Why does my score drop when accounts improve!!

[Anonymous]

I wish I could post a screen shot of my alerts. 8 alerts in a row, all good I.e. balance decreased, credit limit increased, status update to pays on time, etc, yet each alert shows scores dropped 3 points. FICO scoring gives me anxiety because I work so hard to improve my credit, Yet if I increase 1 cc balance by 20.00, my score will drop 25 points. I almost want to quit trying so hard and watching so closely. I have 12 open good standing accounts, 3 closed, I make 75k a year, Average Age of Accounts is 8 years, and 3 late payments on 2 accounts almost 5 years ago. But I can barely get over 600 credit score. My 18 year old daughters is 780 because I add her as authorized user on 2 accounts. I just don't get it. Before i started paying attention to my credit, had  like 21 collections and only 2 open CC's , and 3 charge offs and my score was about the same. 

[SouthJamaica]

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@Anonymous wrote:
I wish I could post a screen shot of my alerts. 8 alerts in a row, all good I.e. balance decreased, credit limit increased, status update to pays on time, etc, yet each alert shows scores dropped 3 points! I'm so tired of fico scoring 😩 it gives me anxiety because I work so hard to improve my credit. Yet if I increase 1 balance by 20.00 on a cc, my score will drop 25 points! I almost want to quit trying so hard and watching so closely. I have 12 open good standing accounts, 3 closed, I make 75k a year, aso is 8 years, and only 2 late payments almost 5 years ago. But I can barely get over 600 credit score. My 18 year old daughters is 780 because I add her as authorized user on 2 accounts. I just don't get it

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If you give us a picture of what your story is, we can help you figure out what's affecting your scores.

We would need to know:

-revolving accounts, credit limits, and balances

-installment accounts, original amounts, and balances

-all negatives

With that information we can start figuring out how you can improve your scores.

[Anonymous]

Goodies:

Payment History - 95%

Total Accounts - 13

7 Revolving Accounts - Revolving utilization 39% Total balance $3,582 / Available $7,400

5 Bank Issued Credit Card Accounts 

1 new car loan opened 2 months ago - already hit my credit and only dropped it about 7 points, so it didnt affect it very much. 

6 Closed paid accounts

Average Age of Accounts - 5y5m

My DTI is around15%

Baddies:

5 collections -  (1-900.00 sprint bill, 3 - medical bills around 100-300 each too old to pay now, and 1 - 600.00 balance from an old credit card that went to collections which I plan to pay soon)

1 - charge off of $345.00 - 4 years old

I totally understand there are a few baddies, but i dont understand why my scores are still around 570-590. is it really those few bad accounts? even with all the really good accounts, and history? and why does MY FICO send alerts that im improving everything but at the same time there will be a little arrow pointing down that says my score has dropped. thats whats stressful.

[SouthJamaica]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Payment History - 95%

Total Accounts - 13

7 Revolving Accounts - Revolvoing utilization 39% Total balance $3,582 / Available $7,400

5 Bank Issued Credit Card Accounts 

1 new car loan opened 2 months ago

6 Closed paid accounts

Average Age of Accounts - 5y5m

5 collections -  all under $1000 each (1-900.00 sprint bill i refuse to pay cause it was 1 month of service and i cancelled immediately and went right back to ATT. 3 - medical bills too old to pay now, and 1 - 600.00 balance from an old credit card after ID theft, that went to collections instead of charge off, which i plan to pay soon)

1 - charge off of $345.00 - 4 years old

I totally understand there are a few baddies, but i dont understand why my scores are still around 570-590. is it really those few bad accounts? even with all the really good accounts, and history. and why does my fico send alerts that im improving everything but at the same time there will be a little arrow pointing down that says my score has dropped. thats whats stressful.

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1. A 95% payment history is bringing you way down.

2. Total revolving utilization of 39% is bringing you down.

3. A new car loan with very little paid off is bringing you down.

4. Five collections are bringing you way down.

No mysteries.

The FICO alerts are not tied to the score changes.

[Anonymous]

I appreciate you taking time to look at my profile, but it is a mystery to me. I know I don't have a 800 point profile, but what do u think I can do to at least get close to 700?
The only 2 late payments I had were 3-4 years ago, I've wrote letters but can't change that. I thought credit utilization should be around 30% for the best scores. And my collections aren't anything big, no repost or bks...im still confused, so I appreciate any advise. Ive been working on this a year

[Anonymous]

Ideal utilization is 8.9% or less.  30% is not ideal and that's hurting your score.

Collection amounts > $100 don't matter relative to one another in terms of scoring.  You could have two collections, one for $150 and one for $1500 and their impact in terms of scoring is going to be the same.  Collections are major baddies and even a single one will hold back your scores 80 points or so 7 years from the time it happened. 

[jamie123]

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@Anonymous wrote:
I appreciate you taking time to look at my profile, but it is a mystery to me. I know I don't have a 800 point profile, but what do u think I can do to at least get close to 700?
The only 2 late payments I had were 3-4 years ago, I've wrote letters but can't change that. I thought credit utilization should be around 30% for the best scores. And my collections aren't anything big, no repost or bks...im still confused, so I appreciate any advise. Ive been working on this a year

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Don't believe what you read on some websites on the Internet. I think you are getting some of your information from Credit Karma and they are steering you wrong.

Credit scores are really a pass/fail score. If you have 100% clean credit reports you can and will eventually have high scores. If you have even 1 late payment your scores can be dropped by 80 points for years. You need to pay all your bills on time or you will never have high scores. And yes, FICO thinks any charge off is a BIG thing. Charge offs are a major derogatory in FICO's eyes.

You have several late payments and charge offs and those are keeping your scores down and will keep your scores down until they age off your reports at 7 years.

[kxkxkxx]

Couple of comments...

First off, not sure if you are on your phone or computer, but either can supply a screenshot...if on your phone, you can usually push 2 of your buttons at the same time (google which ones since I am not sure what phone you have) and it will snapshot your current screen. If on your computer, search your "snipping tool" and you can select as much of the screen as you want and save it as a jpg.

Second...AWESOME job with your daughter....I did the same adding her as an authorized user (no card of course given to her) and she is at 797...way to go Dad!

Finally, @SouthJamaica is 100% correct....time is the only cure here....I had my credit issues too...those collections are like bad slots, they keep not paying not paying, but keep popping up....after awhile though, they will not matter. So keep doing the right things and I promise the scores will keep growing....try not to check in too much, otherwise the fluctuations will get you frustrated.

I came from a BK and an IRS lien and I am now at 740...

[Anonymous]

Thank you so much! I've been trying my best. Im glad I was able to set my daughter up with a good head start. I taught her all about credit as well, so shes alot smarter than i was at that age

Now that im on my PC, i can see a photo button so you can see what im talking aboutIt just seems to decrease and decrease. This even included removing a charge off... yet, no love.

[kxkxkxx]

One thing about FICO (And others will say it too) is....the alert and credit drops or increases don't always go hand in hand....so you can get an alert that you paid down something and your score dropped...so you scratch your head.....what is happening behind the scenes is, yes, you paid something down, but, those collection accounts can still hurt you, so your score will drop at the same time...

So it looks like all your good stuff is being counted against you, but it's not.....you will see down the road that your score increased for no reason at all...but there is always a reason.