How Many Licks Does It Take?

[Le Jacquelope]

How many of the millions of "non-puffed up" appraisals that are done every get newspaper articles written about them.
(snip)

I only said that it appears that there are far more than just a few bad apples - certainly not that most or all appraisers were fraudulent. I do believe the bad apples out there, had a large impact on the industry.

Two particular corporate CEOs turned the 9/11 disaster into a prolonged bear market and sparked the historic (and dreadful, in some people's opinions) SOX Act.

 

[CorsetLvr]

That's rubbish, actually. My credit score runs between 820 and 840, depending on what company takes it, and I don't run debt--not even a mortgage.

Pilot - just a piece of advice, use it or lose it. The single most important criteria in determing scores is your credit activity in the last two years. If you don't use credit, there is no activity to base the score on. Its a sad fact, but in order to have good credit, you really have to take on some debt. This is easy enough to do really. Carrying small balances on credit cards is enough to maintain credit. I'm assuming that you have some open accounts that you simply don't use. That helps some.

Closed accounts dropped off your report after 7 years. So, your credit history could start to get really thin if you continue to not use credit. You never know when you might need credit in the future and when you do, you may find it more difficult to obtain. I tell people to use inactive cards for small monthly purchases and just pay them down to $10, not pay-off, to help build or maintian credit scores. The interest costs for doing this are minimal even if you have high interest rate accounts. Someone with a score as high as your's should be able to qualify for pretty low rates on revolving accounts.

 

[sr71plt]

Pilot - just a piece of advice, use it or lose it. The single most important criteria in determing scores is your credit activity in the last two years. If you don't use credit, there is no activity to base the score on. Its a sad fact, but in order to have good credit, you really have to take on some debt. This is easy enough to do really. Carrying small balances on credit cards is enough to maintain credit. I'm assuming that you have some open accounts that you simply don't use. That helps some.

Closed accounts dropped off your report after 7 years. So, your credit history could start to get really thin if you continue to not use credit. You never know when you might need credit in the future and when you do, you may find it more difficult to obtain. I tell people to use inactive cards for small monthly purchases and just pay them down to $10, not pay-off, to help build or maintian credit scores. The interest costs for doing this are minimal even if you have high interest rate accounts. Someone with a score as high as your's should be able to qualify for pretty low rates on revolving accounts.

Thanks, I'll watch out for that possibility. Of course, the less you need to use credit, the less concerning a credit score is.

 

[CorsetLvr]

Thanks, I'll watch out for that possibility. Of course, the less you need to use credit, the less concerning a credit score is.

You are exactly right, until something unforseen comes up and you need it. That was basically my point. Of course, with your score as high as it is, you have a long ways to fall before it becomes an issue. If you have absolutely no activity, and no open accounts for seven years, your score can essntially go to zero (unscorable). The primary factors in calculating the score is your activity within the last 2 years. So, if you have a couple of credit cards, for example, just take them out occasionally and make small purchases that you can pay off the next month. That way the bureaus will report the activity.

 

[sr71plt]

You are exactly right, until something unforseen comes up and you need it. That was basically my point. Of course, with your score as high as it is, you have a long ways to fall before it becomes an issue. If you have absolutely no activity, and no open accounts for seven years, your score can essntially go to zero (unscorable). The primary factors in calculating the score is your activity within the last 2 years. So, if you have a couple of credit cards, for example, just take them out occasionally and make small purchases that you can pay off the next month. That way the bureaus will report the activity.

I live in a community of the super wealthy, as in couldn't run up a debt no matter how fast they spend (just in the literary field, the two top literary earners--John Grisham and Jan Karon--are near neighbors). I cannot conceive that, regardless of a credit score or the lack of debt, that the earning reputations and recorded assets of such folks isn't discernible by sellers and lenders to the point that the credit structure is pretty much irrelevant to those doing very well without shouldering debt at all. As I posted already, although not superrich, I carry no debt and have considerable big item assets. I haven't the slightest doubt that I couldn't snap my fingers have someone instantly at my elbow willing to put me into debt to them, if I chose. I'm sure I get just as many Citibank offers of platinum cards as anyone else (and, yes, I purchase through a whole stack of credit cards--I don't go around paying cash for everything; but I pay off the balance every month).

 

[Stella_Omega]

I live in a community of the super wealthy, as in couldn't run up a debt no matter how fast they spend (just in the literary field, the two top literary earners--John Grisham and Jan Karon--are near neighbors). I cannot conceive that, regardless of a credit score or the lack of debt, that the earning reputations and recorded assets of such folks isn't discernible by sellers and lenders to the point that the credit structure is pretty much irrelevant to those doing very well without shouldering debt at all. As I posted already, although not superrich, I carry no debt and have considerable big item assets. I haven't the slightest doubt that I couldn't snap my fingers have someone instantly at my elbow willing to put me into debt to them, if I chose. I'm sure I get just as many Citibank offers of platinum cards as anyone else (and, yes, I purchase through a whole stack of credit cards--I don't go around paying cash for everything; but I pay off the balance every month).

That's been my experience too, (from the outside, never having been that rich) that the truly wealthy have plenty of credit.