Inactive FICO score?!?!?

[Anonymous]

Hi All,

This is my first post here so please excuse me if this has been discussed previously but after a few searches I could not find anything relevant to my situation. 

My wife and I are applying for our first home mortgage and we were told by our lender that my FICO score was inactive. I use the Experian CreditCheck monitoring service through USAA and can see thee scores (747, 746, 747). My problem is that I did not have a credit card when I finished paying off my student loans in Feb '10 so I built a good credit history but my FICO score went inactive without any revolving line of credit. This did not show up on the Experian CreditCheck so my wife and I were a bit shocked when we went to the bank and were told that we did not qualify b/c I did not have an active score even though I do have credit scores and a good history. Other than my not having an active score we are well qualified potential borrowers ($250k/year income, no debt, 50% down payment...) 

The lender suggested getting a credit card, and becoming an authorized user on my wife’s card to try and reactivate my credit. We have 6 weeks until we are supposed to close on the house and I was wondering how long it will take for my FICO score to be reactivated? The credit card is with Bank of America, does anyone know how frequently they report to the credit bureaus? I can see the BOA credit inquiry they did to issue the card but not the revolving credit line itself and suspect that is what it will take to reactivate my FICO score. Anyway any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. 

Thanks in advance, 

Ryan

[llecs]

Welcome to the forums!

I use creditchecktotal (CCT) too. Unfortunately they offer scores, but they are not FICO scores. They are a non-FICO score we call a FAKO, and specifically this FAKO score is called a PLUS score. Lenders don't use it. Your FICO scores can easily be higher or lower than the scores you posted.

FICO has a number of different requirements so that a score can be calculated. One of them is that you have to have an account open and that has to be open for at least 6 months. So, if you opened a BofA, it would need to be open for 6 month. BofA is very fast at reporting and they report every month and they'll report the balance you had on your statement date and typically reports that within a day or two. Now if your DW has any CCs that are open and have been used recently, then you can be added as an AU. If older than 6 month, and as soon as it reports to your reports as an AU (not all do...check around), then the history is automatically transferred and you'll instantly get a FICO score (when it reports). Most CCs will report the balance you had on your statement date and report that soon after.