I received a response from E-loan today in regard to my questions Short and sweet... The E-loan credit score inquiry is at this time a "one time opportunity". Due to cost and legal concerns it is only being offered once to a customer. This might change later on. My hard inquiry is now a soft inquiry. I expressed an interest in applying for a home loan soon. I was encouraged to do this as E-loan has the ability to accomodate a wide range of credit profiles. To readers of this post: Please verify for yourself whether you risk a hard inquiry or not. This was not discussed in my correspondence. I obviously received an unexpected hard inquiry in April.