Ridiculous Score Fluctuations - Time to Cancel MyFICO?

[Anonymous]

First, to set the tone, I'm under contract for a house, and am scheduled to close in 3 weeks.  Hopefully will be through appraisel and underwriting next week.

My score on this site has been going up, then down, then back up, 30 points at a time, from day to day.  It's enough to drive me crazy.  The alerts don't tell me anything - just that "Your Credit Score has Increased or Decreased by 30 points, etc."

I had recently disputed and paid a few things off, so I could understand why 2 of my scores went up 20-30 points, but my Transunion one in particular went up 35 points this past Thursday, Dropped 30 points on Friday, Went up 30 points on Saturday, then dropped 30 points again today - with absolutley no explanation other than "Your FICO score has changed."  I even pulled another credit report on Friday (for $50), and had a 725, and then 5 minutes later, got a notification that my score had dropped to a 695 (both Transunion).

Is there any explanation for this, other than I need to stop wasting my money on this monitoring?

Thanks - I'm ending my rant now .

James

[daudi81]

Are you looking at the mortgage scores in the right area within the MyFico dashboard? The numbers you see right when you log in are NOT going to be the same scores your lender pulls, and the scores can be wildly different.

With that said, MyFico CAN show your mortgage scores, but you have to go into the right area. The little MyFico alerts you are getting are not your mortgage scores.. It monitors your Fico 8 scores (I believe), which are different than what your going to see from a mortgage lender.

Also, if you're paying things off, that could explain some fluctuations. Having an open dispute on your report can also make a big difference in your score, depending on a few factors.

FYI - do not open up any disputes while your getting approved for a mortgage. The lender will not approve your loan until every dispute is off. And if you DO have any open disputes on your credit report, the score that you see is usually not your true score. For example, if you have a late payment or collection on an account that you're disputing, your score will be artifically inflated (sometimes by a lot). Once all your disputes are off your credit report, you'll see your true and final score - and the one that your lender will actually use to close the loan.

Anyway, there's no need to cancel MyFico just because you see some score fluctuations. MyFico scores are accurate, so if you do see fluctuations it's due to your report, not necessarily anything MyFico is doing.

[Anonymous]

One thing that I've noticed is that my FICO2's (mortgage) have remained almost the same, even though my FICO8's have been fluctuating as much as 40 points.  Does MyFICO update FICO2's as often as FICO8's? 

Fortunately, I only disputed 2 things across all 3 agencies.  Both Equifax and Experian have cleaned them up in my favor - still waiting on Transunion.  The weird thing is, after I disputed there was no change in score.  I got a 40 point bump after 2 weeks (and an account was updated), and now large decreases, with no negatives to show for it.  I would think that if it was related to the dispute, I should see a bump after the dispute, then a decrease if the dispute doesn't pan out.  In my case, I saw a 20 point DECREASE at the dispute (I think the account i was disputing was doing more good than harm).

Oh well, I'm still way within my range for the mortgage, unless i see more 40 point drops. 

[Anonymous]

I feel your pain.

[Anonymous]

Wow...that is crazy!

[redbeard]

Filing a dispute won't trigger an update on MyFico scoring.  It may change your score, but it doesn't trigger the update process.  Then you get another update that comes along (such as a creditor doing its monthly reporting) and you'll get a notification of the change, even though the change may have been caused by the dispute.

When a dispute ends, the creditor usually files an update with the credit bureau, which may trigger an 'update'.

You can play a bit with what causes the updates in MyFico settings, but there are only certain things that cause the system to actually re-run your score for you to see.  It updates several times so it usually seems real time, but certain events don't cause the trigger to happen at all.

I also don't think MyFico updates your mortgage scores at all.  Could be wrong on that, but mine haven't changed since I bought reports the last time, several months ago.  Of course, they probably haven't changed much anyway, so for me, its not a big issue.

Dan

[Anonymous]

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@redbeard wrote:

Filing a dispute won't trigger an update on MyFico scoring.  It may change your score, but it doesn't trigger the update process.  Then you get another update that comes along (such as a creditor doing its monthly reporting) and you'll get a notification of the change, even though the change may have been caused by the dispute.

When a dispute ends, the creditor usually files an update with the credit bureau, which may trigger an 'update'.

You can play a bit with what causes the updates in MyFico settings, but there are only certain things that cause the system to actually re-run your score for you to see.  It updates several times so it usually seems real time, but certain events don't cause the trigger to happen at all.

I also don't think MyFico updates your mortgage scores at all.  Could be wrong on that, but mine haven't changed since I bought reports the last time, several months ago.  Of course, they probably haven't changed much anyway, so for me, its not a big issue.

Dan

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Correct. They don't update with the 3B monitoring, that requires the purchase of fresh reports.

[daudi81]

From my experience a dispute essentially makes it so the account in question does not count for OR against your credit score. That can go one of two ways....

If you're disputing an account that has a few late payments and/or collections on it - then it's as if those do not exist and your score will artifically raise.

However, if you're disputing an account that doesn't have any derogatory items, and has a long history of on-time payments, this can artifically lower your score due to the fact that you don't have a good, well aged account factoring into your credit score.

So really, it just depends on what your disputing and what the history is like on the accounts that you're disputing. 

This is a big reason why lenders will not approve a mortgage until your disputes are all off - as they do not know your true score.

And yes, the process of disputing accounts and then having those disputes removed can dramatically affect your score temporarily depending on your file. For example, I had a couple US Bank lates in 2013 disputed recently - and my mortgage score raised 35 points while the account was in dispute. Once the dispute was removed, it shot back down 30-40 points.

[daudi81]

Redbeard:

My account alerts me when an account goes into or out of dispute.