Hoping I made right move?

[Anonymous]

A month back I added an Amex and Disco to my portfolio and became AU on DW's new QS1. I am eager to unshackle the secured card accounts and move back into the mainstream.  I anticipated a bit of a hit.

This morning I pulled an update from Equifax. Disco reported, but Amex has not.  TU and EX dipped about 30 points each and EQ dipped 12. With the $7k Disco account and PIF of QS $800 statement balance, utilization went from 25% to 1%. From what I gather then, the inquiries + new credit seeking behavior, overshadows the utilization drop. Is that about right?

A bit bummed the dip was steeper than expected, but hope the investment in a higher ceiling was worth it?

[Anonymous]

What is your Age of Oldest Account (not counting the AU card)?  This could be a closed or open account.

How does the "Date Opened" read for the AU card as it appears on your credit report?  Your report not your wife's.

Has your wife ever been late on her QS1 card in the last 7 years?  Have you confirmed that by looking at her report from annualcreditreport.com?

Being added as an AU can hurt your score, though in some cases it could help.

What credit monitoring service are you using to calculate your AAoA?  Your signature says 7.8 years.

[SouthJamaica]

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@Anonymous wrote:

A month back I added an Amex and Disco to my portfolio and became AU on DW's new QS1. I am eager to unshackle the secured card accounts and move back into the mainstream.  I anticipated a bit of a hit.

This morning I pulled an update from Equifax. Disco reported, but Amex has not.  TU and EX dipped about 30 points each and EQ dipped 12. With the $7k Disco account and PIF of QS $800 statement balance, utilization went from 25% to 1%. From what I gather then, the inquiries + new credit seeking behavior, overshadows the utilization drop. Is that about right?

A bit bummed the dip was steeper than expected, but hope the investment in a higher ceiling was worth it?

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There's a whole lot of missing information here, which we would need in order to answer your question.

[Anonymous]

CreditGuyInDixie, oldest account is from November 2000, and is closed: 18 years 4 months. From the EQ 3-in-1 report, EQ and EX report AAoA 9 years 2 months, and TU 8 years 6 months. The AAoA calculation in my sig is my own, based on how I figured Amex will impact AAoA.

The Cap1 QS1 that DW has, just opened in January. This account hasn't reported to either of our CR's yet, though the HP inquiry did. Should I expect more downward movement when that account and the new Amex account report?

Inquires are EQ 4, EX 5, TU 3.  Two of those fall off EQ this month, and one each from EX and TU.

SouthJamaica, from that 3-in-1, paraphrasing their comments in quotes.

"What's helping your score"

• "You do not have too much outstanding debt."

"What's hurting youre score" (listed in order of impact)

• "You've opened an account recently. Age: 1.0"
  • "Equifax 760+ club members opened newest account 8 months ago." (Just wait until the other new accounts report.) =\
• "You have a low percentage of satisfactory accounts. 38%"
  • "86% of Equifax 760+ club members have every account rated satisfactory."
• "You've opened credit cards recently. Age of oldest card: 18.3 years"
  • "79% of of Equifax 760+ club members have a credit account at least 11.8 years old" (Guess I get ding'd twice for this.) =\
• "You have recent account activity on delinquent or derogatory accounts."
  • Two mortgages suffered poor payment track records, two+ years ago. All payments have been made on-time in the past fourteen months. Guess that payment history is the gift that keeps on giving.

I've been a busy boy since August 2018 - new lines are:

8/18 QS

9/18 DW secured Cap1 M/C for which I'm AU

1/19 Amex (not yet reported)

1/19 DW QS1 for which I'm AU (not yet reported)

2/19 Disco

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the info.  Can you help us understand why you have elected to be added as an AU to a card that is a few months old?  In general, as a score-improving technique anyway, a person should only choose to be added as an AU to a card if all of the following are true:

*  The card is much older than your oldest account.  (Example: Bob's oldest account is 18 months old.  He is added as an AU to his mom's card which is 20 years old.)

