How did you achieve FICO 800+?

[acercode]

I haven't had any credit for past 10 years but decided to finally get back in the game since I want to be able to finance new cars and get a mortgage in the future. And to do that I need good credit. So any tips on how attain FICO 800+ since they get the best rates? Currently, I'm in the 600s. Plus my brother has 850 or close and loves to throw it in my face. 

[SouthJamaica]

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@acercode wrote:

I haven't had any credit for past 10 years but decided to finally get back in the game since I want to be able to finance new cars and get a mortgage in the future. And to do that I need good credit. So any tips on how attain FICO 800+ since they get the best rates? Currently, I'm in the 600s. Plus my brother has 850 or close and loves to throw it in my face. 

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If you have no open credit whatsoever, then I would suggest that the first step is to apply for a credit card. 

[Anonymalous]

If you haven't had any credit in the last 10 years, FICO would consider you unscoreable. FICO requires 6 months of credit history to generate a score, and even Vantage Score requires at least 1 month. If I were you, I'd jump over to AnnualCreditReport.com and pull my credit reports from all 3 bureaus. The 3 bureaus are required to provide you with a free copy of your credit report every 12 months, and that's the official site approved by the federal government. The credit reports from ACR will be more complete than reports from other sites, and due to covid they're currently allowing you to pull your credit reports 1/week, instead of 1/year.

In any case, the answer to your question is to apply for some credit, pay everything off on time, every time (even a single late can really hurt your score), and then wait. Credit's a marathon not a sprint, and getting a score above 800 requires years. Most people with scores of 850 have decades of perfect credit history.

Becoming an authorized user on someone else's card can add some history, but they've been cracking down that on that (it's intended for spouses), so it may not affect your score if they think it's suspicious (works best when you share a last name and an address, and doesn't work with Amex). And even if it does boost your score, a lot of lenders will discount it. A shared secured loan (SSL) can also add some credit mix and give a minor boost, though it's pointless once you get a car or other installment loan. And the AZEO technique (all zero except one) is the best way to optimize your scores at any particular time, though most people find it too much of hassle to bother with unless they're planning on applying for new credit in the near future. For mortgages, it's best if you open no new accounts in the previous 12 months.

[SouthJamaica]

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@acercode wrote:

I haven't had any credit for past 10 years but decided to finally get back in the game since I want to be able to finance new cars and get a mortgage in the future. And to do that I need good credit. So any tips on how attain FICO 800+ since they get the best rates? Currently, I'm in the 600s. Plus my brother has 850 or close and loves to throw it in my face. 

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There was a period where my TU FICO 8's and 9's were over 800. I think the key factors were few inquiries on TU, miniscule utilization, and an aged oldest account.

[disdreamin]

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@acercode wrote:

I haven't had any credit for past 10 years but decided to finally get back in the game since I want to be able to finance new cars and get a mortgage in the future. And to do that I need good credit. So any tips on how attain FICO 800+ since they get the best rates? Currently, I'm in the 600s. Plus my brother has 850 or close and loves to throw it in my face. 

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Doesn't 760+ qualify for best rates?

As far as how to get to 800+, time, credit accounts of some sort, and a positive payment history with no blemishes. Have you pulled a report to see if you might have accounts hanging on from way back when? If you truly have nothing showing, it's time to apply for a credit card and get rolling.

[cashorcharge]

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@disdreamin wrote:

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@acercode wrote:

I haven't had any credit for past 10 years but decided to finally get back in the game since I want to be able to finance new cars and get a mortgage in the future. And to do that I need good credit. So any tips on how attain FICO 800+ since they get the best rates? Currently, I'm in the 600s. Plus my brother has 850 or close and loves to throw it in my face. 

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Doesn't 760+ qualify for best rates?

As far as how to get to 800+, time, credit accounts of some sort, and a positive payment history with no blemishes. Have you pulled a report to see if you might have accounts hanging on from way back when? If you truly have nothing showing, it's time to apply for a credit card and get rolling.

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In most cases, yes....Auto Loans, Mortgages, Credit Cards....if you're at/over 760 then you'll be getting the best rates.  By having scores higher, you will see more leniency when blips like Inquires, Utilization or New Accounts get open...the score hit for those items becomes less dramatic to your score

[disdreamin]

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@cashorcharge wrote:

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In most cases, yes....Auto Loans, Mortgages, Credit Cards....if you're at/over 760 then you'll be getting the best rates.  By having scores higher, you will see more leniency when blips like Inquires, Utilization or New Accounts get open...the score hit for those items becomes less dramatic to your score

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Oh, I didn't realize that some of those scoring hits dimished as FICO scores went up. If it's pegged at 850 maybe there's wiggle room where it won't drop from some changes, but I didn't realize that the higher the score, in general, the more leniency there might be. Yay for thick, aged, blemish-free profiles, I guess.

[91173]

I think time does a lot of it. I don't have any loans on my reports (even paid), only credit cards, and my scores have bounced around between ~800-830 (TransUnion for whatever reason is always about 15-20 points lower than the other two) for as long as I've ever known any scores. But I have active accounts from the early 1990s and the average age of everything that's active is ~13 years.

Someone mentioned being an authorized user. I was helping my mom apply for credit cards in her own name after my dad died and we were worried the card issuers would find out & close them. She had zero items in her own name and was an authorized user on everything that showed up on her credit reports. Even so, her scores were in the 820s. She had one active account that was 44 years old. She applied for two good cards and got approved on both.