Need some good advice!

[Anonymous]

Here's my story:

I went through a horrible divorce (2006) that put me into a good amount of debt that eventually went into collections. I now have a great income and need to clean up my credit report and get better interest rates for my mortgage and a new car by the end of this year. I do have one judgement on my CR from 2008 and a couple of collection accounts. My outstanding revolving debt is as follows:

HSBC (1) 2104 out of 2200

HSBC (2) 867 out of 900

PFFCU 475 out of 500

Chase 284 out of 400

Cap 1 934 out of 1000

I also have an auto loan that I still owe 6400, 1 student loan at 43000 and a personal loan with 3900 left on that. My goal is to get my score as high as possible by the end of the year so I can refinance my mortgage and get a new car, I'm shooting for around Oct/Nov timeframe. This is what I've done so far as of yesterday to achieve this:

I paid HSBC (2), PFFCU, Chase and Cap 1 down to zero balancs (did that yesterday so my scores below do not reflect those new balances yet). I plan on paying chunks of the HSBC (1) down every month...now my questions are:

1) should I pay my car off within the next 4 months OR pay off the personal loan to achieve my goals and can someone try to estimate what my score might be come Oct/Nov timeframe?

[LIGHTNIN]

Are the collections paid? if not, I would suggest to do what's called a PFD Letter (pay for delete).

How it works is, you pay the CA and the CA agrees to delete. Of course try to get this in writing first before paying.

Now some CA's will agree to do PFD's and others will not.

You may see a jump in your CS, it just depends on how old the debt is.

A  CS takes a huge hit,when a judgment is listed on a CR. I've read some people managed to have the judgment removed.

Some court houses have web sites, that contain info on how to vacate a judgment.Check the web to see if the courthouse that issued your judgment has such a web site.

Good Luck to you

[RobertEG]

+1

You are obviously taking the right steps in reducing current util of revolving credit, but with the major derogs still reporting under payment history, you will remain in a "dirty" scoring bucket until they are gone.  Addressing the old derogs will, in my opinion, give you the greatest score bang for the effort.

I would put special emphasis on lightnin's question about the collection.  If unpaid, it may totally shut down any attempt at a mortgage loan.

You might have an informal chat with a prospective mortgage lendor, and get their input as to what they will view as necessary to qualify.

[Anonymous]

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@LIGHTNIN wrote:

Are the collections paid? if not, I would suggest to do what's called a PFD Letter (pay for delete).

How it works is, you pay the CA and the CA agrees to delete. Of course try to get this in writing first before paying.

Now some CA's will agree to do PFD's and others will not.

You may see a jump in your CS, it just depends on how old the debt is.

A  CS takes a huge hit,when a judgment is listed on a CR. I've read some people managed to have the judgment removed.

Some court houses have web sites, that contain info on how to vacate a judgment.Check the web to see if the courthouse that issued your judgment has such a web site.

Good Luck to you

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The collections are small, unpaid balances. I'm disputing one of them with the CA now, sent them written request for debt validation because it is from my college where my employer paid for my classes and I graduated from there in 2006 and received my diploma. There is another "Open collection" fom Verizon but I pid that through their collection agency, Afni a couple of years ago which also shows on my report but as paid. I never paid the others because I was tol in the past that the debt will start over as new.......

[Anonymous]

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@RobertEG wrote:

+1

You are obviously taking the right steps in reducing current util of revolving credit, but with the major derogs still reporting under payment history, you will remain in a "dirty" scoring bucket until they are gone.  Addressing the old derogs will, in my opinion, give you the greatest score bang for the effort.

I would put special emphasis on lightnin's question about the collection.  If unpaid, it may totally shut down any attempt at a mortgage loan.

You might have an informal chat with a prospective mortgage lendor, and get their input as to what they will view as necessary to qualify.

---

Thanks for replying! So, I take it from everyone's response that I need to pay the collections but try to get a PFD if possible. Ok, I can send those letters out tomorrow. I also have a bunch of GWs ready to go out to try to remove the lates from some of my other baddies but on a couple of them I don't have an account number (not listed on the CR) and accounts are so old that I don't remember the account numbers any more and they are zero balances.....what do I do in that scenario? I have read on here that putting social down USA no-no. How else can I identify my account to them?

[LIGHTNIN]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@RobertEG wrote:

+1

You are obviously taking the right steps in reducing current util of revolving credit, but with the major derogs still reporting under payment history, you will remain in a "dirty" scoring bucket until they are gone.  Addressing the old derogs will, in my opinion, give you the greatest score bang for the effort.

I would put special emphasis on lightnin's question about the collection.  If unpaid, it may totally shut down any attempt at a mortgage loan.

You might have an informal chat with a prospective mortgage lendor, and get their input as to what they will view as necessary to qualify.

---

Thanks for replying! So, I take it from everyone's response that I need to pay the collections but try to get a PFD if possible. Ok, I can send those letters out tomorrow. I also have a bunch of GWs ready to go out to try to remove the lates from some of my other baddies but on a couple of them I don't have an account number (not listed on the CR) and accounts are so old that I don't remember the account numbers any more and they are zero balances.....what do I do in that scenario? I have read on here that putting social down USA no-no. How else can I identify my account to them?

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I'm not RobertEG,LOL, but I'll reply for him.

Yes SS# a no-no.

If your CR's dont have the account #'s, try pulling the Free CR's from annualcreditreport.com, the CR's come directly from the CRA's and tend to have more info on them then the CR's you get from a third party.

Or just state you dont have the account number, they can find the account by your name.

[Anonymous]

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@LIGHTNIN wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@RobertEG wrote:

+1

You are obviously taking the right steps in reducing current util of revolving credit, but with the major derogs still reporting under payment history, you will remain in a "dirty" scoring bucket until they are gone.  Addressing the old derogs will, in my opinion, give you the greatest score bang for the effort.

I would put special emphasis on lightnin's question about the collection.  If unpaid, it may totally shut down any attempt at a mortgage loan.

You might have an informal chat with a prospective mortgage lendor, and get their input as to what they will view as necessary to qualify.

---

Thanks for replying! So, I take it from everyone's response that I need to pay the collections but try to get a PFD if possible. Ok, I can send those letters out tomorrow. I also have a bunch of GWs ready to go out to try to remove the lates from some of my other baddies but on a couple of them I don't have an account number (not listed on the CR) and accounts are so old that I don't remember the account numbers any more and they are zero balances.....what do I do in that scenario? I have read on here that putting social down USA no-no. How else can I identify my account to them?

---

I'm not RobertEG,LOL, but I'll reply for him.

Yes SS# a no-no.

If your CR's dont have the account #'s, try pulling the Free CR's from annualcreditreport.com, the CR's come directly from the CRA's and tend to have more info on them then the CR's you get from a third party.

Or just state you dont have the account number, they can find the account by your name.

 Thank you! letters going out today!

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