How To Do Just About Everything
By parvenue
Rate: (5 Ratings)
It happens to most Americans. We all start out with a clean fresh credit rating but then we go away to college or buy a house and the credit cycle begins. The next thing we know, we're given ten to twelve credit cards at major department stores, or an emergency comes up and we use the credit card to pay for it, and before you know it, you've fallen behind in payments, creditors are calling and you lose sleep over it. Well now your worries are over as I very simply give you just 7 easy steps to correcting your credit rating and getting you back on the road to restful nights!
1. Get a copy of your credit reports from the top three credit reporting agencies -either by mail or by phone. You can order them online and get them immediately, but if you do this there is usually a fee. You should be able to obtain the first copy of the reports for free.
2. If there is any debt on your report that is over 10 years old (5 if you reside in NY), send a letter asking the agency to remove it from your report. By law the debt is only reportable and collectible from the period of 5/10 years from when the account officially went dead - from the original lender. Very often credit reporting agencies will try to make it look like the debt is more recent, but if you do this it will be removed and is not legally collectible.
3. Remove any duplicates of your debt. Sometimes a debt will be listed more than once on your report. This will hurt you. For example, I had a student loan out from one bank, but then the bank was bought out by another bank. On my report it looked like I had double the debt. I wrote a letter to the agency explaining the situation and they removed the original lender from the report. Having too much outstanding debt will reflect negatively on your report.
4. Call any creditors in the negative field of your report and ask if you can reach a "settlement" amount on the debt you owe. What this basically means is that you will come to terms with an amount you will pay - usually not the full amount and sometimes (depending on the length of the debt period) not even 25% of the original debt. If they agree to an amount, ask them to send you a letter in writing and also ask if they will agree to put, "paid as agreed" on the report. Also have them put that in writing. This will make it look as though you paid on time in the report and most hungry bill collectors will settle for this if you agree to pay them. Do not cower to their bullying tactics, remember, they will make small sacrifices in order to receive payment.
5. Remove duplicate collection agencies. Sometimes when an account will go into collection, it will be sold to more than one agency. Consequently you will have more collection agencies than fleas on a dog in your report. You can have them all removed and go back to the initial lender simply by writing a letter to the credit bureau agency.
6. Dispute any unknown charges. If there are charges on your report that you do not remember seeing, or spending, tell the agency that you don't know where this bill is coming from. By law they will have to investigate the charge.
7. Pay off small balances if you can from recent bills. If you have a bill go into collections and it is small, pay it off. If you have an account that you've had for many years, do not pay it off, just pay the minimum amount. Long standing accounts - that have a positive payment history are stronger on your report than short deliquent ones.
AND FINALLY...if you need an "EMERGENCY BREAK GLASS" out for immediate good credit, or just no credit, what you can do is refute all of the charges on your report. This will give you a very small window of opportunity to get that car loan, or mortgage or whatever...because the charges are immediately taken off your report and the accounts have 30 days to respond. If they do respond, it will re-appear on your report, but if they do not respond within thirty days, the report is removed.
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