The problem you have is that there is basically few places to buy your real FICO 04 score including directly from the credit bureaus. You can buy your equifax FICO 04 score from here or from equifax (but it is tricky). The TU FICO score sold here is TU98 score which is not accurate for mortgage purposes. Basically no other places to buy FICO scores. The credit scores sold by others are generally not accurate as mortgage lender pretty much use FICO 04 base scoring.
LIMITS IN CARD DESCRIPTIONS
Best way is to compare the 3 reports. And when I say compare, you need to pay close attention to the details. If they are all reporting the same info, your FICO scores from the other bureaus are likely within 20-30 points of the equifax score here. Typically if you have higher utilization, you will see bigger swings between your FICO from the 3 bureaus.
I have a question... I thought I had this thing somewhat figured out. When an account is PIF, and reports as such... does that make your score drop? It seems that this has happened to me 3Xs. When I pay off accounts my score drops anywhere from 5-11 pts. I've been trying to keep my revolving accounts @zero before the end of each billing cycle thinking it would bump up my scores. Is it that I still need to have a balance showing so that the CRA's see that there is still activity on the accounts? It seems that paying debt down is ok as long as you don't pay it off. I'm in the game, I just don't have the right coach and playbook! I'm trying... just need sum help! Trans: 705 before drop, Eq: 671 and fell to 664. Score watch is a nice tool, but its not specific. I feel like a blind man who hit the lottery, But can't find his money!
@whatamess wrote:@I have a question... I thought I had this thing somewhat figured out. When an account is PIF, and reports as such... does that make your score drop? It seems that this has happened to me 3Xs. When I pay off accounts my score drops anywhere from 5-11 pts. I've been trying to keep my revolving accounts @Anonymous before the end of each billing cycle thinking it would bump up my scores. Is it that I still need to have a balance showing so that the CRA's see that there is still activity on the accounts? It seems that paying debt down is ok as long as you don't pay it off. I'm in the game, I just don't have the right coach and playbook! I'm trying... just need sum help! Trans: 705 before drop, Eq: 671 and fell to 664. Score watch is a nice tool, but its not specific. I feel like a blind man who hit the lottery, But can't find his money!
on SW.
Is this a CC? The only times you'd ever see a drop on a FICO for having a zero balance is if 1) the CC or revolving was closed thereby resulting in the TL being permanently removed from util (which can result in a drop if you are carring balances on the other CCs), or 2) all of your balances hit $0 (oddly enough, FICO can ding you for having all $0 balances).
On the reporting of balances, even if you pay 100% of it off, it can still report a balance. Most CCs report the balance you had on the statement date, as opposed to the due date. Some people pay off their CCs on the due date thinking it would report $0, but they end up using it again before the statement date and that can throw off their reporting.
Aside from these two, I can't see a scenario where a $0 balance results in a drop, with that being the only issue or change on the CR. Note that for SW, SW will monitor your scores and monitor for major changes to EQ and will throw out the score and a likely reason behind that score change. Note that not all of the suggested changes results in that specific score change. For example, I once gained 20 for adding an inquiry. Inquiries don't increase your FICO so the increase was due to a dropped baddie which SW isn't designed to pick up on. In other words, you might have 3-4-5 changes on your CR that resulted in a net score change of X, but SW will only give one to you (depending on the alert type). I always recommend subscribing to a credit monitoring service that monitors all 3 reports. Some allow you to pull your reports daily and you can specifically target your report for these changes. e.g. no longer blind.
You will tend to see a drop in your scores due to the HPs on your CRs. The higher your score the harder the hit, same goes for the amount of INQs already on your report, the more you have, the softer the blow. Either way, TLs and/or CLIs generally will have an overall POSITIVE effect on your score in the long run. Like everyone else said, within 6 months your scores should recover from the INQs and be higher because you have more credit to your name.
