Hi Everyone,
I've been lurking for a couple of days and thought I'd post about my credit situation.
College ruined me. I left with about $10k in credit card debt, most from non-essential vanity purchases because I had no understanding of how credit worked, nor of its importance. Fast forward ten years, to my present situation.
Last year, I settled three of my four delinquent credit cards (all in collections) and wiped about $5k of my debt away. In 9 days, the last one (AmEx... a bad burn. Went from Green to Platinum to Optima and derog'd on my Optima) will be clear ($4800 of debt, settled to $2000).
I've got three new cards (all from Cap One: one Platinum Classic [$1,500], one QuicksilverOne [$750], and one Spark Classic Business [$2000 - I'm self employed, so it's a legitimate card, not just an attempt to expand my CLs).
My FICO 8 scores are now all in the 620s, which I'm actually incredibly proud of... in October 2013, when I applied for a new car loan (and got it, albeit at a really terrible interest rate), they were all in the 550's. I pay my balances in full every month, and keep my utilization between 3-20%.
I got a myFICO membership the other day, and am browsing these forums for ideas on how to maximize my credit report. My serious delinquents don't fall off until 2015-2018, so I've got some time, and the patience thing isn't a strength of mine but I know it's the main thing I can do. I'm going to try to "garden" my credit, because I've quite a few inquiries (8-12 depending on the bureau) from car loan application and CC applications), and hope to hit 700+ by the end of the year.
Anyway, thanks for all the help (which you didn't know you gave me) and I'm excited about my financial future for the first time in YEARS!
