Credit Score!

[hsguy]

I was reading the thread about when to take social security and folks talking about having no debt when you retire so I decided to check my credit score at my credit union. This score is called the Advantage score and not the "gold standard" FICO score but still interesting. To preface this I have owned my home outright for several years, bought my last car cash, have no retail store cards, and only use my credit cards for daily expenses and pay them in full every month. I have no late payments, bankruptcy or any other negative factors and I am retired. I owe nothing to anyone money wise.

My score dropped by 27 points from March based upon the following factors:

1. No open real estate secured loans in your credit file
2. Too high proportion of balances from bankcards
3. Oldest bankcard was opened too recently
4. No open retail accounts in your credit file

I don't anticipate the need for credit in the future but being proactive in case the need unexpectedly arises I have formulated this plan of action:

A. Buy a new home way above my means and mortgage it to the hilt.

B. Secure some retail accounts to buy the latest must have gadgets on time and pay the minimum each month. A top of the line Mercedes may look good in the driveway also.

C. My oldest card I have had for about 20 years, don't know how to change that, suggestions welcomed.

Hopefully I'll be able to better sleep at night knowing I am working diligently to improve my score.

 

[Ole Joe Clark]

I get the same song and dance when I check my score, 800 plus, but it could be better if you had bills that you pay on time. I don't care if it drops to zero, I'm not making any bills.

Have a blessed day,

Leon

 

[bigwheelzip]

You could print up a report with all your active accounts and close unused, unneeded credit accounts to drive up scores. These accounts may not all be related to credit cards, but could be lines of credit extended for a purchase.

 

[hsguy]

Thanks for the advice but all unneeded accounts are already closed in my latest report. No big deal in my original post, just a curiosity.

 

[leswad]

My goal is achieve a credit score of 0.

 

[LVSteve]

My score dropped by 27 points from March based upon the following factors:

1. No open real estate secured loans in your credit file
2. Too high proportion of balances from bankcards
3. Oldest bankcard was opened too recently
4. No open retail accounts in your credit file

.....

C. My oldest card I have had for about 20 years, don't know how to change that, suggestions welcomed.

I don't understand how #2 works when you say you pay off your cards every month. You don't run a balance, so how can the proportion be too high? Bad math, IMHO.

Is you oldest card with a bank or some other financial institution? I'm betting their algorithm penalizes those who only use credit unions, not banks.

Just goes to prove what has been said for decades. The credit ratings industry is just there to blow smoke where the sun don't shine.

As for my score, it should be stratospheric. Macy's card, four years into a 30-year mortgage, loans on two luxury cars (granted, one is under $300/month), bills and cards all on time. They should be rolling out the mink carpet and opening the good brandy when I walk into Walmart.

 

[hsguy]

I don't understand how #2 works when you say you pay off your cards every month. You don't run a balance, so how can the proportion be too high.


Is you oldest card with a bank or some other financial institution? I'm betting their algorithm penalizes those who only use credit unions, not banks.


Just goes to prove what has been said for decades. The credit ratings industry is just there to blow smoke where the sun don't shine.

Steve, that was what puzzled me as they are are paid off monthly and my oldest card is a bank card I keep because it doesn't charge foreign exchange fees when I travel.

 

[Onomea]

I hear ya John.

I get mildly irritated when I check mine. I have no debt, pay my cards off every month, recently bought a car and a house with cash, and my credit rating is "good," not excellent?

I have auto pay set on my credit cards. I see a graph when I just looked at my credit rating, and I am carrying a bit more monthly (until next auto pay) debt than usual, although under 25% of my credit limit. I bet if I accepted their offers to increase my credit limit for their card, say double it, and my debt (until next auto pay) was under 12.5%, maybe my rating would be "excellent."

But then I think, "Whatta I care what they think about my credit rating!" Insofar as I can tell, unless I want to borrow money from someone — which I do not — it makes no difference to me.

 

[pawngal]

My scores run 825-830, High dollar of available credit, low usage less than 5% at any given time. Each pd in full every month, no loans of any kind, own my home (pd off 10 years ago) My oldest card is JC Penney, over 40 years. My understanding is that the % of usage of available credit is the biggest factor and of course all payments on time.

 

[hsguy]

My scores run 825-830, High dollar of available credit, low usage less than 5% at any given time. Each pd in full every month, no loans of any kind, own my home (pd off 10 years ago) My oldest card is JC Penney, over 40 years. My understanding is that the % of usage of available credit is the biggest factor and of course all payments on time.

Good information, mine was at 834 but I did charge some significant amounts preparing a property for sale but paid it off in full at the end of the billing cycle. It will be interesting to see if it rebounds.

 

[pawngal]

I hear ya John.

I get mildly irritated when I check mine. I have no debt, pay my cards off every month, recently bought a car and a house with cash, and my credit rating is "good," not excellent?

I have auto pay set on my credit cards. I see a graph when I just looked at my credit rating, and I am carrying a bit more monthly (until next auto pay) debt than usual, although under 25% of my credit limit. I bet if I accepted their offers to increase my credit limit for their card, say double it, and my debt (until next auto pay) was under 12.5%, maybe my rating would be "excellent."

But then I think, "Whatta I care what they think about my credit rating!" Insofar as I can tell, unless I want to borrow money from someone — which I do not — it makes no difference to me.

I think it has to be 10% or less to get "Excellent"

 

[Onomea]

I think it has to be 10% or less to get "Excellent"

Thanks. Good to understand how it works. And that's a simple fix.. If one is so inclined!

