Next Step

**mzsweet** · October 28th, 2007, 08:17 PM

my scores priior to reading any forums early this month were:

10/4/07 now they are as of 10/27/07
Equifax 579 Equifax 579
Experian 596 Experian 626
Trans 592 Trans 638

I opened some credit accounts because I had none at all except collection accounts. I opened the following:

macys $100
orchard (secured) $200
first premier
midsouth cu (secured) $400
crown jewelers $1500 ..not reporting yet

just got approved for 99/$500 card

now its time for me to clean up these collections. i have them with asset acceptance, nco fin/99, national credit systems,iei financial, just to name them. if you had any luck with these companies please let me know. any successful pfd letters you have used would be greatly appreciated.

i have a question to ask concerning paying or not paying the original creditor. some people say to pay them others say no. my last move was a corp. move and i didnt have a forwarding address to give utilites, phone, and cable. of course i got right into works week later and didnt follow through on previous obiligations. now they all are on my credit reort. should i pay them directly or pay the collections. some post..not here say to pay them directly then dispute it as paid through the credit bereau. is it better to do a pfd here?

i also have a charge off from previous credit union 2003. i had 4 loans with them 2 paid in full on time. the last 2 fell behind when i lost my job in 2003. i continued to pay my car loan ($15722) but it was past due 120. the personal loan i never paid off $2000 original amount they charged off at $2636. will this hurt when i try to get a car loan?

any help will be greatly appreciated,

Tarisa

**Meya** · October 29th, 2007, 12:52 PM

Hi mzsweet. First off let me tell you that I acknowledge your location, I have family there and Sandersville GA. Never thought I would see anyone here with your location.

Well, I can say that if you choose to pay your past creditors, go for the settlement not the actual balance. Through honesty, it is always good to pay a debt, but I let mines drop off over the course of years. Your utilities will have to one day get paid because that is something that you are going to deal with as long as you have a roof over your head. I will let you make your own judgement with paying past creditors, but if some are too old, do what I did (shhhh don't tell anyone)

First off get all three of your credit reports, sit down and see if you have any items that are not yours or are reporting inaccuratley. FG has given you a resource link in the "Resources Tab" over to your left, where you can pull all three of your credit reports for free. Then get with a credit monitoring service where you can access your report on a monthly or daily basis. I use "my credit keeper" and "true credit" (.com), take a look at those if you currently do not have one.

As far as a car goes, girlfriend they will give a dog a car if he goes in there and bark.....lol. Your only problem is going to be the interest rate and down payment. They are going to be on the steep side. Car dealers are snatching people off the streets just to stay in competition and they have so many types of loans for individuals in your situation. I think they call those "stips" or "special financing". I have been in the same situation with the car payment thing. I was hospitalized and was strugling to keep my car payments together, I even lapsed on my insurance being sneaky and trying to save money but my lienholder found out and went sneaky with me by tagging $308 to my car note every month without informing me for nearly 6 months. That is how I ended up paying $31k for a $28k (including finance charges) car.

Just keep paying on the current cards you got, you are on the right track. If you are looking for other cards to apply for, we have a forum titled "Nice cards to apply for" you could get some good info there.

Hope this helps!

**Paula** · October 30th, 2007, 11:21 AM

mzsweet,

I guess it just depends on the creditor who you’re dealing with. I know from personal experience that when I tried to payoff a charge-off account three years ago with QVC for $1200.00 they refused to accept payment and referred me to the collection agency who they sold the account to. I called that collection agency who told me that they sold it to another collection agency. Since this is the only bad thing that I really have against me listed on my credit report and it’s been four years now and I don’t seem to have a significant problem with obtaining credit, I’m just going to wait the seven years and then contact all three credit reporting agencies to have it removed.

**Meya** · October 30th, 2007, 04:52 PM

Originally Posted by 100045

mzsweet,

I guess it just depends on the creditor who you’re dealing with. I know from personal experience that when I tried to payoff a charge-off account three years ago with QVC for $1200.00 they refused to accept payment and referred me to the collection agency who they sold the account to. I called that collection agency who told me that they sold it to another collection agency. Since this is the only bad thing that I really have against me listed on my credit report and it’s been four years now and I don’t seem to have a significant problem with obtaining credit, I’m just going to wait the seven years and then contact all three credit reporting agencies to have it removed.

