This is pretty neat. So I took the test and put in true answers and got a range of 755-805. My FICO scores (June) range between 779-794.
So, since my April 2020 goal is to get into the 800 club and, more importantly, "stay there," I played around with the estimator because it lets you start over to see what variables I need to change to exceed 800. So in order to get up to an 825 score, all I need to do is two things: get the aggregate balances on my CCs between $500-$999, which is less than 1% of my total credit limit, and have not applied for any new credit in 12 months.
I was surprise I only had to change two things. My UT is at 7% across three 0%APR cards, which will be paid off by March 2020 when the promo expires and my 2 inquiries will be over 12 months in December.
So, I'm feeling pretty good right about now because I can do this standing on my head. Visions of 825s are dancing in my head. 
Congrats in advance on the 825 score.
The simulator also presumes you will continue meeting the requirement for a good FICO score, pay all your debt payments on time. That’s the biggest factor, because it is the hardest to recover from a mistake. Doing that for years is the secondary benefit of following the prime requirement.
The other two, utilization and not applying for new credit, are the more variable choices that individuals have available to improve score. Or to use credit and see a decline in score for the increased risk of default. I include number of cards reporting as merely a subset of utilization.
The simulator also presumes you will continue meeting the requirement for a good FICO score, pay all your debt payments on time. That’s the biggest factor, because it is the hardest to recover from a mistake. Doing that for years is the secondary benefit of following the prime requirement.
The other two, utilization and not applying for new credit, are the more variable choices that individuals have available to improve score. Or to use credit and see a decline in score for the increased risk of default. I include number of cards reporting as merely a subset of utilization.
@CreditInspired wrote:
I agree NRB525 and I took all of that into consideration. I understand the pitfalls
of one mistake of missing a payment or not being able to reduce my outstanding balance as planned or even applying for another card, but it was a fun exercise all the same to have a guesstimate of what it would take to get there. Even if I don't get to 825, I most definitely see the 800-club in the 1st qtr of 2020. And that alone makes me feel good. I’m already so close and I believe in me.
Thanks for congratulating me in advance. And I’m going to keep this post updated with my scores.
As far as I can tell, the myFICO forums software automatically updates every post we make/made, using our current information from My settings -> PERSONAL -> Personal information -> Signature so I just update my FICO scores in my signature as my various FICO scores become known to me.
I thought it was interesting for what it might reveal about the scoring algorithm.
Like when it asks how recently you've applied for credit and differentiates between 0-3 mos, 3-6, and greater than 6. I saw significant score gains at 3 and 6 months on my own reports.
And then the utilization intervals. Are these a ruse?
@Gollum wrote:
@CreditInspired wrote:
I agree NRB525 and I took all of that into consideration. I understand the pitfalls
of one mistake of missing a payment or not being able to reduce my outstanding balance as planned or even applying for another card, but it was a fun exercise all the same to have a guesstimate of what it would take to get there. Even if I don't get to 825, I most definitely see the 800-club in the 1st qtr of 2020. And that alone makes me feel good. I’m already so close and I believe in me.
Thanks for congratulating me in advance. And I’m going to keep this post updated with my scores.As far as I can tell, the myFICO forums software automatically updates every post we make/made, using our current information from My settings -> PERSONAL -> Personal information -> Signature so I just update my FICO scores in my signature as my various FICO scores become known to me.
I do manually update my scores in the signature line to coincide with the spade I’ve earned. I’ll update it again in September when I earn my Gold spade.
But by keeping track of it here, I can let others know specifically what minutiae factor affected each change, if any 😉.