New to the board.....Need a plan of Attack!!!

[Anonymous]

I'm in my late 20's and finally see the importance of having and maintaining good credit.  I'm very happy that I found this board as it seems to be a solid source of information and support while I try to accomplish my goals.  Just turned down for an auto loan last month and was hoping of trying again in 6 months.  Reason for denial was "income to debt ratio" and "serious delinquencies on past accounts."  I thought I would lay down my credit report info and see how some of you would go about trying to repair it and reaching my goal of 620 in 6 months. (If this is even possible)  Any advice is welcome and thank you in advance.

Brighthouse closed account 748$ c/o report 2-17

Proggressive Auto Insurance closed account 111$ c/o report 5-16

Capitol One Auto finance repo CA 3,069 c/o report 3-16

Capitol One Credit Card CA 814$ c/o 1-16

Salute Gold Card / Jefferson Capitol CA 737$   -The date opened on this account is wrong.  I was thinking of doing a DV since I heard this company either shutdown or discontinued this program in 2009.  Opened date on this account says 2010??? 

Old Navy account that is closed by me in 2006.  Had this account for four years and was always current never missing a payment.  Ending balance of 1100.  I thought about maybe calling them and trying to reopen the account so that it would date back to 2002 when I opened it?  Don't even know if this is possible.

I currently have one Wells Fargo Secured card that I have not missed a payment on for the last 6 months.  I thought about openening another secured card to try to boost my score a little more.  I have heard that this could help or hurt my score from different people??

Also there is a secured personal loan offered from a credit union that is supposed to help build credit.  Don't know if this is a gimic or not but was thinking of leaning this way also. 

My question is if this was your credit report what are some of the first steps you would take to improve your score...debt to income ratio...and clear up some of the old collection accounts.  I don't want to make a mistake and be counter productive. 

[seattletravels]

How much do you have saved to pay these off?

[Anonymous]

Sad to say I only have about 1000 in savings at the moment.   After bills are paid each month I have about 500 left to pay on some of these if needed.

[seattletravels]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Old Navy account that is closed by me in 2006.  Had this account for four years and was always current never missing a payment.  Ending balance of 1100.  I thought about maybe calling them and trying to reopen the account so that it would date back to 2002 when I opened it?  Don't even know if this is possible.

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When you say this had an $1100 balance - is that paid? Or did you mean to say that the CL was $1100 with a $0 balance when it closed?

[Anonymous]

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@seattletravels wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Old Navy account that is closed by me in 2006.  Had this account for four years and was always current never missing a payment.  Ending balance of 1100.  I thought about maybe calling them and trying to reopen the account so that it would date back to 2002 when I opened it?  Don't even know if this is possible.

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When you say this had an $1100 balance - is that paid? Or did you mean to say that the CL was $1100 with a $0 balance when it closed?

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It was 0 balance when it was closed showing paid on time for last 20 months.  CL was 1100

[seattletravels]

Is the WF secured your only open revolving account?  What's the utilization like on that card?

[Anonymous]

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@seattletravels wrote:

Is the WF secured your only open revolving account?  What's the utilization like on that card?

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Yes that is my only open account period.  Utilization is around 50 percent.  I will have it down to almost 10 percent in the next couple of months. 

Should I focus on opening new accounts or paying off past accounts?  I heard paying off old accounts would restart the DOLA but might help my debt to income ratio.

[Anonymous]

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@seattletravels wrote:

Is the WF secured your only open revolving account?  What's the utilization like on that card?

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Yes that is my only open account period.  Utilization is around 50 percent.  I will have it down to almost 10 percent in the next couple of months. 

Should I focus on opening new accounts or paying off past accounts?  I heard paying off old accounts would restart the DOLA but might help my debt to income ratio.

[seattletravels]

What's your end-game? Are you trying to clean up your baddies or increase your score?

If you only have one revolving account, you might try opening an Orchard unsecured or a secured from Capital One.  From what I've read, most people will see a slight increase in their score from the first two revolving accounts that are opened.  You already have one, so really just need one more.

From there, I'd start negotiating PFDs with the collection agencies.  If you don't have a lot of savings, you'd probably just need to start with whichever one's you can afford now and take that one at a time.

[Anonymous]

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@seattletravels wrote:

What's your end-game? Are you trying to clean up your baddies or increase your score?

If you only have one revolving account, you might try opening an Orchard unsecured or a secured from Capital One.  From what I've read, most people will see a slight increase in their score from the first two revolving accounts that are opened.  You already have one, so really just need one more.

From there, I'd start negotiating PFDs with the collection agencies.  If you don't have a lot of savings, you'd probably just need to start with whichever one's you can afford now and take that one at a time.

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End game is hopefully an auto loan by the end of this year and a home loan within the next 5 years.  I'm definatley going to open another secured credit card.  I will try to negotiate some pfd's but what if they don't except?  Should I pay anyways or use that money to save for a bigger down payment for a car?