Anyone have success challenging a debt with CRAs from a closed company?

[Familywantsahouse]

The title says it all. We have a foreclosure from 06. The loan was handled from a VULTURE company called HomeEq Servicing, now out of business. From what I can tell there were lots of lawsuits from them over the same sort of practices they used with us. My husband was working for a subprime broker at the time, his boss got in trouble and he just stopped paying him money he owed and then skipped town. We went 90 days back on the mortgage, then got in a "repayment plan" managed to scrape together and send them 6k (which was double what three months payments actually were) to stop the foreclosure and intitiate the repayment, then they foreclosed on us anyways after taking the 6k. Awesome.

They are now out of business and I'm tempted to dispute this tradeline with the CRAs based on the fact the didn't follow our agreement. At the time we were shellshocked and heartbroken and we should have retained a lawyer, but we were dumb and did not.  How does that work as a dispute? If whomever has taken over cannot produce any validation of the debt will they have to remove it? I imagine this is significantly impacting his score. It's actually 2 tradelines since the loan was an 80/20.

Should I bother with this or let sleeping dogs lie? I know it will age off next year, but we'd like to but a house before then...

[Lois5669]

I'm sure others may have various opinions, but my opinion is this: Let sleeping dogs lie. Let it fall off next year. Just hold out on buying a home until next year if that is possible. Is there a dire need to buy a home before next year?

[casmith1980]

I'm curious to know if this particular debt falls into the new collection laws (anything over $1000 must be paid prior to closing)...

because if it's not, I've been told you can purchase a home via FHA financing as early as 3 years after a foreclosure...(pending other credit requirements)

[RobertEG]

The CRAs perform an administrative dispute process, not a legal proceeding.

The FCRA dispute processes are to address inaccuracies in credit reporting, not conduct an investigation of who is right or wrong in personal contract matter.

When you dispute through a CRA, they forward your dispute to the furnisher of the disputed information, who conducts their own investigation, and reports back the findings to the CRA.  The emphasis is on the word findings.  It can be a simple "yes, we have investigated, and verify the accuracy of the reported information."  They dont forward evdience or documentation to the CRA.  The CRA, unless they have solid reason to question the verification provided from the furnisher, will almost always accept their verification as the basis for their own, final resolution of the dispute.

That is not to say that you cannot dispute the accuracy of the debt itself, as if the debt is not valid, their reporting is inaccurate.  Just dont expect a detailed, documentary investigation and reinvestigation.  You need to get before a court to compel discovery of documentary evidence supporting their finding.