Experian scoring - whats the best site?

[ngerasimatos]

since experian is no logner using the fico system, what is the best site to get a true and fair representaion of what my real score is? i know the difference between fico and fako, but that doesnt apply to this per se. how is one to know what their real score is from ex? such as the score that a credit card company or lender would pull?

[Anonymous]

There is really no way to know with any degree of accuracy. You can pull an EQ Fico score and an EX credit report, and compare tradelines line-by-line. If both bureaus report near-identical tradelines and number of inquiries, your EX Fico should be fairly close to your EQ Fico and give you a decent idea of where you would stand for most mortgage lenders.

Since there are multiple scoring models used by credit card companies (classic Fico, bankcard-enhanced Fico, proprietary built on Fico, completely proprietary, etc.), and CCCs rarely inform customers of score and model used, finding out exactly where you stand prior to a CC application is impossible. All you can do is research what general classic Fico range seems to be acceptable for each company, and even that can be useless if a specific negative aspect of your report is weighted heavily by a particular issuer ...

[ngerasimatos]

but if ex doesnt use fico scoring models anymore, then comparing ex vs eq and tu is pointless.

[smallfry]

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@ngerasimatos wrote:

but if ex doesnt use fico scoring models anymore, then comparing ex vs eq and tu is pointless.

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EX uses FICO you just can't buy it easily. 

[ngerasimatos]

i see. it was my understanding they are trying to sell their own scoring model thus not allowing companies to use the fico model. is that false?

[Anonymous]

"EX doesn't use Fico" is incorrect.

Fico scores calculated from an Experian credit report are no longer available for purchase by the general public is the accurate description of the current situation. There has been no change in the handling and availability of EX Fico scores for lenders AFAIK. There is a credit union that currently provides an EX-based Fico score to its members, and Chase has recently started providing an EX-based Fico score range to some of its customers.

Mortgage lenders and other lenders still overwhelmingly use Fico scores generated from credit reports from all three CRAs. There are subtle differences between the scoring models designed for each CRA's database, but if you have absolutely identical EQ and EX reports, your classic EQ (Beacon 5.0) and EX (Fair Isaac Risk Model) Fico scores should be within a few points or less ...