*  The card is clean (no lates in the last 7 years).

*  The card can be kept reporting a very low balance (zero is best).

You already understand a lot about scoring factors like AAoA, so maybe you can shed some more light on the particular choice you have made.

As a side note I am curious when your oldest account was closed: that's important since you should expect that it will fall off your report 10 years after being closed.  Perhaps you could describe the age of your three oldest accounts, whether they are credit cards or not, whether they are open or not, and if they were closed when that closure occured.

As far as inquiries go, you describe when inquiries will be falling off your reports.  As far as FICO goes, an inquiry falling off your report doesn't matter.  The key timepoint is when that inquiry becomes 366 days old -- at that point FICO will ignore it.

Your goal appears to be to improve your scores in the long term.  If so, I would focus on using each card at least a little, allow balances to report (though keep the reported balance small), and above all always pay your statement balances in full and never be late.  After several months of this, you can and should explore the Goodwill Letter Saturation Technique: though I would make sure again that you wait until you have first established a long history of using each card and never being late on it.  The whole point of that Technique is to give the impression that you are a very different person than you were then.

There is a case I suppose for adding one more card if you can in the next couple months, which would bring the open cards in your name to four.  But the three you have is really all you need.  The key is to stop opening accounts after that, establish a perfect track record on them for several months, then implement AZEO with a low total utilization and begin the long road of the GWLS Technique.

[SouthJamaica]

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@Anonymous wrote:

CreditGuyInDixie, oldest account is from November 2000, and is closed: 18 years 4 months. From the EQ 3-in-1 report, EQ and EX report AAoA 9 years 2 months, and TU 8 years 6 months. The AAoA calculation in my sig is my own, based on how I figured Amex will impact AAoA.

The Cap1 QS1 that DW has, just opened in January. This account hasn't reported to either of our CR's yet, though the HP inquiry did. Should I expect more downward movement when that account and the new Amex account report?

Inquires are EQ 4, EX 5, TU 3.  Two of those fall off EQ this month, and one each from EX and TU.

SouthJamaica, from that 3-in-1, paraphrasing their comments in quotes.

"What's helping your score"

• "You do not have too much outstanding debt."

"What's hurting youre score" (listed in order of impact)

• "You've opened an account recently. Age: 1.0"
  • "Equifax 760+ club members opened newest account 8 months ago." (Just wait until the other new accounts report.) =\
• "You have a low percentage of satisfactory accounts. 38%"
  • "86% of Equifax 760+ club members have every account rated satisfactory."
• "You've opened credit cards recently. Age of oldest card: 18.3 years"
  • "79% of of Equifax 760+ club members have a credit account at least 11.8 years old" (Guess I get ding'd twice for this.) =\
• "You have recent account activity on delinquent or derogatory accounts."
  • Two mortgages suffered poor payment track records, two+ years ago. All payments have been made on-time in the past fourteen months. Guess that payment history is the gift that keeps on giving.

I've been a busy boy since August 2018 - new lines are:

8/18 QS

9/18 DW secured Cap1 M/C for which I'm AU

1/19 Amex (not yet reported)

1/19 DW QS1 for which I'm AU (not yet reported)

2/19 Disco

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I'm sorry but I can't understand your posts. Normally adding a couple of accounts would not, in FICO 8, outweigh by 30 points such a good reduction in utilization. In my experience, all other things being equal, the addition of accounts would have been outweighed by the reduction in utilization. If you really want an answer to the question I need to know:

1. All your revolving limits and balances before and after.

2. On the AU card I need to know limits and balances plus age of account and whether there are any negatives.

3. FICO 8 scores before and after.

If you don't know, then I really can't say.

Update:

I now see that the AU account you added is much newer than your own accounts. That was definitely a mistake, and you should get off that card ASAP.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

CreditGuyInDixie, oldest account is from November 2000, and is closed: 18 years 4 months. From the EQ 3-in-1 report, EQ and EX report AAoA 9 years 2 months, and TU 8 years 6 months. The AAoA calculation in my sig is my own, based on how I figured Amex will impact AAoA.

