Why is my credit low?

Anonymous · ‎03-13-2019

Hey guys,

I joined this page a couple of years ago and i learned alot and achieved my highest credit rating ever. In august 2018 i bought my first house and opened a few cards to take advantage of 0% interest to furnish the house. Here we are 7 months later and my credit is now in the low 600s when it was in the low to mid 700s 7 months ago. Im honestly stumped. My utilization is under 30%, and the only other things that have changed is a few inquirys, the addition of my mortgage, and a personal loan. Im really confused on why my credit score is where it is. Any help is appreciated! TIA!

dynamicvb · ‎03-13-2019

This is hard to pinpoint without more information on your accounts, both before and after. Two things your Average Age went down and your Youngest is less with the new accounts. Along with the inquiries that would be a hit. You mentioned less than 30% utilization. How is that distributed is it all on one card that may be close to maxed out or spread out across several?

I'm not sure why it would equal a 100 points unless you had some baddie popup that wasn't there before.

Started Rebuild 4/2018: EX 616| TU 604| EQ 621

Current 5/28/20:

First Goal Score: 750+ Reached 3/2019

Next Goal all over 800

Anonymous · ‎03-13-2019

Have you pulled your reports recently? If so, where did you get the reports from and did you carefully review them line by line to be sure there were no lates, collections, etc? (Dynmaic is right that this might be the problem.)

You mention that your scores have gone down. Have they gradually gone down over many months? Or was there a a much more abrupt dive? Where are you getting these scores? And are you comparing the scores you see now with the scores that the mortgage lender used? (If so, that would be one reason to expect them to be different.)

When your scores were higher, was your CC utilization very low? You mention being at under 30% utilization now -- can you give us a precise figure out to at least 1/10th of a percent? 28.8% is much better than 29.1% -- since a breakpoint occurs at total utilization of 28.99%.

Do you have at least one card that has a high individual utilization? That would be another source of penalty.

Shooting-For-800 · ‎03-13-2019

Just because you are under 30% does not mean that it is not dramatically more than you were.

Were you under 9% before?

Depending on how thick your file is, small moves can make large swings.

Any cards max'd out?

ANY lates?

How many inquiries?

Credit score going up and down or just down and down?

I assume you actually looked at the report and not just the score, right? No flags?

I would pay 3x minimum payments no matter 0% or not and not apply for anything.

See if that helps 90 days from now.

Rebuild started in 2014 - $100k unsecured credit in 2017 - $500k unsecured credit in 2024.

DON'T WORK FOR CREDIT CARDS ... MAKE CREDIT CARDS WORK FOR YOU!

Anonymous · ‎03-13-2019

No lates, no card is maxed out, only 3 of them have a balance on them at all. Ive always kept them around 20% - 30%. Nothing has really changed besides the mortgage and personal loan.

DollyLama · ‎03-13-2019

Your file was probably a younger file according to FICO. With the inquiries, addition of 2 loans, and # of new accounts opened for furnishings (hope you didn't do a store card for the furniture as that would be deemed as a CFA), will greatly reduce your Average Age of Accounts, Youngest Age of Accounts.

I'd personally, no app for any new credit, let the inquiries age off at the year mark on the newest and become unscoreable, and garden during this time to recuperate the points lost and let the credit age.

HeavenOhio · ‎03-13-2019

If it's a card, it shouldn't be a CFA (consumer finance account). If it's a loan, it could be.

Anonymous · ‎03-13-2019

Perhaps I'm overlooking it from the OP and I don't think anyone has asked this yet, but what is the source(s) of your credit score(s)?

Anonymous · ‎03-15-2019

Thank you for the response. I am using Credit Karma right now as credit check total was bought out by experian. Is there an accurate credit monitoring service anyone would reccomend? The majority of my balance is on one card. I did a balance transfer as i received a 0% offer. You could be correct about the AAoA effecting it. I dont plan on opening any lines of credit. I did have an inquiry yesterday as my fiance is in desperate need of a car so that will be another account on my report shortly :/. Thanks for the help so far, any continued advice is appreciated

@Anonymous wrote:
Have you pulled your reports recently? If so, where did you get the reports from and did you carefully review them line by line to be sure there were no lates, collections, etc? (Dynmaic is right that this might be the problem.)

You mention that your scores have gone down. Have they gradually gone down over many months? Or was there a a much more abrupt dive? Where are you getting these scores? And are you comparing the scores you see now with the scores that the mortgage lender used? (If so, that would be one reason to expect them to be different.)

When your scores were higher, was your CC utilization very low? You mention being at under 30% utilization now -- can you give us a precise figure out to at least 1/10th of a percent? 28.8% is much better than 29.1% -- since a breakpoint occurs at total utilization of 28.99%.

Do you have at least one card that has a high individual utilization? That would be another source of penalty.

Anonymous · ‎03-15-2019

My Credit Karma scores have been as much as 100 points lower than actual FICO scores. Experian and Discover Scorecard offer free Exp FICO scores. Check there first. Credit Karma uses Vantage scores which will count important factors differently from FICO and aren't used by any real lenders. They show my AAoA as way lower than my actual and also penalize more for utilization I believe.