Hi everyone,
I am new here, having just got my first 3B report. I had no idea I have a utility account in collections - I was never sent a final bill or called by the company. It was only $42 and surely I would have paid it, but alas, I did not even know it existed. The account was closed around mid 2011, and looks like it was sold to collections in 2013. The statute of limitations is up for my state, so I have never even been contacted by a collections agency, although under the collections section it lists 2012 as the date, so it might stay on my report until 2019, rather than 2018.
Of course now I am trying to get a mortgage, and my Fico 2 score is over 50 points lower than my other two mortgage scores (696 vs 750+ -- luckily it is only reporting to Experian). It is having no impact on my Fico 8 scores, just my mortgage score. Does this matter? It's not my middle score, but I have heard some people say any collection will have a negative impact. I am afraid to settle it for fear of it digging up something that is not hurting my credit in a major way. We were hoping to qualify for the best rate, but if they are going to go off my 696 that obviously won't happen. I also don't think I have enough time to do pay for delete as we will be applying for mortgage this month.
Any advice? And after we go through the mortgage process, would it be wise to try to get this deleted, or just let it fall off in a couple years?
Thank you!
