Raise Your FICO Credit Score
Amy July 10th, 2008
Credit has always been extremely important in the mortgage industry, but with the recent, Risk Based Pricing Changes, it is even more important to get the best rate, let alone qualify, for the mortgage
Here are a few suggestions, to help raise Customer’s FICO scores! The most important credit history is the last 12 months! Here are a few:
- Pay your bills on time. This is the biggest single item. Set up an auto draft from your checking account, pay on line, snail mail on the 1st so it is received by the 15th. If you’ve had problems in the past, work with the creditor to bring your account current.
- Dispute inaccuracies. This is huge, especially with medical collections. Because of all the privacy laws, we can not even tell you the name of the doctor, hospital……… The credit bureaus have 45 days to respond to a dispute. We have also seen lots of Junior issues. Do not name your son the same name as yours! Just kidding, but this creates lots of problems if Dad has horrible credit and it ends up on Junior’s file! If they can not resolve, they will remove the item from your credit report. People do not have 45 days when they have enter into a contract to purchase a home.
- Keep your credit card balances well below the limit. If your limit is $10,000 and you have a balance of $9,000, even if you pay on time, this hurts your credit score. Call your creditor and ask if they can raise your credit limit for you.
- Use credit. But try to pay more than the required balance, or pay off your credit cards monthly if possible.
- Don’t open a lots of accounts at the same time. This will lower the average age of your established credit history and will hurt your score.
- Closing accounts do not increase your credit score. I have actually seen this to hurt a person’s credit. Please close accounts if it from a security issue.
