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Ok-- Here is the scenerio.. Last year, when I started my rebuild journey, my girlfriend added me to all her credit cards. I was added as an AU to 2 cards, and a joint on one.
Here is the dilemma I am faced with:
She has had to run up the balance on the oldest one to a high util. 7000 out of 7700. The account has been opened since 2003.
The other accounts have much lower limits, but are much newer. So as of now my accounts look like
Citi - 7000/7700 - April 2003 - AU
AmEx - 500/3700 - June 2007 -AU
Chase 0/500 - June 2007 -AU
And then I have gotten two cards on my own
Captial One 0/300 - Nov 2010
Credit One 0/400 - March 2011
So, I was wondering is someone can tell me.. is 7500/12600 with average age of 3 1/2 years better or worse than 500/4900 with average under 2 years?
My gut is telling me to take myself off the Citi card and keep lower balances w/ shorter age... my FICO is at 641 TU right now, and I am hoping to get a 10 pt jump..
opinions?
@rckstrscott wrote:Ok-- Here is the scenerio.. Last year, when I started my rebuild journey, my girlfriend added me to all her credit cards. I was added as an AU to 2 cards, and a joint on one.
Here is the dilemma I am faced with:
She has had to run up the balance on the oldest one to a high util. 7000 out of 7700. The account has been opened since 2003.
The other accounts have much lower limits, but are much newer. So as of now my accounts look like
Citi - 7000/7700 - April 2003 - AU
AmEx - 500/3700 - June 2007 -AU
Chase 0/500 - June 2007 -AU
And then I have gotten two cards on my own
Captial One 0/300 - Nov 2010
Credit One 0/400 - March 2011
So, I was wondering is someone can tell me.. is 7500/12600 with average age of 3 1/2 years better or worse than 500/4900 with average under 2 years? You're also looking at time since oldest account was open which will change from 8+ years to 4 years. FICO watches individual utilization as well as overall utilization so you're looking at a high individual utilization of 91% vs. 14%.
My gut is telling me to take myself off the Citi card and keep lower balances w/ shorter age... my FICO is at 641 TU right now, and I am hoping to get a 10 pt jump..
opinions?
Others who are wiser than me will likely chime in, but my gut is telling me the same thing your gut is telling you. The best thing about AU's is that if you don't like the FICO impact of removing them, you can always be put back on as an AU. DH just popped me back on as an AU on one of his cards after a year's hiatus.
Which card are you joint on?
I am joint on the Chase card; I should have listed that.. sorry about that haha
Utilization of credit is weighted approximately twice that of age of credit history in the FICO scoring algorithm.
Thus, the benefits of the old age of the account in your age of credit category are only around half if its benefit/detriment in your utilization category.
Increasing utilization by the owner of the account could also increase the potential for future lates on the account.
In my opinion, this account has probably lost its benefit to you, and I would suggest bailing out now.
@RobertEG wrote:Utilization of credit is weighted approximately twice that of age of credit history in the FICO scoring algorithm.
Thus, the benefits of the old age of the account in your age of credit category are only around half if its benefit/detriment in your utilization category.
Increasing utilization by the owner of the account could also increase the potential for future lates on the account.
In my opinion, this account has probably lost its benefit to you, and I would suggest bailing out now.
Would you care to share where you got this? I'm not saying you're wrong but I'd like to study the issue.
From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".
I think it was in reference to this: Amounts owed is 30% and the length is only 15% of your score. That's from the What's in Your Score Section on the MyFico site. Here:
http://www.myfico.com/CreditEducation/WhatsInYourScore.aspx
ETA: link
@kjm79 wrote:
I think it was in reference to this: Amounts owed is 30% and the length is only 15% of your score. That's from the What's in Your Score Section on the MyFico site. Here:
http://www.myfico.com/CreditEducation/WhatsInYourScore.aspx
ETA: link
But that's not everything FICO has to say about the matter. It's not an absolute these-percentages-are-locked-in-and-cannot-be-adjusted-for-any-reason. Let's see what else that link offers.
These percentages are based on the importance of the five categories for the general population. For particular groups - for example, people who have not been using credit long - the importance of these categories may be somewhat different.
So it's definitely not a situation where in every case utilization is twice as important as AAoA or credit history. As always YMMV.
From a BK years ago to:
EX - 3/11 pulled by lender- 835, EQ - 2/11-816, TU - 2/11-782
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem".
@kjm79 wrote:
I think it was in reference to this: Amounts owed is 30% and the length is only 15% of your score. That's from the What's in Your Score Section on the MyFico site. Here:
http://www.myfico.com/CreditEducation/WhatsInYourScore.aspx
It’s impossible to micro-manage your FICO score based on general and broad info. I can’t speak for FICO, but my understanding has always been that the pie is a broad overview given to help us understand general FICO workings. It’s a great advantage to see, for example, how significant of an impact utilization can have on your score. I doubt that it was ever given as an exacting, “Beam, exactly 30% of your FICO score is given – point for point – on utilization.” FICO is an extremely complex algorithm with lots of moving data points.
As John Ulzheimer, who has worked with both Fair Isaac and Equifax puts it, rocket scientists have nothing on the guys that put your credit scores together.
Given that the pie is a broad picture to help us understand the generalities of FICO, it’s also important to remember that utilization - and AAofA - are certainly based on lots of different data points. Just sayin’.
A 20 year old open mortgage is not going to have the same impact on my FICO score as a 20 year old open revolving account; and neither of those will have the same impact as a 20 year old open Consumer Finance Account. It’s another thing altogether if I change that to a 20 year old, but now closed Consumer Finance Account….and so on ad infinitum.
And utilization can vary by 100 percentage points making a one to one comparison with AAofA virtually unattainable.
The gigantic variations possible in both utilization and AAofA make it impossible and impractical to compare them as simply as A times 2 = U.
Hope that's helpful!
I posted the chart to provide a possible reference to RobertEg's statement, "Utilization of credit is weighted approximately twice that of age of credit history in the FICO scoring algorithm.", not for the end all be all of what makes up your score. And definitely am not wanting to confuse anyone or say this is how it is all the time. Hopefully, most of the members here have learned the mantra of "YMMV".
Well said!