It has been a year since I got serious about rebuilding my credit so I thought I would check in and give a status update because I owe all of my progress to those of you who post to MyFico.com. Last year at this time I had a Capital One Platinum with a $300 limit and a new car loan I opened in July of 2014 for 12.57%. My scores were in the low to mid 500's and prior to visiting this site I had given up on the idea that I would ever have decent credit again. I allowed my 2009 foreclosure to put me in a state of credit depression and denial so i didnt really care what happened. I woke up when I had to buy a car and had a really tough time getting a loan at any APR. The embaressment and desperation let me to MyFico and by December of 2014 I was begining my journey. First thing was to join MyFIco so I could monitor my scores and activity it has been well worth the monthy fee. I then began working on my collections, I had 7 total over the first few months I was able to get 5 removed and settle the other two so they no longer show as active but show as paid, they will fall off next year, I can't wait. In the course of the past year my scores have jumped about 100 points on average, recently they have retracted a bit because of an app spree. I decided to app spree once my Experian and Transunion scores were over 660, Equifax has never gone over 640 for me yet. Having low credit limits over most of the year has made it tough to keep utilization down even though I PIF or very nearly so due to the timing of reporting (still trying to figure that out). Late last month I was able to add AMEX ED at 6k, NFCU NRewards $9,700, NFCU CLOC 15k, Venture One 3k, and a few others. All together I have grown from $300 in revolving available credit to almost 55k. I expect to be in or very nearly in the 700 club next summer as I will be able to maintain utilization at or less than 5% on my cards and will age my lates and will have those old collections fall off. It will be several years before the lates will fall off, that is the price I have to pay but I am now in the game and in control of my credit (and my wife's, with her help of course) and we are fully committed to our goal of reaching 850 one day. We are a few years away from my wife making big money when she enters her specialty (350-400k a year plus my 120k) and it would be very embarressing to make that kind of cash and have crappy credit.
I just want to thank everyone here in the community for their contributions to my current and future success. Without MyFico I cannot imagine where our credit would be. I will continue to do all I can to share my experiences for the benefits of others to pass it on.