Well Paula, look at the bright side, it is not like you did not try to pay it. That is the same thing I am doing with my 2 medicals and last judgement, I am letting them roll off by themselves. EQ has already deleted my judgement, I am now waiting for TU and EX to release them, and the deadline is 1/17/08. The two medicals will leave sometime around Aug 08.

**NewCred28** · November 2nd, 2007, 01:05 PM

Hi Everyone,
I have a few questions- I am 28 with no credit, I just opened a mastercard with First Bank of Delaware(70cl). I have 6 collections for med bills which total a little over $2,000. I was thinking of opening 2 secured accounts w/ limits of a total of $2500.00. Does anyone know how that would effect my score? I currently don't have a FICO score. P.S.-I really enjoy this sight been viewing 4 about 3 months, really insightful. Oh yeah the med bill collections will fall off in 2010- 2011.

**BRH3** · November 2nd, 2007, 09:13 PM

The new secured accounts will help you as long as you keep the balances low. The collections will continue to kill your score and that is alot of time before it rolls off. Try writing a PFD letter on the collections. Some people have had some luck getting them removed. This would boost your scores alot.

**sophie** · March 5th, 2008, 01:11 PM

I would not base the way you try to increase your credit score solely on what people advise in this forum. Although it seems like the advise is great you may want to seek professional advsie.

**Meya** · March 5th, 2008, 06:48 PM

I would not base the way you try to increase your credit score solely on what people advise in this forum

Can you share some better advice with us Sophie? We will love to hear it.

**LLAY1** · April 3rd, 2008, 08:25 PM

Within 6 months

Exp was 595 now 660
Equifax 605 now 659
Trans U 610 now 670

Here's how I'm doing it.

Dispute! Dispute! and then Dispute some more. Try paying it off, then disputing the charges (I think this is harder to verify plus you've paid anyway). Also, now is a good time to dispute because of this credit crunch and recession, some collection agencies are out of business or in distress. companies are disposing of their portfolios. I must've disputed about $4000 worth of debt...takes a while but they tend to come off eventually.

Now the only neg on my CR is one collection that refused to go away!!! but it drops off this Oct

Another neg is no revolving credit...i've recently opened a bunch of accounts...once these start to show on my CR's i should be ok

I'm on my way to the 700's...should be there by the end of the year.

**Finance Globe** · April 4th, 2008, 12:30 AM

Hi Llay1, are you talking about disputing derog misreported items, or all of them? As a strong statement, nobody is here to win without a fair fight.

**Meya** · April 4th, 2008, 01:17 AM

Once cards goes into dispute, your credit rating will go up. Did you win them all, if not, when they come back as identifying the truth, the scores will fall back down. Don't get me wtong, I am happy for you and wish that many more wil fall off. Depending on what state you are in, the cb's wil take them off, but there in California, you can hang up your coat-tail.

**LLAY1** · April 4th, 2008, 04:42 AM

Dispute them all accurate and inaccurate. Your score does tend to jump slightly soon as u dispute but you must wait till you get a notice of investigation is complete. In my case i can still see the derogs during the investigation but equifax may hide the companies name or something, experian doesn't do anything until investigation is complete. I got them all but 1. that one always gets verified as accurate. It takes a while but it has worked for me.

This is what credit clinics do

**Meya** · April 4th, 2008, 09:49 AM

This is what credit clinics do

I am so happy that you mentioned this, I started a thread named "FG Guide on How to Repair Your Credit" and it simply explains to us how we can do things by ourselves instead of paying these rip off companies to do so. I am happy to hear someone clearing their own credit report, your posting will be of great value to those who are still out there thinking that they need to depend on credit clinics. Like they sayings goes.....Just becasue you are sick it does not mean that you need to see a doctor.

Here is the link to the thread I was tell you about:
http://www.financeglobe.com/SocialNe...op_id= 100313