So I'm having a heck of a time getting my score to stay above a 700 (right now it's teetering between 695 - 705) so we can get a home loan. It's like pulling my hair out trying to get those few extra points so we can stay above that magic 700 mark for a jumbo loan.
Paying off almost ALL debt, keeping my utilization PERFECT (when you have multiple cards that's not an easy thing). I do have a few lates, most are 2+ years old...the most recent is about 15 months old. I have 17+ years of paying off cards, SEVERAL cars, student loans, etc - I have extremely good diversity. I made almost 7 figures this year, and I literally have no debt other than a $1200/mo car payment and rent - so my DTI is off the charts. My total revolving balance usually sits around a $500, with about $70k total limit, resulting in a less than 1% utilization rate (I have mutiple cards, but only 1 carries a small balance every month). My installment debt is a bit different, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Meanwhile, my wife who has almost ALL of her accounts in collection or default (we ran into some financial trouble about 5-6 years ago, and we decided to keep my debt current and let hers go). Other than her car payment, she literally has everything in collections. We are currently in the process of just settling everything and paying off all her debt off at once (about $35k worth of it) - but were curious how low her credit score was and how badly this is affecting her credit.
Our lender pulls her score just for fun, and guess what her mid fico is? 728. (718 low, 746 high).
So, according to Fair Isaac's amazing algorithm used to calculate credit worthiness and risk - someone who lets all of their debt go and has nearly every account in some collection agency, is at LESS risk than someone like me who has a few lates from 2+ years ago but otherwise a spotless record, lots of open and current credit.
I understand why mine is only a 700, I have some "recent" lates (if you call 2 years recent). That's completely understandable. What I do not understand is how hers is so high considering she let everything go.
I've been digging into this credit thing for almost a year now, and I've seen some things that make absolutely no logical sense with credit scoring - but this one takes the cake - which is saying a lot =)
