All Forum Posts by: Alina Nicol

We advise brokers to have their clients pull credit from one of 2 reliable credit reporting websites. An experienced loan officer can look over a report and see trouble before they waste money pulling that clients report. Broker reports are not as detailed. True the disclaimers on most of these sites do state they use their own scoring modules however these 2 sites are pretty accurate and excellent reports. Comming fro someone who views hundreds of different reports on a daily basis, I recomend these top two sites.
Costco.com - if your client is a costco member they can download a report for about $7.00

Truecredit.com -true they make you sign up for a monthly service but you just have to cancell a couple days after you sign up. It costs $14.00

Bottom line? These sites do not leave a hard inquiry on your clients credit report. Yo will not be out another $10-$15 for pulling someones credit and finding out the clients supposedly "good Credit" is actually a 530 middle score. The biggest point? If your client can not afford it, they should NOT be trying to buy a home.

:lol:

Do NOT close any account. Obviously the cards are not new because you would have just opened it in the last year. Just make sure you use the card every now and than because a card will become inactive if you do not use it for two years.

For the love of God don't listen to the above advice. We are only rated on what is open and active so telling you closing the newest accounts will only affect your score for 6 months without reviewing the other accounts you have open is terrible advice. You need Good Accounts to have Good scores and yes the newest ones help the least but you can't determine that by the little information you provided. Taz... I realize you used to write dispute letters for people but you are repeatedly giving people bad advice. Why don't you stick to giving advice wihtin the scope of your current job title. It's not fair to people trying to get good advice. You really are wrong on credit more often than you are right.

If you can affoprd to buy clothes than yes get department store cards. If you decide you need to buy something use the card and pay it off right away. Keep your balance under 50% of the limit at all times, below 35% is even better. All REV accounts will help you if you follow those simple rules.. just remember that while the account is new it WILL neggativly affect your credit for the first year.

We are only rated on what is open and active, so if you close your account, it will LOWER your scores. Keep it open the rest of your life if yo can.

This information is flat out incorrect. I can't even believe how far off base you are. Stop giving advice out of the scope of your profession, you may end up misinforming someone at their expense. 75% of credit reports have errors on them and there is NO law that states a subscriber must provide proof of them item they are reporting so your claims that all items are accurate are ridiculous. Taz... you don't know what you are talking about. You sound like an educated man but I think your relying too heavily on a source of information that is just incorrect.

Being a lender shareholder, in no way qualifies you as an expert in credit. I was an underwritter with several lenders as well as an account manager and AE, that alone doesnt qualify me either. Every LO thinks that just because they can read credit scores that they know about credit and its just not true.
I am not arguing that a consumer will never see the same scores as a finiacial institution or the like pulling their credit. It states on most sites in the disclaimer that these consumer websites use their own scoring modules based on the public information provided by the bureasu to generate their own credit scores.

Exactly... thats what I was saying... FICO 08 isnt implemented yet. The webite for the board of credit edcation is down or I'm ptting it in wrong. Be patient and I'll post that information. Still not sure where you are getting your from though. Tell me... what is your job title that makes you qualified to give advice on credit.

Actually in a perfect credit world the magic number of REVOLVING accouts is 5 SEASONED Revolving accounts. Seasoned meaning not new.

Fact..... in order for a debt consolidation company to settle your debts, you will be advised to stop paying all your payments and they will allow them to go into default status of 120 day or more. Your credit will tank and all your accounts included in the consolidation will be closed by the creditor. Since we are only rated on what is open and active your scores will drop even further because you will have no open credit.

First off, no offense Taz but the advice you keep handing out is as usual not based on fact rather than opinion. The fact is that once a debt is handed over to a collection company the original creditor WILL NOT deal with you. You will have to deal with the collection company reporting it. It is my professional opinion that if you cannot afford your debts and are at risk of going into default you do not consult a debt consolidation company rather get in touch with a bankruptcy attorney. They will advise you and the best course of action and trust me your outcome after a year (credit wise) will be much better than dealing with a debt settlement company. Don't take Taz's word for it, don't even take my word for it.. look up the information or call a BK attorney. Don't ever take legal advice from someone on a blog who is offering advice out of the scope of their profession, not only is it a bad idea but it's also illegal.

Taz.... you are completley inccorect. FICO 08 has not even been implemented yet and my cstomers authorized user accounts are still showing up on credit reports. I recently had my husband add me to 3 of his cards and as of last week they not only reported by my scores are higher. Tell me something..... everyone think carefully and tell e why it would make sence for all three credir bureaus to se the same scoring module? (FICO08) wouldn't they all be pretty much reporting the same score? Wouldnt that negate the need to have 3 credit bureaus? So why would they purposely put themselves out of business... why would banks want to pay to see three scores when they are all the same? Everything Taz has said here is hearsay not fact. (except the fact that using a secondary number is illegal.... because it is) Unfortunatley there are many credit myths out their that are very inccorect. Trust me when I say that when these changes are implemeted we will be amoung the first to know. We are all board certified by the NATIONAL BOARD OF CREDIT EDUCATION (NBCE) This means we were trained and certified to know everything there is to know about credit. We are not some fly by night useless "Credit Repair" company shooting off dispute letters and calling it credit repair.