 

[Bullzaye]

I don't understand how #2 works when you say you pay off your cards every month. You don't run a balance, so how can the proportion be too high? Bad math, IMHO.

Is it possible that the "Too high proportion of balances from bankcards", is referencing the "available balance" of the cards? Meaning, the credit available on the card which has gone unused. Which would just be a fancy way of saying, "Ya ain't chargin' enough stuff on your card(s)."

 

[hemiram]

I worked and worked towards the goal of getting my credit score to the point I could get one of those 0% car loans, which I have never been able to get in the past. I sold my house, which I resisted for a long time, I should have done it as soon as my last dogs passed away. Finally, in 2017, I sold the house, and that saved me a ton of money, not just because of the mortgage being that expensive, it was the taxes, $6000 a year, that were making my life difficult. Along with that, were the repairs the house needed over the years, along with snow removal and grass cutting (I'm handicapped at this point, but I have always been big time allergic to grass and pushing a mower with a haze of pulverized grass coming out of it is not a pleasant way to spend time). The grass and snow removal ended up being about $1500 a year. At the point I sold it, my house was going to need a roof, carpet, paint, and a new dishwasher, it failed the day I decided to get out. All in all, while I didn't clean up, money wise, selling my house to a friend to "flip" was the best move I could make. Soon after I sold it, my credit score began to go up as I paid down credit cards and soon enough, they were all paid off and my score went to 800. It's now about 830 or so. About 6 months ago, I bought a couple of high dollar items and used the "six months same as cash" options via Paypal Credit. My scores dropped almost 25 points instantly, but now, as I'm going to be paying off the remaining balance soon, are back to the 830 range. Over the years, the credit bureaus have made some very strange mistakes. One of the oddest ones was one of them refused to remove a department store account from my report, even though it was my parent's account, and at that time, my mother was the only one who used the card once in a while. I called them and spoke to two people about it. I asked them how could the account be mine, as it was opened in 1964, when I was 8? Why isn't it on my mother's credit? And since my dad died in 1973, why was his name on the card anyway? They sent me a pretty nastly letter, insisting the account was mine and had been since my father died. I just closed the account at that point, as it wasn't work arguing about, but it made me wonder what else they could have wrong?

And wondering what the banks and stores could get wrong is what I wondered yesterday. I woke up and there is an email alert in my inbox from the bank I have my car loan with. "Repossession Notice" is what the title was. At first, I thought it was some clickbait, but the number it had to "Call immediately!" was the legit number. So I call, and sit and sit for a while waiting for a pickup. A woman finally comes on and gets my account up and says, "We haven't received a payment on your loan since June!" "Well, that's not right", I told her. I had my checking account info open and they got, not one payment, but two in June, one in July, two in August, one in Sept, and one in Oct. They cashed the checks, and currently, I am six months ahead, and will make my Jun 2021 payment in a couple of weeks. So how can I be behind? She got all flustered, and puts me on hold. But I can hear her and some guy talking, "We have another one that's messed up!". "(Swearing) Is he angry?", "Not yet, he's just confused". She gives him the account number and he says, "He's almost 6 payments ahead! What is going on?". She transfers me to him and as soon as he comes on, I said, "No, I'm not angry, yet!". He went silent, and I said, "I could hear you and her talking the whole time I was on hold". "Seriously?". So it was all straightened out. When the present bank swallowed up the old one, somehow, if you were ahead, the system would label you as behind, to the point it was repo time, and send an email alert, if you have them set up and a letter. If someone looked up the account, it was accurate but from what he said, a couple of repos had occurred in the last month or so. They sent me an email message explaining all was well and no repo would be happening. I'm still watching my car when I'm at work, and at home, I have my dashcam set to go off with any movement of the car and alert me via wifi, which will call my phone, just in case some repo guy doesn't get the message. Well, if my previous bank can decide my mother had died, I guess there is no limit to how far they can mess things up.

 

[pharmer]

If you owe the bank $1,000, you have a problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, they have a problem and are concerned that you are well and happy. Joe

 

[NYlakesider]

My credit score is adequate as Roles Royce used that term to denote engine horsepower.

All the reporting companies have their own set of standards and no doubt in my mind within reason I can buy just about anything I want, when I want it.

 

[ImprovedModel56Fan]

I don't try to make sense of credit scores. I also don't try to understand why one sanitary napkin is better than another.

Two cases, one reason.

 

[Xfuzz]

They keep score ????

 

[andy52]

It does become difficult after retirement if you don't have many payments to make.
I don't have any car or home payments, I have a couple of credit cards that are 15 plus years old I keep a small balance on.
Last year I needed a new lawn tractor so I went to the John Deere dealer and financed a X-350 that I could have paid cash for just to maintain some sort of credit history.

 

[Ivan the Butcher]

I am 64, not employed, not retired, married owned my truck outright, owned the condo outright, wife on her job 25 years, her car owned outright, too much credit card debt, yada, yada, yada! Score: 710. Got a Personal credit line (wanted $70,000) of 106K used that to buy new truck, pay off cards. Score went to 765 Then Covid shut things down, and the financial world is falling apart, my score 725.

Your score has to do with "Their" willingness to loan you money also! Financial world recovered, score: 765 again. We changed nothing and paid our bills.

I'm not really "Too Big to Fail!" but I will admit that I'm too fat to sink!

Ivan