UTL Threshold Datapoint (Perhaps)?

dmantt99 · ‎03-16-2019

Hoping that TT, BBS, CGID, et al can comment on this.

I recently (late last year) had two of my oldest accounts age off TU (20+ y/o paid mortgage, 14 y/o paid car loan), Fico 8 dropped to 788 (per Discover statement) in December. My UTL had been all over the map before that, but the last 4 months have shown some interesting numbers as I pay it down. The details are:

AoYA: 2y5m

(new) AoOA: 8y5m

(new) AAoA: 5y4m

Inquiries: 0

9 Total Accounts (7 open, 2 closed, no AU)

Car Loan 28%

Mortgage 82%

AZEO inplace (1/4)

UTL vs score since December are:

Dec: 788 Aggregate: 16.38 Individual: 92.26

Jan: 801 Aggregate: 25.02 Individual: 38.72

Feb: 803 Aggregate: 19.81 Individual: 30.66

Mar: 812 Aggregate: 18.87 Individual: 29.20

The jump from Dec to Jan clearly shows the impact of a maxed out card (in this case a small card, thankfully).

Jan to Feb makes sense, as no known thresholds were crossed.

Feb to Mar doesn't, at least that I can see. Feb aggregate should have rounded up to 20% (correct?), and Mar aggregate to 19%. The Mar individual should round up to 30%, so that shouldn't be impacted by the <30 ind. threshold.

No additional changes other than month-to-month aging.

So where did the 9 points come from this month?

Anonymous · ‎03-16-2019

Your highest individual card utilization is straddling the 28.9% threshold, which on some profiles can impact score 4-5 points. Too close to call IMO if that's a factor here.

It could very well be something age of accounts related. Since all 3 age of accounts factors improve by 1 month on the 1st of each month, it's often very difficult to pinpoint which one(s) may have positively impacted score.

That's a pretty dramatic AoOA drop for you, going from > 20 years to 8.x years. You didn't happen to mention your "before" scores with your AoOA at 20+ years? I'm curious to hear what type of drop you experienced. Also with those older accounts in place, what was your now 5.x year AAoA prior to those dropoffs?

dmantt99 · ‎03-17-2019

I got my first credit card in 1972, first car loan in 1973, and first mortgage in 1977. Unfortunately, I wasn't smart enough to keep at least one old credit card open, always just closed them when something "better" came along. When I retired about 10 years ago, I sold my home, paid off the mortgage (along with a car loan I had at the time), and moved to a different state. I bought a small farm a couple of years later (that mortgage is currently my oldest account).

I don't have November's information, but I did find my records for October (two months prior to when I believe the two oldest accounts dropped off). Again, this is for TU:

Discover Fico: 828

AoYA: 2y0m

AoOA: 23y1m

AAoA: 7y5m

UTL: 23.83 (aggregate), note that I don't have the individual UTL for that month, Discover only shows aggregate.

For most of last year, my Discover score was in the 810-830 range. I don't manage my UTL (as you can see), and tend to rotate card usage to insure that none of them get closed for non-use.

The drop from October to December, while substantial, is likely not all due to the change in aging---I suspect the high individual card usage (92.26) may have more to do with it. Unfortunately, I don't know what my highest individual UTL was prior to December to confirm.

Getting back to this month, I suspect the 9 point gain from February has to have something to do with the aggregate UTL going below 20%. Although the individual UTL is right on the border, it should be reporting 30%, not <30%, right?

Thanks for looking this over.

Anonymous · ‎03-17-2019

You actually want it at 28.9% or lower and if you're going to be incurring any interest charges shooting for about 27% would be smart. Remember that all percentage round up, so if you're at 29.01% it will be "seen" by the FICO algorithm at 30% utilization and you'll have crossed that threshold in the less favorable direction.