Need help/suggestions to remove black marks on my credit

[Anonymous]

I have been thinking of improving my credit, but I always see a wall in front of me and nowhere to turn. Hope you guys can help, so here goes...

While a student (until 2005), I had 2 credit cards, and a phone line. Between 2005 & 2007, I was really hard up, and could not pay these off. Now, they are all black marks on my credit history, which don't seem to be going away.

I pulled my Experian Report, and the following are listed as Potentially Negative information.

1. CAVALRY PORTFOLIO SERVICE Status: Collection account. $79 past due as of Jul 2011. Status Details: This account is scheduled to continue on record until Sep 2011. Recent Balance: $79 as of 07/2011

My first foolish action was that I went ahead and paid sprint instead of cavalry. I did not keep a record of the statement. Cavalry just seems to keep hitting my credit history again and again

1. CHARTWAY FEDERAL CU Status: Account charged off. $(2500) written off. Status Details: This account is scheduled to continue on record until Jul 2014. Recent Balance: $0 as of 03/2009

this is 1 account which I paid only in bits and pieces. I believe this was converted into a loan account that is listed below.

1. CHARTWAY FEDERAL CU Status: Account charged off. $(2500) written off. Status Details: This account is scheduled to continue on record until Mar 2014. Recent Balance: $2,693 as of 07/2011

This again seems to be renewing. Looks like the amount due from above was moved here

1. BEST BUY/HSBC Status: Paid in settlement. Status Details: This account is scheduled to continue on record until Dec 2013. Recent Balance: NA Creditor's Statement: Account legally paid in full for less than full balance.

This might have been my second mistake. I wanted to pay something off when I got some money in hand, and I chose this one. They offered me the option of settling, and I took it. Don't know what can be done about this

I now make a comfortable income, but this has been dragging on my creditworthiness every since. I have enough money to pay all this off (except HSBC, which is settled, but still negative), but I do not want to pay money, and still have this negatively affect my credit if at all possible.

I also have some addresses on the credit report, where I have never lived. I believe this is because I was added on to a friends card, who moved to these addresses.

I have been thinking of hiring someone to help fix this, but I have no idea where to start. I don't mind paying for this to be fixed, but I really need it fixed . Any opinions on SkyBlue Credit Repair or Lexington Law (both ads I saw on CreditKarma). Do I hire a lawyer? Do I contact each of these myself ( have been reading up on DV, PFD etc., but have no time to take action)

[llecs]

Welcome to the forums!

I'd suggest reading the following:

Common Abbreviations

Credit Scoring 101 - great for knowing what is in your credit score and to see how your score is impacted.

What Steps Do I Take - great for learning the repair process.

and Example letters - PFDs, GWs, DVs, etc.

For Calvary, I noticed that it'll fall off this month. I personally wouldn't do anything until it did. Calvary might be claiming you owe the money. After it falls off this month (though likely mid-next), then you can always send your settlement letter from Sprint to Calavary and they'll stop bugging you for it.

For Chartway, did you agree or consent to a new account? There may be an issue there. Looks like this happened around 3/2009. Are the open dates the same? ARe these your oldest accounts? It might be worth it to say nothing if it helps your length of history. Looks like the DOFD is off too, though I wouldn't be too concerned about that. I personally would send a PFD letter to Chartway. If they agree in writing, then pay it and they'll delete. If the second, paid, Chartway CO is not helping your AAoA, then you can always make an argument with Chartway that they improperly opened a 2nd TL without your consent.....also what bugs me is that it was converted to a loan. If the original was a CC, and they changed it to a loan, then the SOL (maybe in their eyes) would be lengthened and therefore have a longer time period to sue you. I'm assuming you live in VA here. VA's SOL on CCs is 3 years. VA's SOL on loans is 5 years. Of course they'd have to prove you agreed to a loan though.

Best Buy appears to be reporting OK. It's reporting as a paid CO. Send a GW letter asking them if they wouldn't mind removing the lates and/or settlement comments.

I'd ignore the addresses so as long as your current address is correct.

I wouldn't hire anyone. You'd likely spend hundreds of dollars and see no results. Plus they use a method which makes it much harder to get the paid stuff removed. Per time, it's not involved at all. You only have two letters to send here: 1 GW and one PFD. There are examples in the above link and you would definitely wrap this up much faster than any service out there. IMO, they are scams anyway. I've seen them do some terrible things to other poster's credit on here.