Difference in FICO Score

[Anonymous]

I have been working on improving my credit score for a year now.  I started with scores of EFX 450 XPN 503 and TU 460 (courtesy of my last relationship).  I am working toward a VA mortgage to purchase the home I have been renting.  My goal is a 620 mid score.  I have paid off all collections (which are over a year old now), paid all of my open accounts on time for over a year and paid down all of my revolving balances below 15% of the credit limits.  I also obtained a secured visa and installment loan last year to build new/good credit history.  These accounts are now paid in full and were paid on time every month.  I pulled my new FICO scores through myfico.com on 04/01/11 and had scores of EFX 593 and TU 647.  The XPN plus score was 655 ( I understand that the XPN is not a FICO score and I anticipated this being less when the lender pulled my scores).  So, as you can guess, I was pretty excited to have a mid score of 647 which is above the required 620 of my goal.  Finally I could close on my house!

My lender pulled my credit report today (04/04/11) which showed the following scores:  EFX 593 TUC 612 EXN 639, according to my lender's report I still need 8 more points to get to the 620 mid score.  I am so frustrated, I thought that myfico.com used the same scores as the lenders use.  EFX is the same on the lender's report as the myfico report, EXN is lower 16 points (to be expected because they use a different model) but the Transunion has me very confused, its a difference of 35 points less! So again, I don't qualify because it's my mid score.   I read in other posts that the lenders use TU 04, but, myfico uses TU 98, why isn't this disclosed by the site?  I am so discouraged!  Is it just a waiting game to get the score up 8 points now or is there something I can do?  I did see that my lender's report shows 3 accounts "in dispute", could this be affecting my score?  There was also an inquiry on 04/01/11, however; my lender pulled my credit on 04/04/11, so this is inaccurate, I'm the only one that pulled a report on the 1st, so it should not be showing, could this make a difference in my score?

Any advise/insight anyone could give me would be greatly appreciated!  It's been a long road and I'm ready to be past it!

[llecs]

Welcome to the forums!

As you read and as is posted ad nauseum on these forums, most lenders pull a different version of TU as found on myFICO. Why won't FICO update to TU04 at least? I don't know. I could be because of contractual issues between FICO and TU. Maybe it has to do with limiting confusion because of the other versions floating out there; maybe they only wanted to offer one score. Not sure. Frankly, I wish myFICO, if they could, would offer all versions of FICO scores via TU and EQ. Most lenders use TU04 and offering that would be more convenient, though quite a few lenders, including Fannie/Freddie, I believe, still use TU98. There are some lenders out there that use neither.

BTW, you mentioned VA (thanks for serving). Is this VA lender a major lender? IIRC, USAA , for example, doesn't even use TU98 or TU04 in the mortgage process. Does your lender say they are using TU04? You mentioned a dispute, did you dispute anything after your last FICO pull (not sure how TU04 or later models treat disputes...I assume the same as TU98 (removes the financial and late components of the TL for scoring))?

[Anonymous]

The lender is a credit union in the area that has been working with me over a year (they turned me onto myfico to assist me in rebuilding my credit).  I have a copy of their report, the scores were pulled as follows:

EFX Beacon 5.0

XPN FICO-II

TUC FICO Classic 04

I paid off my revolving debt on March 22 and requested Transunion to update the items to show a zero balance.  The accounts are reflected now with the correct balance, however; the lender's credit report shows "account in dispute" under each, which I suspect is pulling my score down, as everything else looks good.  I think I might just have to give it another month and see what happens, it can only go up from here!  It was just very disappointing to believe I was finally ready to close and then have it come back 8 points from what I need and a full 35 lower than what I thought it would.  It certainly would be nice if myfico would update their model to the more current version, it would have allowed me to avoid having my credit report pulled too soon and have another inquiry show up.

I appreciate your take on this! 

[AndySoCal]

The account(s) that are disputed remain almost neutral in the FICO score. When the dispute is removed from the account the account will be fully included in the score score. Talk to the lender who you disputed the account with and see if they will remove the dispute since the balance has been updated.

[llecs]

I know it can be frustrating, OP, and I can only guess why we can't pull more score versions here. I went through the mortgage process about 2 months ago and my TU04 was lower than my TU98 by 40+, though DW's TU04 was much higher than her TU98. In the end, it was my EX that mattered.

[Anonymous]

It can be discouraging at times but trust it's worth it. 

Me and my wife went through those same credit score issues when trying to buy our home and we found that things didn't always get adjusted or accurately reported timely resulting in our lower credit scores. We both had to follow up doing some research, making phone calls and sending emails to get our credit info udated to reflect accurate info on the reports. 

It took us 2 months to see the results and adjusted scores but I'm thinking for the 8 points you need that could reflect as a positive on your report in as little as a month.