I agree with two important points made here:
- Scores in the mid-700s are high enough to qualify for the most attractive credit offerings available, including the best credit cards, 0% financing, etc. Anything more is icing on the cake!
- In making their decisions, most lenders look well beyond credit scoring to other factors such as income, DTI, home ownership (stability), your banking relationship with them, etc.
Credit scores are like academic testing scores: Universities, medical schools, and law schools look far beyond SAT, GRE, MCAT, and LSAT scores when evaluating candidates for admission. A perfect test score but a boring résumé is no guarantee of admission to your first choice of schools!
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:There is no magic number but, I get bummed when my EQ mortgage score dips below 800
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Asked FNBO for a credit limit increase on my card with a score in the 800s and they said "NO". Now if that doesn't just make you wonder? As others have posted the high scores do not guarantee approval.
@Anonymous wrote:
Asked FNBO for a credit limit increase on my card with a score in the 800s and they said "NO". Now if that doesn't just make you wonder? As others have posted the high scores do not guarantee approval.
Great example. FNBO is paranoid about inquiries; credit score is nearly irrelevant.
I think of my score as a ticket for admission. Unless a lender (like FNBO) is hung up on other things, your score gets you in the door. But lenders take your entire file into account when making decisions on extending significant credit.
@Anonymous wrote:Asked FNBO for a credit limit increase on my card with a score in the 800s and they said "NO". Now if that doesn't just make you wonder? As others have posted the high scores do not guarantee approval.
Credit scores IMO aren't in the top 3 or maybe not even the top 5 in the list of factors considered by a lender for a CLI.
There will be a threshold, in any given bank for whatever score model they use, above which no applicant will get a better rate on that loan product. This is because of the way FICO scores are designed.
A FICO score measures risk of default given the persons current debt structure and payment habits. That is not an application for credit, which is why optimizing score without a planned app is so much navel gazing. Maximizing score requires no new borrowing, lots of on time payment history, and low debt amounts.
Once you approach a bank about an application for credit, whether a CC, LOC or Mortgage, that new debt balance will cause your score to go down, because you have now taken on a new risk factor, a new risk of default. The bank doesn’t care if you have 850 vs 800 (picking a number) because that new loan is going to take away (lower) that 850 score.
A FICO score measures risk of default given the persons current debt structure and payment habits. That is not an application for credit, which is why optimizing score without a planned app is so much navel gazing. Maximizing score requires no new borrowing, lots of on time payment history, and low debt amounts.
Once you approach a bank about an application for credit, whether a CC, LOC or Mortgage, that new debt balance will cause your score to go down, because you have now taken on a new risk factor, a new risk of default. The bank doesn’t care if you have 850 vs 800 (picking a number) because that new loan is going to take away (lower) that 850 score.
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:It is possible to open a new account (specifically a CC or a LOC) without score dropping below 850.
In certain situations opening a new account (SSL if no open installment loans) or (CC if no revolvers in file) may boost a Fico 8 score by 30 points. Key point is to report a low B/L ratio for the new SSL or low utilization for the new revolving account.
Yes, that is true, but not really borrowing anything where the rate you pay matters.
Taking out a new mortgage gage usually sits at 100% utilization for quite a while. That’s where interest rate matters, not with my pretend SSL at $500.
@Thomas_Thumb wrote:There is no magic number but, I get bummed when my EQ mortgage score dips below 800
That is a personal goal of mine as well -- keep all mortage scores north of 800. 
I currently have two of them in that range, with hopefuly the third (EQ) there in a coule of weeks.