FICO Causes and Effects (What Happened, and How Did it Affect Your FICO?)

[Anonymous]

Well I paid down about `15-20% of my debt

EX went from 694-709
TU went from 684-675
and Eq went from 658-675 (although they only show a portion of the paid down amount)


My dh applied for a mortgage and paid down about 10% of his debt

Pre app:
Eq 715... now 684!
Ex 739 now 747
TU 730 now 704

[Anonymous]

So, I have three student loans 15K, 15k, and 2k. I have extra cash each week, would my score be better if I pay of the 2K or putt extra cash towards the other ones?

[haulingthescoreup]

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@Anonymous wrote:
So, I have three student loans 15K, 15k, and 2k. I have extra cash each week, would my score be better if I pay of the 2K or putt extra cash towards the other ones?

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Hi, roland, welcome to the forums!

Oddly, it helps your scores to have at least one open installment loan open. You will probably see relatively little score impact from paying off two of the loans, and paying down the third can actually hurt you, if it would be the only remaining installment account. It will certainly help your wallet, though.

Going for the 2K first, and then snowballing the extra money toward the next one makes sense. Just realized that as you approach paying off the last one, if you don't have an auto loan or something by then, you might get a score drop when it's fully paid.

This is a case where financial sense trumps FICO sense, IMO --just be aware of this if you're getting ready to buy a house or something, and you don't need any score surprises.

Message Edited by haulingthescoreup on 04-06-2008 01:23 PM

[tonsers]

In February, I had:

BofA VISA: $5K/23400
Chevron: $35/2000
Macys: $0/3200

I decided to app for two new cards, was approved for:

BofA AmEx: $8K CL
Discover: $9600 CL

Transfered $3K of the VISA balance to the Discover at 0%.

My EQ score has jumped from 733 to 761.
Finally made the 760 club!

[Anonymous]

positronicshell wrote:

I also committed an absolute NO NO + applied for a GAP STORE CARD

Can someone point me to a thread where it is explained why applying for a GAP card or other store cards is bad for ones credit?

TIA.

[Trishco]

I observed a drop in my EX score of 5 points within 6 days. 

04/02 677

04/08 672

Activity:  04/02

5 accts with balances

BoA 4283.00/10k cl  43% util

Activity: 04/08

6 accts with balances

BoA 783.00  8% util (BT promotion ending)

Disc 3000.00/4k cl  75% util  (0% BT)

My overall utilization is about 14% so I was originally perplexed about doing the trans.  However, with the interest I'm saving I'll take a 5 point hit.  Though it might have been more as I had a new account hit the 12 mos mark this month.

[MidnightVoice]

DW has an AU on my Amex report, and her score went down 1 point

[Anonymous]

Paid off a credit card with a $1500 balance - down to zero. Equifax and Experian gave me 20-25 point increase. TU gave me a measly THREE POINTS!!!!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous]

I made a database that keeps track of my FICO score changes

•My paid off car loan had an erroneous late charge. I disputed, they deleted
Score went up from 765 - 792 (+27)

•Next month, score went up -- no reason
Score went up from 792 - 796 (+4)

•Next month, score went up again -- no reason
Score went up from 796 - 798 (+2)

•I used a credit card that hasn't been used in 4 months (considered inactive)
Score dipped from 798 - 792 (-6)

•Hard inquiry detected
Score dipped from 792 - 787 (-5)

•Next month, score dipped again -- no reason
Score dipped from 787 - 786 (-1)

•CC balance went up almost double (working on house)
My Utilization is normally about 5%. It jumped to 10.5%
Score dipped from 786 - 776 (-10)

As you can see, utilization is a big part of the formula. I'll see what happens next month when it should go back down to around 8%

[Anonymous]

As I said elsewhere, I had some issues recently (medical, unemployment) which took me to 93% util.

Am working on paying down fast.
Got a 9 point bump in TU today showing a drop to 80%

New util doesnt show on others yet. Can't wait until everything updates (looking at May) since I am actually at 60 util right now, and will be paying more before next report dates.