A crash course in credit scores

Credit scores.

Fortunately or unfortunately, they are the first cut for deciding whether or not you will get a mortgage.

Obviously, your income has to line up with your mortgage payment, but without acceptable credit scores, you won’t get a loan! Most lenders use your middle score. Each of the three credit bureaus has its own scoring system and therefore, you have 3 separate credit scores. Lenders will throw out the highest and lowest and use the middle one. This score really needs to be a 620 at the minimum.

So, how do you know what your credit scores are?

I personally use Credit Sesame and Credit Karma.

These are considered “educational” scores and will not line up exactly with a “mortgage” score, but I have found that they both rise and fall consistently.

For example, if a lender pulls a 580 and your Credit Karma shows a 620, you need a 40-point increase. Most of the time, when your Credit Karma score gets to 660, the lender will also get very close to that same increase.