Question about FICO score

[seriousthistime]

It's been a few years since I had to worry about my FICO. I just applied for a new job out of state. If I'm hired, I'd have to move within the next month. And that is certainly not enough time to sell my house so I'd have to rent it out and then rent a place in the new location. So I'm wondering, when landlords check your credit do they pull a credit report or your FICO or both? I know I can get a free credit report from the government web site (and I think it doesn't count as a "hit") but am pretty sure I have to pay to get my FICO.

And what are employers doing these days regarding credit checks? Is it credit report, FICO, or both?

The thing that makes me wonder about my FICO is that unless there's something inaccurate with my credit report, it should look good. No late payments, bankruptcies, write-offs, collection accounts, etc. Everything paid on time for years and years. But in the past few years I had a couple of credit cards with high credit limits and high balances to match, and as I paid down the balances the credit limit was reduced too. And a couple of other credit cards that had no balances on them were closed due to inactivity, and one of them was my oldest card.

If I have to pay for a FICO, I'd like to pay for just one. Which one is best?

[wodehouse]

There's only one "FICO" score that is available to consumers; the others are "FAKO" scores.

FICO is published by the Fair-Isaccs Company. They make the FICO score available to consumers through myfico.com (there is also a useful forum there as well). Fair-Isaacs publishes different "flavors" of the FICO score for different industries...auto loans, insurance, etc. Only the most general FICO score is available to the consumer.

The credit reporting agencies don't like having to pay fees to Fair-Isaacs and they have also found they can make a lot of money from consumers by publishing their own credit scores, or "FAKOs". But when it comes down to those considering granting you credit, etc, they will almost invariably use Fair-Isaacs FICO scores.

I would assume that there will be some decent correlation between a FAKO and FICO score. ie: Take 100 people and get their FICO and a FAKO and most of them should match up very closely. So if ones credit life isn't too crazy then a FAKO might give a good indication of their FICO. But if one is buying a score then why not just buy the FICO? (No, I do not work for Fair-Isaacs!)

[Deleted]

It's going to depend on the landlord. Big apartment owners will probably subscribe to a service and will insist on pulling their own credit report and charge you for it.

I'm fairly unconventional and will ask people if they have a recent credit report. And if not, I will have them go to www.annualcreditreport.com. All three credit reporting agencies Experian, Trans Union and Equifax reports are available for free 1X per year. But your "score" will cost you about $8.00 per report. FICO (as described above) pulls the data from the three agencies and using their propriatary formula comes up with their own score. You can buy your FICO report and score for about $50.

The scores do differ. I forget which agency uses "Vantage" score but it's quite a bit higher. For example my FICO score is around 820 (highest is 850) but my "Vantage Score" was 900, their highest score.

If I were in your shoes I would go to the free site and and pull each of the reports and pay the $$$ for the scores. What you really want to be doing is checking for accuracy. It won't affect your score and you want to get the ball rolling if there are errors. It can take months to clean those up!

[seriousthistime]

Since I don't need to know exactly what my FICO is at this moment in time, I went to the free credit report web site, got my free credit report and bought my Equifax score for $8. It says the scores fall within a range of 280 to 850 so I think it's not a Vantage score. For now, that's all I'll do since I don't have an immediate need to know. Anyway, it turned out to be 775.

Bonnap, as a landlord, how would you view a 775 from a potential tenant? Where are your rental properties?

And wodehouse, when I refi'd my house they told me what my three credit scores were, and they were all within about 10 points of each other, so for me at least your theory is correct.

[2kids10horses]

775 is excellent. No worries, mate.

Edited to add: Since you are planning to lease your existing home, I would try to find a tenant who wants to buy. Do a lease/option.

[seriousthistime]

Excellent advice, 2kids10horses. I think the neighbors would be reassured, too, because I don't know of any renters in this neighborhood.

[Deleted]

Serious,

I agree that 775 is a very good score. You shouldn't have any problems renting.

4 of the 5 properties are in CA; SF Bay Area, So. Cal Mountains & 2 in San Diego County
1 in the Phoenix metro area.

Think long and hard about doing a lease option. I used to be a big fan but now I'm having second thoughts. The biggest problem I see is that if you have to do an eviction you have crossed the line from being a simple landlord-tenant relationship into a buyer-seller relationship. Make sure you get appropriate legal advice from a real estate attorney who has a track record of creating good lease option agreements.

[Deleted]

I just talked to my mortgage guy cause we're buying a new house. He said that 740 is the magic number..if you're above that, you're good credit. You don't get too many extra points for being above that.