Low FICO Score

[Anonymous]

Hi all!

I'm about 11 months old in the credit industry. My time until now has been led by a ton of bad advice, financially.

So, I pulled my EQ FICO score today and received a 659. I'm getting messages like "high revolving usage" (35%) and "too many recent inquiries" (8 hard pulls dating back to last year May) in red.

Here is a general rundown of the review I got:

Short credit history : Oldest Account - 11 Months

                                 Average age of accounts - 6 Months

Credit inquiry: 8 Inquiries this past year.

Heavy usage within revolving credit: 35%

Credit accounts with balances: 2 accounts

Now, I have never been late on a payment. I do understand that I made a mistake with all of those hard pulls, but I didn't think it would have dropped me this much. The reason being for so many hard pulls is because someone once told me that I should try to apply to as many places as possible to keep my total credit limit high. Well, I got screwed. As far as the 35% rate, I try to keep it below 30% but it appears my numbers are being reported before billing statements.

Any ideas on what I should do to make some huge improvements?

Thank you so much!

[Booner72]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hi all!

I'm about 11 months old in the credit industry. My time until now has been led by a ton of bad advice, financially.

So, I pulled my EQ FICO score today and received a 659. I'm getting messages like "high revolving usage" (35%) and "too many recent inquiries" (8 hard pulls dating back to last year May) in red.

Here is a general rundown of the review I got:

Short credit history : Oldest Account - 11 Months

                                 Average age of accounts - 6 Months

Credit inquiry: 8 Inquiries this past year.

Heavy usage within revolving credit: 35%

Credit accounts with balances: 2 accounts

Now, I have never been late on a payment. I do understand that I made a mistake with all of those hard pulls, but I didn't think it would have dropped me this much. The reason being for so many hard pulls is because someone once told me that I should try to apply to as many places as possible to keep my total credit limit high. Well, I got screwed. As far as the 35% rate, I try to keep it below 30% but it appears my numbers are being reported before billing statements.

Any ideas on what I should do to make some huge improvements?

Thank you so much!

---

Hi there - FICO will stop scoring the inquiries after 12 months - so even though they show for 24 months, they aren't scored.  The amount that is reported to the bureau is usually what is listed on the statement.  So say you pay your bill in full, then charge up something after payment but before the statement - that is what gets reported.  Most people wanting to get max FICO pointage make multiple payments each month so that what is reported is within their control.  I hope this info helps.  Keep reading and you will get all the info you need to learn how FICO scores work!  There are super great, supportive people here who are more than willing to share their knowledge.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Hi all!

I'm about 11 months old in the credit industry. My time until now has been led by a ton of bad advice, financially.

So, I pulled my EQ FICO score today and received a 659. I'm getting messages like "high revolving usage" (35%) and "too many recent inquiries" (8 hard pulls dating back to last year May) in red.

Here is a general rundown of the review I got:

Short credit history : Oldest Account - 11 Months

                                 Average age of accounts - 6 Months

Credit inquiry: 8 Inquiries this past year.

Heavy usage within revolving credit: 35%

Credit accounts with balances: 2 accounts

Now, I have never been late on a payment. I do understand that I made a mistake with all of those hard pulls, but I didn't think it would have dropped me this much. The reason being for so many hard pulls is because someone once told me that I should try to apply to as many places as possible to keep my total credit limit high. Well, I got screwed. As far as the 35% rate, I try to keep it below 30% but it appears my numbers are being reported before billing statements.

Any ideas on what I should do to make some huge improvements?

Thank you so much!

---

You don't look to be in bad shape at all.  Your inquiries will fall off after 12 months, and you have no lates and presumable no negatives.  Hopefully those 8 inquiries weren't for nothing and you have a few good cards in your wallet!

There isn't much you can actively do to improve besides lower your Util to 1-9%.  Search for the September gardening thread -- no more apps, just let your accounts age and watch your score go up all on its own!

[RobertEG]

+1

While your situation may be frustrating you, you are certainly in better shape that most who are in the credit score rebuilding process.

The absense of delinquencies is a firm footing for score improvement.

In my opinion, the most important consideration for you at this point is whether you will be needing an actual score improvement within the next six months in order to apply for necessary new credit.  Then short-term issues, such as current revolving % util could be important.  Otherwise, since % util has no scoring memory, the fine-tweaking of your util at this point is not that important.

Are both of your current accounts revolving accounts that are reporting to the CRA?  If so, you probably wont gain much by the addition of a new CC.  CL is overrated, as you can obtain the same effect by reducing your current balances, while at the same time put yourself on better financial footing. 

[Anonymous]

HI merkajoe,

Welcome to the forums!  Glad you're posting here.

You really are in pretty good shape.  FICO is just letting you know where you can fine tune things a bit.  And just to note - not having lates is helping your FICO score, so don't be alarmed.

FICO uses reason codes - everyone gets reason codes attached to their FICO score, even with really nice scores.  And reason codes are all "negatives" by their nature - so it can be disarming if you're not prepared to see that.  You can get a utilization message, for example, with maybe a 20% utilization (depending on what else is on your credit report) but that has nowhere near the impact that a 90% utilization would have.

FICO scores on overall utilization as well as utilization on individual cards.  So, the general mantra for highest FICO scores is to let all of your revolving accounts except one report a zero balance.  Let that one remaining revolver report a balance less than 9%.  Most cards (but not all) report your balance as of the statement date.  If you post who your revolving accounts are with, folks will chime in and help you determine when they report balances to the CRA's.

FICO also scores on how many accounts report a balance.  Letting one account report a balance works well for most everyone.  After that, you can do some dibbling around and see how many accounts you can report with a balance without getting a FICO nick.  Or, if you're not the experimenting type - just stick with letting one account report a balance and know that you are in good shape.

Did you pull your FICO scores from here?  If you're wiling to share them, folks can give you some helpful insights.  Whoops - see you were good enough to do that in your OP.