how do you calculate AAoA?

[Anonymous]

okay so i am trying to figure out the fastest way to increase my fico with my CC. I have the following

one CC with 425 limit opened for 13 months

one CC auth user opened for 7 yrs 1000 k limit

one CC 450 limit opened for 6 months

one CC with 200 limit opened for 3 months

one CC with 325 limit opened for 3 months

total util is 7% for all

my question is should i close one of the two or both the two newest cards even though it will decrease my available credit? will this increase my AAoA? I also have two student loans  that are 4 yrs old and two new student loans that are about 6 months old. I have a 3 yr chap 7 and 6 paid med collections that are 1 yr old. my most recent baddie is from nov of 2009. i will be disputing it because it is innacurate.

thanks for any thoughts.

[MarineVietVet]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

okay so i am trying to figure out the fastest way to increase my fico with my CC. I have the following

one CC with 425 limit opened for 13 months

one CC auth user opened for 7 yrs 1000 k limit

one CC 450 limit opened for 6 months

one CC with 200 limit opened for 3 months

one CC with 325 limit opened for 3 months

total util is 7% for all

my question is should i close one of the two or both the two newest cards even though it will decrease my available credit? will this increase my AAoA? I also have two student loans  that are 4 yrs old and two new student loans that are about 6 months old. I have a 3 yr chap 7 and 6 paid med collections that are 1 yr old. my most recent baddie is from nov of 2009. i will be disputing it because it is innacurate.

thanks for any thoughts.

---

Your AAoA is the sum of the ages of every account on your report, whether open or closed, calculated in months, divided by the number of accounts and then divided by 12. I use the division by 12 to make it easier to convert into years. This is measured from the time each account was opened until present.

So it looks like you have a total of 217 months. Divide that by 9 (number of accounts) = 24.1 and divide again by 12= 2.009 AAoA. BTW CA accounts are not included in AAoA.

FICO rounds down for AAoA so your AAoA is 2 years. Closing any cards won't change your AAoA. Closed accounts in good standing will continue to report for up to 10 years after closing.

Your short credit history is hurting you but only time will take care of that. Your utilization of your credit cards is very good. Continue to keep that low.

That BK and your collections are hurting you also but I bet you already knew that. The BK will remain for 7 years after filing. Work on getting those collections and any other derogatories removed if possible.

I hope some of what I said helped.

From a BK years ago to:
9/09 EX pulled by lender 802
3/10 EQ- 800
4/10 TU -772

You can do the same thing with hard work

Credit Scoring 101
Common Abbreviations
Frequently Requested Threads
Whats In Your FICO Score

[RobertEG]

Marinevet gave you a very accurate and comprehensive overview of how AAoA works.

It is not one or the major scoring criteria.

How can we help you get rid of the old derogs? Payment drogs are the bane of your FICO score now, not AAoA

[Anonymous]

all of the derogs are paid medical collections from one year ago. I have already tried the hipaa process to get rid of them. before i paid in full i tried to PFD but the CA said no.At that time i was unaware that i should have been dealing with the OC and not the CA. When I found this site, i had already paid off all the collections.  i knew i wanted to apply for a mortgage soon, so i figured having paid medical collections would look better than unpaid, even if it didn't necessarily help my score (which may in fact have hurt it by making the accounts more recently active). either way, i figured paying them and avoiding being sued and more public records would be in my best interest at the time. the baddies are all being reported by the collection agency (the same one reporting like 6 different accounts). the only thing i haven't done are goodwills because i figured if they wouldn't PFD, and they wouldn't remove for Hippa, why would they remove for goodwill?

now i am in a bad situation. I am under contract with a closing date of aug 2nd. my lender is BAofA and I feel like my file won't make it through underwriting. I was one of the idiots who believed my LO when she told me everything was fine and gave me a preapproval even though my midscore WAS 615 at the time. now my midscore is 605.My EQ fico dropped 14 points during this process. I think its a combo of the inquiries and one CC from 4 yrs ago updating. (it was cap one updating the fact that my account was in bankruptcy. i have no idea why they would update now in 2010 for an account from 2006  that was discharged through bankruptcy. it was already on my report from before, but now my EQ status date shows june of 2010 when it used to say 2006) i am hoping when EX and EQ update my AU status with the CC that has a 1000k limit and 7 yr history, and my last baddie from november of 2009 gets deleted (which it definately will because i have proof of payment and statement from OC showing zero balance) that I will get  to 620 or above, and hopefully can get approved by someone when BAofA rejects me by aug 2nd. When my CS increases i plan to use a broker.

[Anonymous]

i just read my post and realized the last thing i wrote is a little confusing. i plan to have my most recent baddie removed, which is not a medical collection. its actually a cable bill that was paid to the OC and never went to a CA at all. I have my proof of payment and statement from the OC showing zero balance for this baddie, so i don't anticipate having trouble getting it removed. i think i will try rapid rescore because this is the only baddie on my CR that is less than 1 year old, so i am hoping that will rebucket me and give me the opportunity to get to a midscore of 620, that along with the AU card.

[MarineVietVet]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

i just read my post and realized the last thing i wrote is a little confusing. i plan to have my most recent baddie removed, which is not a medical collection. its actually a cable bill that was paid to the OC and never went to a CA at all. I have my proof of payment and statement from the OC showing zero balance for this baddie, so i don't anticipate having trouble getting it removed. i think i will try rapid rescore because this is the only baddie on my CR that is less than 1 year old, so i am hoping that will rebucket me and give me the opportunity to get to a midscore of 620, that along with the AU card.

---

Because the derogatory is so recent getting it removed hopefully will help you enough. Only time will tell.

Good luck to you.