Score using maiden name is 120 points higher than with married last name...??

[Anonymous]

I'm currently applying for a mortgage with my husband.  On myFICO my Equifax is 618 and Transunion is 630.  Two different mortgage brokers pulled a 507 and 510 for me.  The mortgage broker we are currently talking to says he has a good feeling that when he pulls my scores using my maiden name he will get much higher numbers.  How on earth is this possible and what does it even mean?  I'm very confused. 

[Revelate]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I'm currently applying for a mortgage with my husband.  On myFICO my Equifax is 618 and Transunion is 630.  Two different mortgage brokers pulled a 507 and 510 for me.  The mortgage broker we are currently talking to says he has a good feeling that when he pulls my scores using my maiden name he will get much higher numbers.  How on earth is this possible and what does it even mean?  I'm very confused. 

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That sounds sketchy as the SSN is the primary index.

That said, names are a fuzzy match system which is how collections and AU's and other things land on reports either correctly or uncorrectly in some cases, but that's usually done when the SSN isn't known.

In any event the credit report should be unique and specific to you, but unfortunately the scores found here on myFICO aren't the ones commonly used in the mortgage process.  I would look at the reports (ideally from annualcreditreports) and look to see what can be addressed on the file.

[Stylez]

It could be that some of your negative items aren't being registered by the credit bureaus under your maiden name. Just today I looked at my credit report and saw a charge off from American Express. I've never had an American Express card. I called American Experess and gave them my social. They discovered that there was another guy with my same first and last name that the item belonged to. Experian was attributing the charge off to me by mistake. So even though your SSN is supposed to be the main indentifier, the name can still trip up the credit bureaus.