Do we understand how mortgage scores deal with higher limit cards?

Justaguy wrote: ↑Thu Jul 21, 2022 10:12 am Test result: Before today, my lowest limit on a card with a balance was $34,000 and I was getting the all-zero penalty on EX2. Today, my card with a limit of $29,900 reported a balance, and… THE ALL-ZERO PENALTY DISAPPEARED! In earlier testing, I got the all-zero penalty when my LLCwB was $30,000. (Happily, that was exactly the same card that has a $29,900 limit today, so there is no risk of this result being an artifact of FICO treating different types of cards differently.) So there it is. The credit limit at which EX2 starts disregarding cards, for purposes of the all-zero penalty is $30k. The card one uses for AZEO should have a limit below that. TU4 and EX5 are believed to function the same way, but their cutoffs are higher. I have tested $40k and that counts as a card in those scores. I will now turn to searching for their cutoffs.

This information must be heavily publicized! Because of your discovery you will go down in history!

Thanks for the kind words. I’m tempted to post about it over at MF, but I’m also mindful of the fact that it’s just one DP from just one person and just one scorecard. It would be a much stronger finding if we could get others to confirm it. Does anyone here have the ability to do a test with a LLCwB of $30k or slightly under $30k? Bonus points if you’re on a mortgage scorecard other than Clean, Mature, Thick, With new Accounts.

Justaguy wrote: ↑Thu Jul 21, 2022 10:12 am So there it is. The credit limit at which EX2 starts disregarding cards, for purposes of the all-zero penalty is $30k. The card one uses for AZEO should have a limit below that. TU4 and EX5 are believed to function the same way, but their cutoffs are higher. I have tested $40k and that counts as a card in those scores. I will now turn to searching for their cutoffs.

I just updated our sitemap.xml file with the URL to your post. This is the file that all search engines look for in the root directory of any website. They'll pick it up and index it over the next few weeks, and then it will start showing up more prominently in Google/Bing searches. Also, hovering over LLCwB in a post (touch hold a few secs on mobile) will show your $30K data point along with credit to you for the find. Really cutting edge information, @Justaguy !

I’m guessing the effect on traffic will be negligible because a significant portion of the people who care about this obscure detail are already members here. Regardless, your technical skill is impressive!

Justaguy wrote: ↑Thu Jul 21, 2022 10:12 am Test result: Before today, my lowest limit on a card with a balance was $34,000 and I was getting the all-zero penalty on EX2. Today, my card with a limit of $29,900 reported a balance, and… THE ALL-ZERO PENALTY DISAPPEARED! In earlier testing, I got the all-zero penalty when my LLCwB was $30,000. (Happily, that was exactly the same card that has a $29,900 limit today, so there is no risk of this result being an artifact of FICO treating different types of cards differently.) So there it is. The credit limit at which EX2 starts disregarding cards, for purposes of the all-zero penalty is $30k. The card one uses for AZEO should have a limit below that. TU4 and EX5 are believed to function the same way, but their cutoffs are higher. I have tested $40k and that counts as a card in those scores. I will now turn to searching for their cutoffs.

@Justaguy congratulations! this is awesome! You did it! this is absolutely wonderful, I’m glad you have found it! Great job! Sorry I haven’t been around in a while, life has really been hectic and dealing with health issues, but I’m gonna try to get caught up as soon as I can, at least I’m making some progress getting things done now, so there is light at the end of the tunnel. I hope to be back full-time in the near future! Great job you did wonderfully! So we know the 2004 model is under 40 what do we know it’s above? by the way, remember version four and five was patched. I wonder if version three’s cut off is the old one or the same as the rest of the 2004 versions? Again great job!!! Sorry for my late response.

Justaguy wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 1:34 am I’m guessing the effect on traffic will be negligible because a significant portion of the people who care about this obscure detail are already members here. Regardless, your technical skill is impressive!

