After reading and reading, I thought I had it straight, but maybe not so much.

[Anonymous]

Based on the info you've provided, Verizon should fall off (be excluded) this month. Furthermore, if the main difference between your EX and your other reports is the Verizon collection, you should soon be in great shape for the refinance.

Don't sweat the old, minor sporadic lates. Goodwilling (GW) them away won't help your scores much unless you can get all of them removed. Easier to just let them fall off. Waiting it out is difficult, but on the bright side, as those Lates age off, those tradelines will eventually become positive again.

As for refinancing, it may not be worthwhile after factoring in points, closing costs, etc unless your current rate is somewhat high, such as over 5%. Alternatively, simply making larger payments and/or paying more frequently can greatly reduce the cost of an existing mortgage. There are various mortgage payment calculators out on the net, which may be helpful in running the numbers to determine the best path to take.

[Anonymous]

---

@RobertEG wrote:

Few consumers have ever heard of the term DOFD, and fewer yet understand its definition.

They consider, and most likely rightfully so, that it would confuse more than help, so they elect to provide an approximate date of expected removal, which is kinda self explanatory, if not a bit vague.

---

Nope. If that was the case then the estimated removal date would show on the third party monitoring sites, but it does not. IMHO, the absence of that piece of data is simply a way to manipulate more people into purchasing reports directly from the CRA's.

[Anonymous]

I would not wait to allow the item to fall off. I was in a similar situation last year with a $200 bill from Sprint where they said I owed money on an account that I went into the store to close when they were still NEXTEL. A few moves later and a college degree and I find out that I have a deragtory mark from them when applying for something else.  I will be honest I waited for it to age off and that day came and went. Ultimately what got the derog off of my report was by hiring a credit repair agency and they worked on my behalf to get this done. Now I am also told that you can write directly to the credit agency, TU, EX, or EQ. and work with them directly.  I strive to never be in this situation in the future but now I know that waiting it out was not the best choice. That's just my 2 cents!