Tricky AZEO question

[Anonymous]

We are trying to get my husband's score up to qualify for mortgage....he is 3 points shy of 620. Last month I added him to one of my CC which has a zero balance and is 5 years old(longer than either of his credit accounts) hoping this gives him a boost. Aside from some medical collections (which are draghing his score down), he has 2 credit accounts, one a capital one card the other was a revolving acct through Santander and a student loan avct. My delimma is that the Santander has been reporting closed since last year when they stopped offering these accounts and closed it so no further charges could be made but it still reports his line of credit and balance which is now at 4% utilization. The Capital one had a $6 balance last month but not sure if we should pay it off or keep a little on. If an account is reporting closed would it still factor into the AZEO equation? Any suggestions to maximize points would be great!

[Pikaboo-icu]

I don't know what type of account Santander is but I can tell you I made a mistake with AZEO last month.

I allowed my Amazon Prime store card to report and NOT a bankcard, VISA MC etc... My score dropped 14 points.

So if the Santander card is NOT a visa, mc, amex etc... I would allow the small bal on Cap One to report, if possible.

And I'm not 100% sure but I do not believe a closed account will count toward AZEO but that needs to be clarified by a more experienced member.

CHEERS

[Anonymous]

Yes, that's what I'm afraid of. If the capital one reports zero will it impact him negatively. Also, the Santander was not a Visa, MC, or AMEX type card. It was more like a dept store card (Brandsmart). We could have paid this off already but didn't want this to negatively impact either. I really feel stuck as to what to do.

[Anonymous]

Ok, update to my previous post...he has 3 open accounts a JCP card and AU on Tires Plus card, both have a zero balance no late pays. Last month the capital one had $6 balance of $850 limit. CK shows the Capone at 1% and overall utilization at 0%. The Santander is not even a factor (I guess because it is a closed acct). So after typing and reading all this to myself. I assume we should put a little something on Capone, any suggestion on optimal utilization for overall and for the Capone card? JCP has CL of $300, Tires Plus has CL of $1200. If we used say $25 that would put him at 2.76% for Capone and 1% util overall.

[Pikaboo-icu]

The store cards having a balance wont count toward AZEO so those should stay at 0.

Having any balance on the Cap One should be enough as CK and the like round down, thus 0%.

I believe as long as there is something reporting on a major bankcard, you're good. Don't allow any one card to report a uti over 9% so keep cap one under that. 

There are AZEO experts here, I am not one of them but I have been learning, through my own mistakes. 

[Anonymous]

Thank you !!

[Anonymous]

Any non-zero reported balance on your cap one card will constitute 1% utilization, even if some front end fluff software rounds your < 1 decimal down to 0%. This means you'll be at 1% aggregate utilization for FICO scoring purposes, which is the best place you can be.

[CH-7-Mission-Accomplished]

I think having a balance report on a store revolving account should work fine for AZEO.   It just wants to see some minimal amount reporting on a revolving account.   Some people only have store cards and they get the necessary benefit from having one revolving account report.

I wonder about having a balance on that closed revolving account?   Doesn't that make that card appear to be maxed out since the available limit is zero and there is a positive balance?   I'm not sure about this but that sounds right to me.

[Anonymous]

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@CH-7-Mission-AccomplishedI think having a balance report on a store revolving account should work fine for AZEO.   It just wants to see some minimal amount reporting on a revolving account.   Some people only have store cards and they get the necessary benefit from having one revolving account report.

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Yes and no.  It's been well documented on this forum that certain store cards "count" while other's don't.  Because it's inconsistent across the board, it's a best practice to simply not use a store card for AZEO.  If someone only has store cards, they'd have to determine one that does "count" and use that.  There are a couple of threads floating around where store cards that count (and are ignored) for utilization purposes are discussed.

[Anonymous]

The Santander card (closed acct) is actually reporting his original 800 CL not a zero CL.