@Anonymous wrote:I’ve been reading these boards for about 3 weeks now, and it’s amazing how much it’s quite literally changed my life in such a short period of time. Just the overall feeling of support on a topic that’s usually wrought with disdain and embarrassment has been so incredibly uplifting. I also never realized how shockingly little I understood about credit and FICO scores.
After about 10 years of completely thrashing my credit, most of it due to my own recklessness, I’ve spent the last 5 trying to fix everything. I have several open lines of credit that I’ve been paying on time, and my scores have been gaining ground over the last 6 months (663 TU, 640 EQ, 647 EX - FAKO). Of course looking over the reports has led to a ton of other questions and curiosities over what I can do next which I’m hoping people here can help me with.
If any of these should be broken into separate threads, please let me know.
1) My utilization is being reported at about 60-65%, but is actually under 20% right now. Realistically, how much of a bump could I expect if I got it to 0-5%?
Do you maybe have something mis-reporting as revolving? Or a closed account that you were paying on? You could see a decent bump (probably in the vicinity of 20 points) going from 20 - 5%. Also, if you recently paid that down, your creditors probably report about once a month, so expect a lag.
2) What’s the easiest way to find the DoFD? I’m all but certain that at least a couple of things on my report should have long since dropped off, but all I can find are Last Activity dates which are a lot more current since I paid everything I owed.
You're going to find DoFD on TU's report, I believe, and an expected date of drop off on EX and EQ. I could be remembering wrong which is which. To get the reports that include this info, you should go to annualcreditreport.com and get your free annual reports from each of the CRAs. If you've already pulled your yearly free reports, you can purchase them from their sites, as well. Remember to .pdf or print them out to make sure you have them handy - they're the most complete reports you can get.
3) Along the same lines, I opened a Sears card in college that I know they closed the line of credit well more than 7 years ago. Wouldn’t this indicate that the DoFD was more than 7 years ago and should have dropped off? Would the fact that I just finally completed paying it off keep it on?
Negative information will drop off about 7 years from the date of first delinquency. The account itself will turn positive once all of the negative information drops off and will continue to help you for 10 years after it was closed, as a general rule.
4) Did I **bleep** myself by paying everything off and losing the leverage of a PFD?
No. You avoided being sued and probably getting new "updated" negative reporting on your reports. You should start a GW campaign now.
5) Aside from Sears, the most recent activity from a negative item on my credit report is from Capital One, which has 120+ day late from ’07. In the last year I’ve opened up 2 new cards with Cap1. I’ve read that they’re notoriously difficult to work with respect to GW letters, but is it possible that the fact that I have 2 current accounts with them PIF could help with this?
Sure, Capital One is hard to deal with. People sometimes have success with them. Hang in there, either the negative info will drop off in 2014 OR you'll succeed at GW efforts before then. Just send them a GW letter about once a month - maybe vary to whom you address them. Maybe call them once in a while to ask for mercy.
I have a bunch of other questions, but I’ll start with these for now. I appreciate any help and/or insight that could be offered.
Starting Score: EQ 583 TU04 619 EX 592 (lender pull) 2010
Yeah, I couldn't remember which one was the odd report out.
@Anonymous wrote:Thanks so much for the info. I truly appreciate it. I think I'll call both Sears/Citi and Capital One tonight while clutching a rabbit's foot, and then start sending letters out tomorrow. That in mind, If I'm able to have the negative items removed, I wouldn't have anything negative in the last 5-6 years. Am I correct in assuming that the older something is, the less weight it has on a report?
And the one other thing I should have mentioned. I got a car loan in August, and on 2 of the reports it's showing 8 separate inquiries from when I was rate shopping. My understanding is that in an instance like that, it's only supposed to show as 1 inquiry. Is there an easy remedy for that? Is it just opening a dispute with the bureaus?
Yes that's true I know with CA's,they hurt less and less as time goes on.
A recent CA can hurt as much as 80-100pts and IME when my last CA dropped from my CR's, I saw no score change.
Now if you are comparing one baddie to another, that is a different story.Some baddies hurts more then others.
Like a 90late reporting in Jan2011 will hurt more, then a recent 30day late reporting this mo march2011.
With that being said, I would suggest sending the GW letters to the baddies that was hurting your CS the most,then work on the others hurting less.
Info on inquiries, they report for 2years but only hurt your CS for 1 year.
Congrats to YOU, for paying down your CC's to 20%, I bet that is a wonderful feeling.
Now if you want to feel even better and sleep better at night,start an emergency fund. In case if your income decreases,you'll have money to pull from the emergency fund, until your income increases again.By doing that, you will avoid the lates and CA's showing up on your CR's,because they never happened..Also you will be saving money by not having to pay the extra fees associated with late pymts and the CA's.IMO, having an emergency fund is the best thing I ever done.
Oh and BTW, Welcome to the forums, and I must say your nicely spaced post was very easy to read and understand.
So for lurkers out there wanting to post....it's post like these tend to get more replies.Good Work, lippakid. Glad to see you joined our family, here at myFICO.
