Does the removal of a judgment improve score over time?

[alsobob]

Hi everyone, 

Please answer this for me if you can.  I'm about 3 weeks away from closing on a house.  Back in April, the New York State Tax Dept passed a judgment warrant against me on something that was totally bogus.  I fought it and was able to get them to remove it, but it was still showing as a judgment on my credit report.  My lender pulled my scores on 6/7/13 and I saw that my scores dropped about 60 points across the board as a result of this error.  I freaked out, but realized I had work to do.  I had the state fax me a removal letter, then used that letter to to get the county clerk to remove the judgment as well.  

I then called the 3 bureaus and in 6 days (including a saturday and sunday) was able to get TU and EXP to remove the judgment.  I just paid the ridiculously high price of $43 to get the Experian and TU scores, but much to my dismay, of the 60 points I lost, only 10-15 came back.  My scores, even after the judgment was removed are lower than when my commitment was given to me. It doesn't seem fair that the points I lost haven't come back.  Everything else is great, utilzation is at 1%, no late payments in the last 2 years, only "negative" thing was another credit pull happened this month when my lender pulled the reports.  

Does anyone know if in the next 2-3 weeks, with all else staying the same, will I get more points back?  The myFico thing is a straight rip off.  People shouldn't have to pay nearly $50 to see whether or not their real scores have changed.  But that's another rant.  The point is, I need to ensure that my scores go up at least 15 points or more.  The reason is because my lender is going to pull the reports one more time in the next week or two so I can proceed with the mortgage.   

Does anyone know anything useful about this?  Will my scores come back? Why hasn't it?  Credit.. what a rip off..

Thanks in advance! 

[llecs]

Welcome!

Your FICO is a snapshot in time and scores only what is showing on your CR as of that moment. If the judgment was not there, then FICO would have no idea that a judgment was ever there to begin with.

Where was the $43 purchased from? MyFICO? The price should have been a hair less than $40. If you purchased it from myFICO then know that your lender is likely using a different FICO score version than what is available via this website. That can easily account for the score different and it certainly wouldn't mean your lender would see the same score. The EX FICO on here is the newest EX FICO though many lenders use a version that's over 10 years old. Conversely, the TU FICO on here is an older version and lenders prefer a newer version. This can account for large score differences and it could mean that your lender will see the same score as before (or better minus the judgment).

If the $43 was purchased from the 3 bureaus (e.g. purchased from experian.com or transunion.com), then know that the scores they offer are not FICO scores and lenders generally don't touch those scores at all and that can explain the score difference.

[alsobob]

Hello there,

the $43 was charged by myFico for my Exp and TU scores.  It was actually $39.90 or something, plus tax.  Still tho, $43 is ridiculous for information that is so vital to a consumer's financial decision making, and that varies so wildly from place to place.  But, like I said, that's another rant for another time. 

I also expected that since the items were deleted, it would stand to reason that the scores would go back up by around 50 points or so.  So imagine my shock and dismay when the myFICO scores only gave me back 10-15.  

The lender credit pull occurred on 6/6/13 by a company called Credit Plus.  The three scoring models used in the report were:

Equifax/FACTA Beacon 5.0

Transunion/FICO Classic (04)

and 

Experian/Fair, Issac (Ver 2)

Are these the scoring models used in the myFICO scoring system?  If not, then to me at least, there's as much value in these scores as in the scores given to me by Credit Karma or Quizzle.  

I pay a decent amount to myFICO, for the one time Exp and TU scores, as well as the Scorewatch thing that tracks my Equifax score.  So to see that the judgment being deleted hasn't raised my score emough is terribly disappointing. 

[p-]

You should compare the reports side by side.  It's likely there is another difference between the original report with the high score and you most recent one.  Does the new one have more inquiries, or a different utilization picture on your credit cards?

[alsobob]

I actually have done that.  The only difference in the two reports was the deletion of the judgment, and the new credit pull that was done by Credit Plus on 6/613.  I know that pulls have a negative effect, and I have admittedly done a lot in the last year (had to buy a car and now this house, and I shopped around a lot to get the best deal). But I seriously doubt one additional inquiry would count for such a huge dip.  My Experian score which was the one that was hurt the most went from a 694 to a 631 because of the judgment.  Now that the judgment has been deleted, and the utilization of all my cards remains at 1%, it's just strange to me that the scores wouldn't go up more than they have.  I even have an Amex that went from a $250 posted balance to $118.. damn annual fees, so even that was cut by more than half..Yet, after the judgment was deleted, the EXP score only went up to 638.. so strange.

Again, I'm hoping that when the lender does pull the scores in July, they'll use a different metric than what myFico uses.  If that's the case though, I seriously have to question what the point of having a subscription here is.  

If anyone knows whether the scoring models Credit Plus uses are the same as MyFico, please let us know.  

thanks again!

[llecs]

Do you have a link for Credit Plus? I ask because Experian offered a service called Credit Plus. The scores offered by them are not FICO scores. I googled "credit plus" and found one who works in conjuction with the mortgage industry, but their literature points to using a FAKO called "CreditXpert". There might be other "Credit Plus's" out there too.

[alsobob]

Hi,

So Credit Plus is CreditXpert, and when I called them, they said that they did in fact use FICO scores.  I guess they're just using a different scoring model than the ones myFico uses.  This is very unfortunate again because when you combine the relatively high cost of using myFico.com, you're expecting it to be right.  Of course, right is a very subjective word.  At this point, all I can do is hope and pray that when the bank pulls my score on July 8, all the points lost will come back. 

[Darius1976]

I am in a similar situation.  i had 3 collections removed but my score didn't budge one bit.  The collections are still gone though.  Although they were old collections (2 were 6 years old, one was 6.5 years old), I would think my score should bump alittle...  did your score change on your July 8th pull?

[alsobob]

Hi,

yes it did actually.  It's funny, after the fiasco of the judgment came another dramatic situation with Midland Credit Management.  They reported that two of my previously paid and closed collections accounts were re-opened as collections.  Caused major havoc and stress in my life!  I was able to work with them and the credit bureaus and eventually after lots of phone calls, faxes, emails and yelling, I was able to get those items removed as well.  I pulled my credit on July 16th and while judgments and open collections caused my scores to go down 90 points, after working with the credit bureaus, some of them removed the collections accounts all together and the result was that my scores went up 115 points. So in total, it was worth it but it took a lot of time and convincing people that mistakes were made in order to get things resolved.  Thankfully by the grace of God, we closed on our house last thursday and moved in on Tuesday which also happened to be my birthday.  Heck of a birthday present for me! Good luck with this stuff man it's such a headache but keep at it and eventually, in like a month, you'll see the scores rise.

[guiness56]

Creditxpert does not use FICO scores, they are built by a company called Neuristics, Inc.