[Noisebridge-discuss] Bringing Down the Credit Bureaus

[Sai Emrys]

On Fri, Jan 8, 2010 at 5:12 PM, Brian Molnar <brian.molnar at gmail.com> wrote:
> But this is not "no info". The information here is how long you've had an
> account without any negative reports made against it.

That is a separate datum, though:
a) duration of account without an active negative report
b) result of a specific loan or status of a scheduled payment

You're saying you have a), and I agree, but I'm saying you lack b)
unless you make *all* relevant events (i.e. scheduled payments)
reported regardless of outcome.

Certainly a) is also relevant. But it's not as fine grained as b), and
therefore, I think you will loose accuracy. But I don't know for sure,
which is why this is a pragmatic question. Of course to test, you'd
need to have that data to be able to run a simulation vs not having
it…

This is what I meant when I said you're being sloppy about the data
analysis. Maybe it's good enough, maybe not. *shrug*

> If I've had a home mortgage since 1985 with no missed payments, this makes
> my credit history better than had I not had the mortgage.

And if I know you had a mortgage since 1985 and all I know is that the
lender hasn't told me anything about your payments? Not the same as if
they've told me you made all of them, ne?

> Even though there
> aren't 290 reports with the credit bureaus saying I've made each month's
> payment on time, this still enhances my credit worthiness.

Actually, there are. Haven't you seen your credit report? It's got a
report from every single lender of revolving credit for every single
monthly payment for whatever the history window is.

I don't know re. mortgages specifically since I don't have one, but
certainly this is the case for credit cards.

> This system would be no different in that regard. And moreover, adding a
> mechanism that easily lets them add explicit positive data only enhances the
> value, IMHO.

I agree that adding the ability to give a "more positive than neutral"
report is good. But what is more positive than merely "yeah he paid
like he said he would"?

- Sai