Latest posts for the topic "Boosting My Credit Score"

Boosting My Credit Score

timj — GMT

I recently paid off our home equity line only to see that my credit score dropped from 777 to 769. I have no other debt, pay off my credit card each month, have never had any negative info reported on me and pay bills on time every time! How can I boost my credit score which I believe should be 800+!

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

dtempleton — GMT

[b]Credit scores[/b] will fluctuate depending on the data that changes in your [b]credit reports[/b] -- so an 8 point difference from last month isn't unusual. Paying off the HELOC didn't lower your score. Something else in your credit reports had to have changed. From the sounds of it, it may even have been the balances on your credit cards. Even if you pay off your cards each month (which is great), the balance would have to be reported at the credit bureaus for it to be reflected as a 0 balance in your credit reports. Typically, your credit report will contain whatever was reported on your last statement and the only way to get your balance to reflect 0 is to pay off the card and stop using it for a month or two until the credit card issuer reports the update to the credit bureaus. This is a smart strategy if you're planning on applying for a loan - plan ahead a 2-3 months so that you can go in with the highest score possible.

As far as your scores go, you are in great shape and obviously are doing an excellent job at managing your credit. And I have to be honest, when your scores are over 750, trying to finagle the system to get to that 800 mark usually ends up backfiring and you could end up causing more damage than good -- so keep that in mind. My advice? Keep doing what you've been doing and be confident in the fact that you have excellent credit in an environment when you need it most. If there were ever a time to have excellent credit, now is it.

Having said this, if you ordered your scores through [b]myFICO[/b], the reports are returned with score factors or reason codes that explain where you lost the most points in the score calculation. If you're determined to reach that 800 spot, go back to your reports and read through those explanations. They are listed in the order of most importance and are different for everyone depending on the data in your credit reports. So what may be good advice for someone else, might not be good advice for you.

Hope this helps!

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

hittmast — GMT

My credit score is 694. I would like to know if it would improve, or hurt my credit score, if I closed a couple of credit card accounts or should I leave them open? For the at least the last three years, or so, I have made all payments ahead of time and paid extra on the credit card accounts. I have automatic payments set up for the home mortgage, boat, both vehicles, phone, electric, water, etc. We have four or five credit cards, with credit limits ranging from $5000 to $8500. I guess I should correct that number to three or four credit cards...After receiving a letter from Capitol One earlier this week, advising they would be raising our interest rate to 22+%, I paid off all of the card balances yesterday and emailed Capitol One to tell them to close that account as soon as the online payment posts. We have been with them for several years. I told them, in the email, that I refuse to do business with a credit card company that would raise our interest rate to 22% when we have always paid early and always paid extra. Should I close the other accounts or leave them open? We also have three debit cards but I don't think they showed on the credit report and I also noticed that the bank that both of our vehicle payments are financed with do not report that the payments are made on time. The bank is listed on the credit report but I was disappointed to see that they do not reflect our on-time payments. We have been paying on the Prius for 15 months and the Jeep for a year longer than that. I wondered if I should call them (the bank) to ask about it. I also thought about going online to see about advice on setting up a budget. Any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Mrs Howdy

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

dtempleton — GMT

Ouch! I wish I had caught you before you sent the letter of to CapOne requesting they close your account. Don't close any more of your credit card accounts! Closing them could have a detrimental impact on yours scores!

I know it's frustrating but even though your first reaction might be to close an account, it's not the best strategy for your credit scores and can actually backfire and lower your scores. This is because a large percentage of your scores is based your revolving utilization percentage - in english, this is the proportion of your balances to your credit limits. When you close an account, your amount of available credit decreases, which could cause a spike in your revolving utilization and lower your scores. I know it's frustrating but the best thing to do to protect your scores is to pay off the account and simply stop using it - don't close it.

If it helps, you're not alone and CapOne isn't the only credit card issuer that has increased rates on their customers. Over the last few months it's happened to almost all of us - myself included.

As for your other questions, I've answered them in order:

The reason you aren't seeing your debit cards in your credit reports is because they are like checking accounts - and checking account information isn't reported in your credit reports.

If your auto loans are not showing up in your credit reports, you might want to call the bank and request that they report them for you so that you get the positive credit for the accounts. However, credit reporting is completely voluntary so legally the lender doesn't have to report the loan. This is also why in some cases you'll see a lender report to one bureau but not all three.

Setting up a budget - our learning center has some great tips and information to help you get started with a budget. You should be able to find what you're looking for here:

[b]Create a Family Budget[/b]
[b]Do-it-Yourself Debt Reduction[/b]

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

gibran68 — GMT

My credit score right now is 605, I have one item that's current and that is my monthly car note which I've never been late paying. I want to try and boost my credit score, I was wondering if I should apply for a dept. store charge card or will doing that impact my score in a negative way? I'm very leary of having inquiries on my credit report since I know too many can have a negative impact as well. currently I have 2 inguiries, 1 in the early part of this year (Jan) and 1 in Jun of last year. Would it be beneficial for me to get a store card or just stay with 1 item I'm paying on right now and let my score build gradually

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

johninkc — GMT

Establishing additional credit lines to increase one's credit score is a mixed bag of tricks. My goad is to increase my credit score so that I can refinance my house for a shorter term (from 30 year to a 15 year fixed) and at a lower interest rate. My 2nd mortgages is nearly paid (24 years in advance).

So, to accomplish this I opened three new accounts within the last 6 monts; one auto loan, one personal loan and one credit card. But, the consequences have been adverse because the inquiries alone decreased my credit score. Having new open accounts decreased my score, too as well as increasing my outstanding debt.

I didn't realize that the auto loan which was only $1000 would hurt my credit score because it was thru a finance company. I paid it off after three months. I only have seven months remaining on the personal loan and the credit card balance is at $320. I could pay those off now. The cedit card is interest free for one month and I did need a new computer monitor.

I've looked at three different synopsis of my credit reports. Now they say my credit score is lower because I don't have a major credit card. But, I don't need one because I have four bank accounts with a debit card for each of them.

Now, I'm trying to boost that score as quickly as possible so that I can get my scores raised so that I can get good terms for my mortgage refinancing. So, I essentially took three steps backwards just to play the credit manipulation game. Should and if I would pay all or nearly all of my personal loan and the credit card balance asap, how long would it take to get it updated to the credit bureaus. And if it is reported, will it immediately benefit my credit score (at least put it back to where it was)? And should pay the remaining year on my 2nd mortgage or refinance it with the 1st mortgage? If I pay it off, will it immediatley benefit my credit score.

Please advise me. I'm running out of time while the mortgage rates are still low.

Thank you.

Re:Boosting My Credit Score

GerriDetweiler — GMT

It's really hard to boost one's credit score very quickly. The most common way to do that was a technique called "piggybacking," or "renting tradelines," which we wrote about extensively at Credit.com. But the credit reporting agencies got wise to that and they changed their algorithm to prevent most gaming of the system through that technique.

I don't have an easy answer for you. From what you are saying, you only have recent new credit - but you don't have long-term credit references that are reported, correct? For the long term, you do need a major credit card to help boost your credit score, even if you don't need it for purchasing purposes. But I don't want you to run out and open up a new one, because it's just likely to lower your scores.

What are your FICO credit scores?

Have you talked with a loan officer? In particular, you may want to consult one who does FHA loans as they have more flexible credit score requirements than conventional loans. (Though even FHA is starting to tighten up.) Have you checked an FHA loan?