So, I've gotten so much encouragement reading the other rebuild logs in the forum, I thought I would do one of my own - just to hold myself accountable! I started the journey on May 10, 2014. At that time, my FICO scores were: EX 604, EQ 587, TU 658. Tradelines as follows:
BADDIES:
Cortrust Bank (CO on all 3) - Balance of $645, CRFD expiring Oct 2015 - Dispute verified with EX 5/30/14 - Determining next steps to take (6/2/14)
Tribute (CO on all 3) - Balance of $600, CRFD Oct 2015 - Disputed with CRA due to balance being shown on account paid in collections - DELETED 5/21/14
US Department of Education (Collection account on EX & EQ) - Balance of 8048, CRFD in 2017 - Now paying $200/mo starting 5/14 against this defaulted student loan - this will continue to report 
US Department of Education (Collection account on EQ and TU) - Balance of 0, CRFD in 2017 - Got no clue on this one - think this might be a predecessor to the one above
Aspire (CO on EQ and TU) - Balance of $1039, CRFD Nov 2015 - Disputed with CRA due to balance being shown on account paid in collections - DELETED 5/21/14
Jefferson Capital Systems (CA for Tribute, reporting all 3) - Paid, Closed - Planning to just let this one age off naturally
Midland Credit Management (CA for Aspire, reporting EX and TU) - Paid, Closed - Planning to let this one age off naturally
Active Accounts:
Cap1 Opened 2/2012 (Former Orchard Bank)- Perfect Payment History, 235/300 4/2014 - Recent CLI increase to $400, balance was paid in full in May, and will continue to PIF each month
Cap1 Opened 8/2011 - Perfect payment history, 1069/2000 4/2014 - Paying this one down
First National Bank of Omaha opened 7/2012 - Perfect payment history, 1991/2200 4/2014 - Paying this one down
First National Bank of Omaha opened 7/2012 - Perfect payment history, N/A/2200 (Card reported lost or stolen, closed/Never late)
GECRB/Amazon opened 5/2014 - 0/600 - This will always be a PIF account used for Amazon purchases only
GECRB/WalMart opened 5/2014 - 0/700 - This will always be a PIF account - used for regular grocery shopping
GECRB/Conoco opened 5/2014 - 0/400 - This will always be a PIF account - used for fuel purposes
Comenity/LaneBryant opened 5/2014 - 0/300 - This will always be a PIF account - for the DW
Other Misc Info:
Opened checking and savings accounts with a small, local CU. Will be talking to them about getting a small 1-2000 dollar personal loan. The plan is to put the loan amount into the savings account and let it sit there while we pay off the loan. Once the loan is complete, roll the value over into a CD. Also plan to use my checking account there for paying my self employment taxes quarterly, so I'll be rolling a lot of money thru that account. I'm keeping my existing bank for most things for now, but if the CU treats me right, they could very well end up getting more of our business over the next year - I got a 2K loan from my existing bank 2 years ago to help pay for my wife's hearing aid, and they did not report the loan to the credit bureaus at all.
Current Plans:
1.Wait for Cortrust dispute to complete. Honestly, I'm not 100% sure Cortrust was paid - I know I paid 3 accounts via collections in 2011 just to get my parents off my back (they were calling my parents regularly trying to reach me, even tho I was only staying with them for a few months until I found a house to rent) - but my records are spotty from that time. I'm hoping that they simply won't choose to validate after this long, and let it drop, but if not, I'll probably just let it sit - they obviously have no interest in suing.
2. Might give a single try at Midland and Jefferson for deletion under the FTC ruling. The accounts are long paid, so if it doesn't work, I really have no problems letting them sit until they expire late next year, but if I can get an easy deletion on these, I'll take it!
3. Reduce utilization on my two bigger cards. I ran them up long before realizing how big a factor utilization was in the credit score. Now that I know, I'm paying these bad boys down!
4. Garden everything else at least until the end of this year
Goals:
1. 720+ on all 3 by the end of 2015.
2. Future PC on the larger Cap1 card to some form of rewards card (QS maybe). Smaller Cap1 and FNBO will probably be dropped at some point in the future in favor of other cards (the smaller card has been stingy about CLI upgrades - only $100 in 2+ years, and FNBO won't even offer a CLI without multiple accounts with them, which I'm not going to do).
3. Start home shopping with the DW around that time, and perhaps look into getting an RV (we love to camp, but only have a tent right now).
So some bad news on the dispute front (will post a separate thread asking for advice on this one). Cortrust verified my TL with Experian (and I imagine they will verify with the others as well). Not exactly sure where to go next with this one.
Sent off first payment to my student loans last week, along with a signed copy of my payment agreement. Still need to send in the form to approve automatic withdrawls from my account for those payments.
Need to get a handle on when all my accounts report to the credit bureaus, so I can know approximately what day they report, and pay them prior to that. I'm putting a lot of things I used to put on my bank's debit card onto the new store cards, and 2 of them just posted with balances, which impacted my utilization and dropped one of my scores down a few points, and I now have one score back below a 600. Until I can pay down the two big cards (which I'm trying to do as quick as I can safely handle), I'll never have truly optimal utilization.
I've got my regular bank savings and checking accounts (been with them since early 2009, small town bank, they pretty much know me on sight there), and my new local CU checking and savings accounts (using that for paying my self-employment taxes to IRS). Considering also opening an account with one of the larger CU's (DCU or NASA are my first thoughts, but I'm open to suggestions), and starting up a "Credit Builder" type loan with them. Once that loan is paid off, roll it over into a CD, and maybe start up another - right now, the only installment TL I have is my student loans, which are in default, unable to rehab, won't reflect the payments I'm making on them currently, and won't be paid off for 3-4 years at present - that's going to hurt my scores immensely for quite some time, since it will report as collections every month.