The Cap1 QS1 that DW has, just opened in January. This account hasn't reported to either of our CR's yet, though the HP inquiry did. Should I expect more downward movement when that account and the new Amex account report?

Inquires are EQ 4, EX 5, TU 3.  Two of those fall off EQ this month, and one each from EX and TU.

SouthJamaica, from that 3-in-1, paraphrasing their comments in quotes.

"What's helping your score"

• "You do not have too much outstanding debt."

"What's hurting youre score" (listed in order of impact)

• "You've opened an account recently. Age: 1.0"
  • "Equifax 760+ club members opened newest account 8 months ago." (Just wait until the other new accounts report.) =\
• "You have a low percentage of satisfactory accounts. 38%"
  • "86% of Equifax 760+ club members have every account rated satisfactory."
• "You've opened credit cards recently. Age of oldest card: 18.3 years"
  • "79% of of Equifax 760+ club members have a credit account at least 11.8 years old"

---

I find the language there worrying.  It's not the language one would find in a FICO negative reason statement -- at least I don't think so.

SouthJ knows a ton about all the credit monitoring services out there.  I suggest you talk to him specifically about the precise CMS product you subscribe to from Equifax.  I am told that at least one of EQ's CMS products use its own proprietary scores (i.e. not FICO scores).

[Anonymous]

The only consideration I had when adding myself as AU to DW's accounts was to increase my utilization ratio. I didn't even think, or know about, the adverse consequences of another new account. Another mistake.  Appreciate the criteria you laid out -- very straight forward.

Eventually the QS1 will be SD'd or merged into a superior Cap1 product, if they allow it, down the road.

That oldest account, an Amex card, was charged off, then settled in 2017.  My TU CR indicates it will be removed May 2020. Does the negative of the charge off outweigh the benefit of the account age?

The next two oldest accounts are Chase home loan and equity line of credit, both opened September 2005. Both loans fell on hard times. When I brought the former steady in 2016, Chase sold it to another loan management company. Both companies now report that loan, which seems odd? The latter account was charged off, and then settled in 2017. TU reports that will be removed in October 2020.

We are aiming to get pre-qualified this Spring for a new home purchase in 2020. Hoping I didn't ruin our chances.

[Anonymous]

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@SouthJamaica wrote:

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Update:

I now see that the AU account you added is much newer than your own accounts. That was definitely a mistake, and you should get off that card ASAP.

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Took this seriously... I'm off. Hopefully it doesn't report.

Thank you.  Reading through rest of your post, and will update soon.

[Anonymous]

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@SouthJamaica wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

If you really want an answer to the question I need to know:

1. All your revolving limits and balances before and after.

2. On the AU card I need to know limits and balances plus age of account and whether there are any negatives.

3. FICO 8 scores before and after.

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Is it possible the Equifax 3-in-1 report is not completely accurate, Fico score wise, as CreditGuy suggested?

Here is the before and after picture...

Prior to ordering the 3-in-1 report, I was monitoring Fico scores by:

• Equifax - a MyFico report orderd on Feb 1, score was 693
• Experian - via Experian free service / updates, Feb score was 691
• TransUnion - via Discover and / or Chase websites, Feb score was 698

Limits and balances were:

• Disco Chrome secured $800 / balance $0
• Cap1 QS $3,801 /  balance $800
• Cap1 M/C secured $551 / balance $0

The report shows:

• Disco Chrome secured $800 / balance $0
• Cap1 QS $3,801 /  balance $0
• Cap1 M/C secured $551 / balance $0
• Discover (account opened Feb 1st) $7,000 / balance $35

and:

• EQ 682
• EX 665
• TU 670

Apparently Amex hasn't yet reported the new (opened Jan 30th) Delta account, CL $10k. 

Yesterday I closed the secured Discover ($800 CL) account. Today I removed myself from DW QS1.