Getting conflicting reports, and I'm trying to buy a house!! HELP!

[Anonymous]

So, I'm trying to buy a house with my gf. She has excellent credit. We went to see a mortgage broker to get pre-approved, and he pulled our TransUnion scores. Hers came up golden, mine came up 590!! I was a little shocked, especially since myFICO score is 626. I also just did a transunioncs.com score after reading about it here, and it came up with 655 TU! I'm a little new to this...what's going on? Thanks!

[llecs]

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alexrigg wrote:
So, I'm trying to buy a house with my gf. She has excellent credit. We went to see a mortgage broker to get pre-approved, and he pulled our TransUnion scores. Hers came up golden, mine came up 590!! I was a little shocked, especially since myFICO score is 626. I also just did a transunioncs.com score after reading about it here, and it came up with 655 TU! I'm a little new to this...what's going on? Thanks!

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Welcome to the forums!

There are many different FICO versions out there. MyFICO and transunioncs both offer a TU98 version of the TU FICO score. Your lender could have pulled a TU04 version. You can always shop around and find a lender who uses TU98 if looking for a higher score.

The difference between myFICO and transunioncs could be explained by the difference in time between both pulls. If they were pulled on the same day, they would have matched. Looks like something happened to your TU report that led to an increase. If that change occurred after the lender's pull, then it certainly is worth having him/her pull a new TU report.

[Anonymous]

Well, myFICO score shows 626, as of today. But, I'm not sure how to refresh it. The 590 score was pulled about three weeks ago, since then Ive gone from being almost maxed to my credit limits to having literally NO revolving debt. I've paid it all off. Also, the status of a former collection account changed to paid/current. I pulled the transunioncs.com score TODAY. Is my myFICO score behind the times? Thanks for you help, Ilecs!

Alex

[llecs]

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alexrigg wrote:
Well, myFICO score shows 626, as of today. But, I'm not sure how to refresh it. The 590 score was pulled about three weeks ago, since then Ive gone from being almost maxed to my credit limits to having literally NO revolving debt. I've paid it all off. Also, the status of a former collection account changed to paid/current. I pulled the transunioncs.com score TODAY. Is my myFICO score behind the times? Thanks for you help, Ilecs!

Alex

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Unfortunately the scores don't refresh. You'd have to buy an updated score if you wanted to see that change. But I can tell you that if you did purchase a new score today, it would match transunioncs' score since that was pulled today.

The change in revolving debt likely produced the increase. Paying a collection will never improve your score. Congrats on the debt paydown.

Is the TU98 version behind in the times? It has been debated here before. Most lenders now pull a TU04 version of FICO score, but you can easily find another lender who pulls TU98. One thing we all can agree on is that it would be a good thing if FICO sold all versions of FICO score that the lenders could possibly pull. I'd buy them all. I think there's some resistence from the CRAs to provide that data....the score is really coming from them.

[Anonymous]

Thanks again!

Well, as far as the CA goes, I never really paid them. It was for a student loan, and the CA worked with the US Govt to consolidate it, rather than just pay them. So, Im not really sure how that goes. The account status changed, and that showed up on my ScoreWatch, (forgot to mention that I bought that when I joined). Does THAT refresh? I got an alert a few days ago about the loan in question showing a status change, but it said my score had stayed the same. Anyways, I guess my next question is HOW do I find a lender who uses the TU98 score?

[llecs]

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alexrigg wrote:

Thanks again!

Well, as far as the CA goes, I never really paid them. It was for a student loan, and the CA worked with the US Govt to consolidate it, rather than just pay them. So, Im not really sure how that goes. The account status changed, and that showed up on my ScoreWatch, (forgot to mention that I bought that when I joined). Does THAT refresh? I got an alert a few days ago about the loan in question showing a status change, but it said my score had stayed the same. Anyways, I guess my next question is HOW do I find a lender who uses the TU98 score?

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ScoreWatch is good, IMO. The reports don't automatically update; you'd have to purchase a new report if you wanted to see all of the changes. But they do include 2 free reports per year w/ the subscription with one being used when you first sign up and you get a $5 discount on all future EQ FICO report pulls. The key to SW is whenever you pull a new report or see a score change, immediately go into the settings and change the "target score" to your current score. SW monitors score changes and as a change occurs, you'll then get an alert if that change resulted in a new score. While you won't see a full report, at least you'll know where your score is at.

Finding a lender that pulls TU98 can be a challenge as most lenders now are using TU04. But the FICO formula takes all of your mortgage inquiries within a given window (14-45 days depending on the formula and CRA pulled) and groups them together and only counts one of those inquiries. So, if you apply for a mortgage at 6 different lenders, FICO only dings you for one inquiry.

There isn't a database of lenders and FICO versions used (be great to create one), but I bet if you search in the Mortgage area or search for "TU04" you can probably see some examples of lenders that pull that version so at least you can narrow that list down of prospective lenders. My wife and I are starting a mortgage search and plan on applying with at least 6-8 lenders within a week period to de-dupe the inquiries.