What's your FICO score?

Hey_Porter · #1 05-09-2007, 01:26 PM

I'm curious not only about how the scores vary in OOT, but also how many people don't even know their score.

Mine is currently a 727 or 722 depending on which service. I thought that was pretty good, but I still got "second tiered" for a bar loan, which I thought was surprising. Not long ago my score was in the mid 600s, but I seriously eliminated some debt, closed some relatively young accounts with small credit limits, and incurred some "new" forms of debt. I guess that helped. Also, I'm not sure what the time frame is for "forgiving" these type of things, but one of the reasons my score was low is because I had a "more than 30 days late" alert on one of my cards (totally stupid; closing the bank account your credit card direct pays from + not paying attention to paper statements = bad credit). My reports say that my score is being kept down for minimal credit history (when does that stop being an issue? I've had a credit card for 6 years), and lack of premium credit cards. Anyone know what the hell that means?

guids · #2 05-09-2007, 01:28 PM

670 something

I was stupid when I was 18, and am still recovering from it, even though I have no debt other than a car and student loans.

ChipWrecked · #3 05-09-2007, 01:29 PM

709

I got a couple late pays from three years ago. I wouldn't recommend letting that happen.

DING-DONG YO · #4 05-09-2007, 01:30 PM

[ QUOTE ]
670 something

I was stupid when I was 18, and am still recovering from it, even though I have no debt other than a car and student loans.

[/ QUOTE ]

Keep at it, they get better fast. A good litmus is, if you keep getting better credit card offers in the mail (lower teaser rates for longer periods, no annual or start-up fee, etc.), then your credit is improving.

I was at 800 at one point. Prob 700-740 now.

MicroBob · #5 05-09-2007, 01:34 PM

After about my zillionth late-payment I'm embarassed to even post my score on here.
I suck.

kyleb · #6 05-09-2007, 01:35 PM

Mine is like 500 or something ridiculous

MicroBob · #7 05-09-2007, 01:38 PM

okay, I don't feel so bad now.

DING-DONG YO · #8 05-09-2007, 01:45 PM

lol, [censored] up thing is I'm sure I'm in more debt than any of you and my score is great.

Some tips:

1 - NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER make late payments. This is the worst thing you can do to your FICO score. Pay the minimum every month.

2 - Don't cancel old cards. If you only had 1 card from the time you were 18-22, then open another one and cancel the old one, your credit history looks shorter.

3 - Don't cancel old cards. A piece of the FICO model is your debt:available credit ratio. If you cancel cards with a zero balance, then your available credit (denominator) is smaller which makes this ratio look higher which makes you look like more of a credit risk.

Go to fairissac.com for some more tips. Fair Issac is the company that developed the FICO model.

Brag (yea yea, * me): I have over 150K in available revolving credit.

Mother Mucker · #9 05-09-2007, 01:54 PM

When I got my car a couple of years back, I was a 743.....not sure now though. I haven't had any late payments and nothing too much has changed with my debt so my number shouldn't be too different.

Hey_Porter · #10 05-09-2007, 01:56 PM

From what I understand, debt:available credit ratio is pretty big. That's why I'm loving MBNA/Bank of America right now. It was my second card, and for not having much credit they gave me an awesome deal (no fees, 0% balance transfers, 0% interest on all purchases for however long, etc., and an eventual APR of 9%). Long story short, they tried to pull a rate change on me to a variable rate and I declined, and haven't used the card in two years. Nevertheless, every now and then I'll glance at my statement and find that they've raised my credit limit again. It's several, several thousand over what it is was when I quit using it.