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getting my score up quick

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Anonymous
Not applicable

getting my score up quick

I need some ideas on how to improve my score within the next 2 reporting cycles. I'm going for a mortgage, and my score is currently 598. It was 633 last month and maybe I paid too much on my cards. My mortgage guy tells me he doesn't really see any rescore opportunities which is frustrating as I have like 5 credit cards(all below 10% currently) and 1 that's like 85%. The high one just reported and it had already dropped before that one so I'm lost and out of time.

 

I have a couple of small(under $500 charge offs within the last year or 2...not within the last 6. 1 late payment like 6 months ago.

 

Somebody give me a secret other than maintaining a low balance. Also, they are so low if I went from 10% to say 20% would my score drop again? What a game

Thank you in advance

23 REPLIES 23
SouthJamaica
Mega Contributor

Re: getting my score up quick


@Anonymous wrote:

I need some ideas on how to improve my score within the next 2 reporting cycles. I'm going for a mortgage, and my score is currently 598. It was 633 last month and maybe I paid too much on my cards. My mortgage guy tells me he doesn't really see any rescore opportunities which is frustrating as I have like 5 credit cards(all below 10% currently) and 1 that's like 85%. The high one just reported and it had already dropped before that one so I'm lost and out of time.

 

I have a couple of small(under $500 charge offs within the last year or 2...not within the last 6. 1 late payment like 6 months ago.

 

Somebody give me a secret other than maintaining a low balance. Also, they are so low if I went from 10% to say 20% would my score drop again? What a game

Thank you in advance


Your scores did not go down because you "paid too much" on your cards. You need to pay a lot more on your cards, and/or get rid of some of your negatives, if you want to get your "score up quick". 

 

There's no magic trick here. I don't see the "game". 

 

You can probably pick up some points by paying some of your balances down to zero.

 


Total revolving limits 741200 (620700 reporting) FICO 8: EQ 701 TU 704 EX 685

Message 2 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick


@Anonymous wrote:

I need some ideas on how to improve my score within the next 2 reporting cycles. I'm going for a mortgage, and my score is currently 598. It was 633 last month and maybe I paid too much on my cards. My mortgage guy tells me he doesn't really see any rescore opportunities which is frustrating as I have like 5 credit cards(all below 10% currently) and 1 that's like 85%. The high one just reported and it had already dropped before that one so I'm lost and out of time.

 

I have a couple of small(under $500 charge offs within the last year or 2...not within the last 6. 1 late payment like 6 months ago.

 

Somebody give me a secret other than maintaining a low balance. Also, they are so low if I went from 10% to say 20% would my score drop again? What a game

Thank you in advance


You arent going to like the answer then. You need to let all cards, except for one bank card (not a store card or charge card) report $0 and the one card report like $5-10 bucks.

 

Paying the COs will also help and susprised the UW does not want those handled anyway. They affect you regardless if they are 6 years old, they are not like a single 30d late, COs are major derogatories that impact you the entire time they are on your CRs, but can likely be improved some by paying them.

 

So recap:

 

Pay all but 1 card to $0 and let $0 report

Let 1 card report only $5-$10

Pay/settle both the COs

Message 3 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick

thanks for your insight. My card has a 12500 limit and the balance is under $500. some are $5000 and same around $500 balance. You can pay too much on them answer if you have an idea, please.

Message 4 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick

ok thanks for clarifying. sorry thought you were just giving a general answer.

 

so why do they say paying the charge offs won't help it then? I can understand an underwriter asking but if the score doesn't go up then?

Message 5 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick

If you've got a card reporting at 85% you've got to get that down.  Below 50% would be a good start, but ideally down to 25% or so.  If that's a major bank card, you want to zero out your other cards... that is, pay them off and have $0 balances report.

 

The negative items are what are really holding you back.  In order for your score to go up fast you'd have to get your negative items removed.  My suggestion would be working to eliminate your most recent that you said was about 6 months ago.  Target anything very recent, as eliminating it would push out the amount of time since your last negative.  You can check out the rebuilding section of the forum for ideas regarding the removal of negative items on your CR.

Message 6 of 24
Slabenstein
Valued Contributor

Re: getting my score up quick

When you say your "score" is 598, which score do you mean?  Your middle mortgage score?  If so, which bureau is your middle?  With regards to your utilization, what matters is 1) your aggregate utilization, which you haven't stated and 2) your highest individual utilization, which in this case is 85%.  The 10% individual util on your other cards is not scored directly right now, but those balances are all part of your aggregate util, so the lower they are the better.  The 85% highest individual is likely having a significant negative impact on your FICOs (though I think util is a smaller factor on the mortgage scores than it is on 8's), so bringing that down as much as you can should help.  For best results, you'd want to to be at 9% or less.  Whether you would see a significant score drop from increasing the individual util on your other cards to 20% would depend on what that would do to your aggregate utilization.  This may not be what you want to hear, since you say you're looking for other "secrets", but the mortgage scores love $0 balances, so if you're apping for a mortgage the best face you can put on your reports as far as balances goes is to have one of your revolvers report a small balance (to avoid the all-zero penalty) while all of your other revolvers report $0.  The reason that balances are the secret to sprucing up your scores is that they're the major scorable characteristic on your reports that's manipulable by the consumer from month to month; the others really aren't--at least, not in any positive way.

 

With the charge-offs, are they updating or not?  If they are, you can probably help your score by paying them off, since I think that will reduce your aggregate util and your total balances.  If they aren't, you might see a drop in score when you paid them, since they would update as a recent delenquency again.  I would be surprised if you could get a mortgage with unpaid CO's reporting, tho, so that may be a bullet you have to bite.  The late payment you could attempt to goodwill, since all that would cost you is the time to do it, but with it being that recent I don't know if you would have much luck.


Message 7 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick

ok thanks ill check out the removing them section. I have talked to them though and tried to pay in full and nothing. Said it would report as paid I even tried to talk with a manager etc..

 

I agree with the 85% but it went from 633 to 598 after I paid a capital one card from $4400 balance the previous month to 500ish with a limit of $500. The 85% reports like 3-4 days after the capital one card and was already down before it went up. That is what's confusing me thought it would shoot up after the large decrease. 

 

 

Message 8 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick


@Anonymous wrote:

ok thanks for clarifying. sorry thought you were just giving a general answer.

 

so why do they say paying the charge offs won't help it then? I can understand an underwriter asking but if the score doesn't go up then?

 

 

 

 

 



A lot of people tend to say this, but it really is not entirely true. Now, paying collections will not improve your score unless removed and it is the last or only one.

 

Message 9 of 24
Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: getting my score up quick


@Anonymous wrote:

ok thanks ill check out the removing them section. I have talked to them though and tried to pay in full and nothing. Said it would report as paid I even tried to talk with a manager etc..

 

I agree with the 85% but it went from 633 to 598 after I paid a capital one card from $4400 balance the previous month to 500ish with a limit of $500. The 85% reports like 3-4 days after the capital one card and was already down before it went up. That is what's confusing me thought it would shoot up after the large decrease. 

 

 


Where did you get this specific score?

Message 10 of 24
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