Sorry to resurrect somewhat of a zombie post, but I thought I would provide some updates here! It's been 18 months since I got serious about the rebuild, and a lot has happened. I have not quite met all my goals, but I am well on my way!
First off, the info I was originally given regarding my student loans was incorrect. I was eligible for a second rehabilitation on them! So therefore, I am rehabilitated as of April 2015! One of the 2 US DoE tradelines is now gone from my reports. Still have a single tradeline on EQ and TU showing lates from 2009 to 2012, slated to fall off the report June 2017.
The Cortrust CO fell off last month, as well as Midland and Jefferson collection postings, so I now have one totally clean report (EX) and 2 with only a single baddie!
My active accounts and their status (all increases are from when I started 18 months ago):
CapOne Platinum $1500 (up from $400)
CapOne Quicksilver $5000 (up from $2000, PC'd my Platinum a few months ago)
FNB Omaha $2750 (up from $2200)
Amazon $1800 (up from $600)
WalMart $1500 (up from $700)
Conoco $700 (up from $400)
Lane Bryant $550 (up from $300)
Of course, stupid me could not resist adding to my credit portfolio with my new higher scores:
Prosper 10K Installment loan - We did this as I was substantially behind in my self-employment tax payments, so rather than have a huge debt to the IRS at the end of the year, we got the Prosper loan to get us back on track, and we REFUSE to let it happen again!
Beginning of 2015 financed a new laptop for work from Dell, so we now have a $3500 line of credit with them. This reports as a revolving line of credit.
A couple of weeks ago we found out that our car was leaking coolant. DW often has to drive up to the closest major city for doctor's appointments, so we decided we didn't want to risk her possibly having issues with the car. We ended up financing a 2005 Jeep Grand Cherokee with a credit union at 3.99% APR for 4 years. Our goal is to make more than the monthly payments and have it paid off within 3 years.
Although I am somewhat proud of myself in one aspect - a couple of months ago I applied for a card from our local credit union. While they approved me for a $2100 starting limit, I felt the APR was too high and the rewards structure was not to my liking, so I declined to pursue it further.
I also opened a savings account with Alliant CU. This will be our "rainy day emergency" fund. I will put $100 each and every month into that account and just let it sit there gaining interest. Later, after our debt reduction plan (see below) is completed, I will put more into it, and as it builds, will keep what is equivalent to about 2-3 months of income in that account, moving any excess to somewhere that gives me a little more yield than a regular savings account.
The best news came on the same day we finalized the purchase of the Jeep. DW has been out of the workforce for 6 years due to chronic debilitating migrane headaches that would have prevented her keeping a job. Last year, the doctor finally found a medication that has been a miracle for her - she's had one major migrane over the last 10 months, and finally felt comfortable trying to find a job. Well, she got told she was hired on as a part-time teller at a local bank, and starts on Monday! So that will be some extra income we can apply to our debt reduction plans!
The real problem I have is I have not been able to make any dents in our utilization. In fact, it's worse! Because both of us ended up needing new glasses in a 3 month timespan, we had to stop doing a PIF on the WalMart card. Christmas purchases last year also did the same for our Amazon account. And the new job has made us carry a balance on the Lane Bryant account this month for the first time ever, as DW had to purchase a lot of new clothes to wear in her new job.
So I did not meet one of my goals (720+ by end of 2015). Part of that is my utilization, and part is the one student loan tradeline still there. I expect that by getting utilization down I can approach, and maybe reach the 700 club, but at this point only time can help on the one student loan tradeline. Currently my scores are hovering around the 660-670 mark. I did meet the goal of a PC on the CapOne card to QS. And the wife and I decided together to not start really looking for a home until my reports are completely clean in 2017, and hers are nearly clean.
So, new goals!
1. Clean reports for me (no baddies at all) in July 2017
2. Debt reduction! We are currently working on a modified snowball method. We're not paying small accounts first, we're not paying high interest first. We are factoring both of those into our decision of what to pay next, along with how much utility we can get from paying down that account. Plus, wife and I are putting our extra money toward different accounts (for example, she's paying down Lane Bryant while I pay off Dell - once finished with Lane Bryant, she will pay off the CapOne Platinum (so we can merge it to our QS), while I move on to WalMart as we use that one pretty heavily for groceries (our only grocery store is our Walmart).
3. Start working on DW's file. She's very thin right now - one judgement that we just yesterday sent off a settlement on, which falls off the report beginning of next year, one old collection outside of SOL and falling off the report middle of next year, another collection (medical) that was paid to CA before I started learning about this stuff (boy I wish I'd known how to deal with medical collections when I did that one!) - this one probably will not fall off until 2020. Everything else she has is AU accounts on my cards with perfect payment histories. Once she's stable in her job, we will probably get her some form of credit card in her name.
4. Pay off the new Jeep early ( 3 years goal), and once that's done, trade in my aging truck on something new, taking advantage of my perfectly clean reports.
5. Start looking for property to purchase and build on when the majority of our accounts are paid off, and my report is clean in mid-2017.
Got some news and it's big! Last week, I decided on a whim to dispute the remaining 2 student loan tradelines on my TU and EQ reports - these were my only 2 baddies still remaining on my reports. My student loan had gone thru rehab, and is now current with FedLoan, so for a trial run I did a direct dispute with TU via my creditkarma account, dispute reason being the account was sold to another lender (FedLoan). They removed! So, I did the same thing with EQ, and just got word today that it was also removed! I'm now 100% clean of any baddies on my reports!
All that remains is to keep going with the debt reduction plan, get utilization down, and let my accounts age. I do not feel I need any new credit for another 2-3 years, just need to pay down my balances.
I am so happy right now! This is the first time in like over 20 years my reports are totally clear!
