe FICO 8 ignores deferred SLs in terms of making its installment util calculation.  If that had been the case, you would have gotten a definite score increase from executing the technique.

Thanks for doing something really important for the broader community.

PS.  You write: "...loan has been reported to transunion and equifax. ..."

Can you confirm that, when the loan reported, it reported with a $44 balance?  In other words almost all of the loan has been paid off on the loan as the record appears on your report? 

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

---

@Anonymous wrote:

Quick update: loan has been reported to transunion and equifax. It doesn't appear on experian yet. I used the $1 offer to check my scores on creditchecktotal. My transunion score did not change and equifax went down by 10 points. So currently I have:

753 EXP

759 TU

757 EQ

So far, it doesn't seem that the installment loan is treated differently from my student loans.

---

This is really important news.  You have (I think) definitively ruled out any possibility that the SS loan technique could ever be of help to a person with student loans (all of which are in deferment).  The conjecture was: maybe FICO 8 ignores deferred SLs in terms of making its installment util calculation.  If that had been the case, you would have gotten a definite score increase from executing the technique.

Thanks for doing something really important for the broader community.

PS.  You write: "...loan has been reported to transunion and equifax. ..."

Can you confirm that, when the loan reported, it reported with a $44 balance?  In other words almost all of the loan has been paid off on the loan as the record appears on your report? 

---

Glad to be of service. Here is a screenshot. It shows the balance as $44. Will update when I get my experian score.

[Anonymous]

I paid off $420 but when I check "manage automatic payment" it shows

Your loan is currently set up for automatic payment. If you wish to change or cancel the automatic payment, please call us at 800-328-1935 for assistance (Hours: Mon-Fri 7am-7pm CST).

my first payment is 5/15. Should I call on 5/14 or after the first payment goes thru? I thought I can cancel online...

[manyquestions]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

I paid off $420 but when I check "manage automatic payment" it shows

Your loan is currently set up for automatic payment. If you wish to change or cancel the automatic payment, please call us at 800-328-1935 for assistance (Hours: Mon-Fri 7am-7pm CST).

my first payment is 5/15. Should I call on 5/14 or after the first payment goes thru? I thought I can cancel online...

---

Usually you can cancel it online a day or two before the first payment is scheduled. So try to do it online on 5/13. Should work.

[Anonymous]

Just to add some datapoints.  My SSL hit my credit reports at $80/$500.  I've already paid it down to $44, but that won't hit for another month or so.  I saw some interesting behavior in my scores.

Original scores

TU: 724

EX: 719

EQ: 718

New scores:

TU: 723 (I had a hard inq on this hit in the same time period, so its safe to say it would have went up.)

EX: 714 

EQ: 732

My Equifax certainly improved.  Went from my lowest to my highest just like that.  It appears Experian did not like the addition of an installment loan above 9% util and is reacting a little more sensitively to that.

I will report back when my low utilization hits.  I'm hoping for another decent boost from that.

One additional datapoint is that prior to this hitting my credit report, I was not able to pre-qualify for Chase.  My AAoA is at 3 months.  My oldest account is 7 months.  Now I prequal with Chase for Slate, CF and CSP.  Adding an installment loan, or getting to 7 months, triggered something with Chase.  I'd like to believe it was the installment loan.

Edit:  I wanted to add that I was able to cancel my autopayment 3 days ahead of time and it did not make a payment to my loan on the scheduled day.  

I also have a question, because I'm not quite sure how this works:

My initial funding was $510.  I made an initial payment of $420 to the loan, then I made another payment of $36.26 to get it down to $44.  Somewhere in here is some interest causing weird figures, but regardless it's down to $44 now.

I have $89.87 in available funds and 138.87 in current balance.

If I withdraw $84.87 and leave $5 avaiable, I'm okay right?  I don't have to keep $44 frozen and $44 available to cover the loan?  I'm a little unsure.  I was going to leave $5 in to cover interest and keep a small sum in my savings.

[manyquestions]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

 Somewhere in here is some interest causing weird figures, but regardless it's down to $44 now.

I have $89.87 in available funds and 138.87 in current balance.

If I withdraw $84.87 and leave $5 avaiable, I'm okay right?  I don't have to keep $44 frozen and $44 available to cover the loan?  I'm a little unsure.  I was going to leave $5 in to cover interest and keep a small sum in my savings.

---

$138.87 - $89.87 = $49        

$49 - $5 = $44

I think your "available" funds are what you can withdraw.  It looks like you will still have $44 locked to cover the loan, and another $5 for the minimum balance.

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

.... I have $89.87 in available funds and 138.87 in current balance.

If I withdraw $84.87 and leave $5 avaiable, I'm okay right?  I don't have to keep $44 frozen and $44 available to cover the loan?  I'm a little unsure.  I was going to leave $5 in to cover interest and keep a small sum in my savings.

---

138.87 - 89.87 = 49.  Of that $49 that is not currently available, $5 is the initial Share deposit.  The remaining $44 is what is frozen.  This is what it means for it to not be available.

You do not need to assign an additional $44 from the money that is not frozen as if it were frozen. 

Note that your loan balance will gradually creep up over time via interest, though presumably you will be making small payments every six months.  Still, I would not withdraw every available penny since I am not sure whether, when the loan balance goes up, Alliant looks for a small amount of money to lock in place.  Withdrawing $80 of the $89 available would be immensely safe.  Depending on your plan for making subsequent small payments, you could likely get away with withdrawing $86.

Remember that your Alliant savings account offers one of the best interest rates on the market, so keeping some cash there is really not a bad move.

[dmFICO8]

I recommend anyone to call if you are not heard from Alliant for 3 business days after submitting your SSL app!

I submitted my app on 5/4, then not heard from it, a week later I call today, loan officer said the email was sent to my gmail on same day (5/4), but I have not received it, not in spam folder. Anyway, I did it over the phone, he basically just read me the terms, not even asking me the due date, just told me when my first due date is, which is what I wanted anyway. It was done over the phone in 2 minutes, received e-sign documents email within 15 minutes, signed the documents in few minutes, then logged in and everything is there, fund and ssl account. Whole process took around 30 minutes including once I got to loan officer. I am not in a rush, but if you are not heard from Alliant in 3 business days, call them! Waiting and patience don't seem to work out!

Edit: alright, upon reviewing my SSL docs again, I signed the optional Debt Protection Plan (third signature, it looks like those CC balance protection plan), I looked at the terms for my first signature, just a peek at my second signature, thinking all signatures are required, not careful with third and just signed. No one has mentioned this, and I am not sure how this fee is going to be charged, now more hassle to deal with. I can always avoid those CC protection plan from web page, but e-sign really got me this time, and first time doing loan documents.

[steelholder]

Did you guys get a boost in your score as soon as it reported, or did it take a bit? Im seeing alliant reported in my CCT report but only saw a 10 point boost for equifax. Im in no rush just wondering. I also noticed my credit karma vatage scoring went up but not the real deal fico.