How will paying off an auto loan early affect my FICO

[Anonymous]

On my myfico EQ and TU reports it states my remaining balance on my auto loan is too high. When I purchased this car, it was at a point of desperation of needing a vehicle but not having good enough credit scores in order to obtain a desirable finance rate. I assume my reports show my balance vs the time left on the note. I've never missed a payment, never been late. I'm about to inherit some $. Not a life changing amount, but it will allow me to take care of a few things. If I were to just pay this auto loan off now which is basically 10 months early, how do you all think it would affect my FICO?

[Anonymous]

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Understanding-FICO-Scoring/Auto-loans-paid-FICO-Score-dropped/td-p/4...

[Anonymous]

IF you pay it off in full and don't have another installment type loan on your report - it might ding you in the credit mix department.   However, I know I paid off one of my car loans off early - and it it still on my report....not sure how it affected it because I didn't know my scores at the time I did it.

However, if you need to get somethings under control and the immediate need isn't your score - I recommend paying it off.  You can save on interest, and save the payments (or pay off other debt).   IN the event that you need to worry about your score for future financing....you can always make adjustments or get a small installment loan to boost your score at that time. 

I'm all for - if you can pay off your car - do it!