Desperately need advice . . .

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

Good afternoon!

I am new to the boards and have been reading a lot of the threads; I have noticed that several people on here have scores that have gone up in a very short amount of time. I was wondering if anyone had any advice for me. I have just recently started to clean up my credit and I don't even know where to begin. Unfortunately, I have a lot of work to do. I have several charged off credit cards (a couple recent, but mostly OLD) and quite a few medical bills/misc bills that have gone to collections (again, some recent, some very old). I really don't know where to begin or which items would make the largest impact as far as my credit score goes. Anything you guys could offer would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

If you can pay the collections send a PFD mail to them. Don't pay them until you get them to delete it after you paid. If you're in good standing with your CCs, call them or send them a GW letter so they remove any derogatory information. I recently jumped up 43 pts because of removing a 6 month old 30 day late payment.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

Regretfully, I'm not in good standing with my credit card companies. I was in perfect standing with two of them until October of 2007 (changed jobs & was out of work for a couple of months)and now I have a 90 day late on both of them and they have sent them to collections.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

You can try www.prosper.com and get a P2P loan. Use the loan to pay off the collections. But also ask to have it removed before PIF. It takes times. I've only been on this forum less than a month and I'm learning so much. I've been haggling with all sorts of things, but I never thought I could do it with my credit report. Just remember to be nice when talking to them.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

The last thing I want to do is take out another loan. I'd like to try to do this on my own. I don't owe a ton of money - I would say collectively it's about 8K (3K is one personal loan, the remaining are small balance credit cards and collections) but my credit is a mess.

I guess what I really would like to know is if I should try to pay off the collections or the credit cards first. ?? I have already sent a PFD on a few of the collections (very small balances) and they have agreed to take it off. Now, I'd like to know if I should continue with that or if I should focus on the recent credit cards. There are two and they total about $2,000.00. I am just looking to make a rather quick, decent impact on my credit score. If I can see that I'm making some progress in the first few months, I know I will keep with it.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

Yoou have a two-fold problem here. If you don't pay off the cards, there isa possibility that they will be turned over to collections. If you don't pay off the collections, there is a possibility that they will be resold and add another collection to an already troubled profile. The thing is, which do you think you can pay off. You said you didn't want to borrow a ton of money, but if you can get financing, hopefully from a CU not a CFLender, consolidation of the debt may not be a bad idea. At least a tthis poit you can contact collectors for a PFD agreement with money on the table and possibly talk your card issuers into removing the bad payment history in the same way. The thing is all this takes funds and during the wait the situation could get worse before it gets better.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

I highly doubt I can get financing to pay these off, which is why I wanted to try to do it myself. I am making good money, so I should be able to pay all of this off in a few months. A loan would be nice, but my credit is so sketchy, I doubt it's possible.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

I would pay off the collections first if they agree to PFD. Then I would go for the CCs. Also I would leave money aside for emergencies.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

IndyColts wrote:

I am just looking to make a rather quick, decent impact on my credit score. If I can see that I'm making some progress in the first few months, I know I will keep with it.

The problem is, it doesn't work like that. Your credit didn't get bad overnight, so it's not going to be stellar immediately. Soemtimes it even gets worse before it gets better. Other people's results are usually useless for comparison because we've all got a unique credit history. YMMV.

Maybe if you let us know how much cash you have available to throw at the debts, and how much each debt is, its status (in collections, 30 days late, etc.), interest rate, CL, etc. we can make some suggestions how to tackle it.

Anonymous · ‎01-23-2008

BTW OP, if you have a local credi union, you would besurprised what they are willing to work with. They are edefinitely more lenient than banks.