@Justaguy You made the finding, so it’s up to you, but I wouldn’t post it elsewhere. Let them come here to get the knowledge. We need to be opening fully soon anyway. We need to be known as THE source of accurate information; thousands of places have false information, so publicizing it, actually dilutes it. People know what they get from us or here is accurate. Not so elsewhere. We have more accurate organized and detailed information than anywhere in my opinion, I think most would agree? have to update the Primer and put a link to this thread giving you credit! Congratulations again very well done!! The Primer said ~$31,000, so it was off by $1000. Should’ve guessed it would’ve been a even number. I wonder if 35 is the number for the others? Or has that been tried? That’s what’s listed, but I think you said it was above that right? if so it may be $40,000. Might have to try $39,900?

I could test TU4 with $35k or $50k, but I don't have anything in between currently.

Hi @Birdman! Great to see you posting. I hope your health issues are resolving. I haven’t made a thread about this elsewhere, but I did share the finding in response to an on-point question on MF. Honestly, the quantity and quality of scoring analysis and testing over there has dropped off so much that very few currently active members there would even notice or care about this issue. I might have worded it poorly, but according to my testing, TU4 and EQ5 treat $40k as a card. So if they have a cutoff, it’s higher than that. How high? It’s anyone’s guess. A DP at $50k would be a good place to start the search, if you’re willing, @BrutalBodyShots. I’ll look back at my EX3 to see if I can learn anything about that one.

Upon further review…

My DP that I’ve been citing as evidence that TU4 and EQ5 treat $40k as a card has a weakness. My Amex charge card also had a balance reporting then. That card’s highest balance ever was $38.9k (a humbling reminder of my past foolishness).

Some people may feel certain that FICO 04 treated charges cards as non-revolvers for all purposes, but I do not share that certainty. So in my mind the $40k number is still in doubt. Some of my posts on the topic overlooked this detail, and therefore overstated my confidence re $40k. That was a mistake and I apologize.

It will take me a few months to line things up for more testing. I will report back when I do so.

I can’t find any instance in my records where EX3 acted any differently from TU4 or EQ5 with respect to the All Zero penalty. But that’s not a very meaningful statement, because I have never incurred the All Zero penalty on any of those three scores.

Justaguy wrote: ↑Sun Aug 14, 2022 11:56 am I can’t find any instance in my records where EX3 acted any differently from TU4 or EQ5 with respect to the All Zero penalty. But that’s not a very meaningful statement, because I have never incurred the All Zero penalty on any of those three scores.

The patch was regarding HELOCs and removed HELOCS from Revolving Utilization in 4 and 5, but apparently 3 was not patched. So I know of that difference and that may be the only major difference, but I just figured it would be good to reference that and ensure whether that was the same as well. Maybe the patch was because lower limit HELOCS were interfering with revolving utilization? But yes, the cutoff is still there on 4 and 5. Open-ended cards count towards AWB, but not towards revolving utilization, but utilization doesn’t trigger the AZ loss, balances do. There’s a discrepancy with how mix and utilization treat open-ended cards, IIRC, so they’re not treated the same for all purposes. You are correct. I don’t think a charge card will stop the AZ loss, if I remember correctly. I need to go refresh my recollection. Is that open-ended reporting correctly as open ended? @Justaguy and thank you very much, I appreciate your well wishes, at least I have discovered the problems and I’m in the process of getting everything treated, so I’m looking forward to being much more active very soon, and to think these problems have just been getting worse for years and I wasn’t even aware. And it’s great to be back I was looking forward to this thread in particular because I knew you would have discovered it! Great job and congratulations again!

@BrutalBodyShots are you going to test 50?

Birdman wrote: ↑Fri Sep 09, 2022 8:15 pm @BrutalBodyShots are you going to test 50?

I can't until Citi resolves my reporting issue. I can't zero out that card if they can't figure out how to update my TU report. Ridiculous.

Darn. You can get a one off update when you complain though right?

$40,000 gave me an 11 point AZ penalty on EX2! @Justaguy I just realized I have to look at 3/4/5. Smh. OK I think I can still do that. I just have to see when they update. what’s the latest boundary we have?

Birdman wrote: ↑Mon Feb 13, 2023 10:17 pm $40,000 gave me an 11 point AZ penalty on EX2! @Justaguy I just realized I have to look at 3/4/5. Smh. OK I think I can still do that. I just have to see when they update. what’s the latest boundary we have?

I forget where the last "safe" point was checked. Was it $36,000?