On the road to rebuilding, any advice will help!-UPDATE

[Cherekas]

Hello All-

As you can see from my registered date I've been around on the forum since 2010 silently learning ways to improve my credit. All was well until around 2012 and 2014. 2012 lates started reporting on my student loans as I graduated school and I thought they were in deferment. But I realize now that they had come out of deferment and when I called for a forbearance they never actually backed out the lates from my credit report although they did back date the forbearance, it still hit my credit. So now I have over 25 loans reporting late from Aug 2012, Sep 2012, Oct 2012. I finally consolidated my loans in early 2015 because I couldn't keep up with several different payments. 

Other negative factors hurting my credit, 2 credit accounts were charged off in 2014 (I lost my job), Discover and BOA, both are submitting lates to my credit file and its hurting my score.

Discover sued me (2015) and I have a judgement for $2448 (reports on all 3 files). They have offered me 60% to settle

BOA did not sue but I owe $1135 (different 3rd party agencies have sent me information to settle the debt), reports on all 3 files

Furniture store I owe $320 (last settlement from Dec 2016 offered 50%), reports to only EQ

Current accounts paid up to date are:

Credit one $1100 - $0 balance

NYC CC $1300 -    $0 balance

Macys $1800-        $0 balance

Marathon Gas $1590 -  $0 balance

Victoria's secret $3000 - $520 balance

USF CU $1000 - $314 balance

Cap 1 QS $9250 - $7400 balance

Jewelers Club $5000 - $58 balance

Cap 1 platinum $500 - $50 balance

Total credit= $24,540

My plan is to settle the 3 charged off accounts by late Feb when I have the extra funds to do so. I contacted BOA last year sometime to settle that debt with them directy because they are the ones reporting on my credit file but they directed me back to the 3rd party and I asked if they would delete it once I paid it and they declined. Any suggestions with Student loans or my settlement offers would be greatly appreciated. I tried to include all information needed. Thanks in advance.

My scores are:

FICO EQ 609, EX 597, TU 614 1/21/17

[rmduhon]

If the student loans are federally backed then the lates can't be removed until they hit 7 years, these loans fall under a different law then other debts. Paying off the Cap1 Platinum and jewelers club will give a bit of a boost because then less than half of your cards will be reporting a balance.

[Cherekas]

Thanks for the information. The student loans are federally backed and are all consolidated as of Feb 2015. Some of them, I show are set to start falling off my reports around 2019, that should help eventually. Both cards will have a $0 balance as of Feb 14. So hopefully that will help along with paying the 2 charge off cards with BOA and Discover because their reporting lates that are dragging my score down.

[Cherekas]

Question: I received a settlement for my Discover account (balance $2688, settlement 50%), I also have a judgement on this credit line. So I'm wondering will the judgement amount be settled as well because I plan to request that the law office have the account vacated once paid. I also understand that they will issue a 1099 statement for taxes to be paid on the balance. 

Accounts updated:

Credit one $1100 - $0 balance

NYC CC $1900 -    $0 balance

Macys $3300-        $0 balance

Marathon Gas $1840 -  $0 balance

Victoria's secret $3000 - $462 balance

USF CU $1000 - $0 balance

Cap 1 QS $9250 - $6559 balance

Jewelers Club $5000 - $0 balance

Cap 1 plat $1100 - $122 balance

Merrick $700-    $0 balance

Total credit= $28,190

[Anonymous]

@Cherekas.

The Cap 1 account is killing your scores.  70% UTI is too high.  Once you take care of the collections, it would be good to start lowering your UTI on that account. 

[Cherekas]

@Kaykay65 

That is currently my plan and I certainly agree with you. Its the card a currently use for all bills and I'm expecting some settlement money in May. So I will pay it down then. But I'm currently focused on the 2 charge offs because they are highly suppressing my score and its pretty much not moving at this point. The 2 cards are reporting 122% Discover and 126% BOA utilization so they are a high priority for me. 

[Cherekas]

New update so I can log my rebuild progress:

Current accounts paid up to date are:

Credit one $1350 - $0 balance

NYC CC $2300 -    $0 balance

Macys $6300-        $0 balance

Marathon Gas $2340 -  $0 balance

Victoria's secret $3000 - $269 balance

USF CU $1000 - $580 balance

Cap 1 QS $9250 - $6549 balance

Jewelers Club $5000 - $0 balance

Cap 1 platinum $1100 - $0 balance

Merrick $700 -$0 balance

Total credit= $32,340 (balance increased by $7800 since January)

Negative accounts

Discover settled for less and account is now reporting $0 balance (I was also able to get the judgment removed as of 7/3 on EQ and 7/6 on TU, waiting for EX response)

BOA settled this account and it is now reporting $0 balance

I have not pulled my new scores to see where my score will land after all of this recent progress. I will update my scores when I pull new reports at the end of July, as I am waiting for the new activity to update, which should be by July 20. 

Once this all settles then I'll start my GW campaign for lates on my reports from Cap 1 (5 lates from 2014)

[Anonymous]

I suggest you clos out 3 or 4 of those credit cards you have a 0 balance on.  Not a fact but I'm pretty sure the amount of cards are neither hurting or helping.  Keeping it to 2 or 3 revolinvg credit cards is much better than 5 or 6.  I am a good example when it comes to this. I closed 2 of my retail cards after making payments on time for a year.  Once i closed those I opened a Capital One card coupled with my Wells Fargo Dealer Servies loan, I have two accounts in Good Standing.

Once I closed my car, experian, trans union and equifax all reported those cards/accounts as satisfactory and positive to my credit history and report.

[Cherekas]

Thanks for your response. It doesnt hurt for me to have the amount of TL's I have. As you can see, I also have some debt and as long as my utilization on my cards is low, it actually helps me. So your method would hurt me more. Welcome to the forum and read up a little more on utilization. 

[Cherekas]

I decided to update my rebuilding progress. My scores are rebounding so awesome and I may hit my goal of 700 by the end of the year! I paid off my 2 charge offs (settled both), one in April and the other in June. My one judgement that was reporting on all 3 CA's has been deleted although it was paid as well (it was deleted with the July 1 credit updates). I was also able to get an old collection deleted and a new one popped up around May but I was able to get that one deleted as well, I now have 0 collections or judgements.

I wasn't applying for any new credit until my debts were paid. So as of the last week of July I decided to apply for a few new accounts because I had quite a few of inq's falling off. I went to the Amex preapproval site and it showed that I was preapproved for 3 cards. I decided to take a chance. (New FICO scores are updated today)

New cards I added: (July 31- August 3)

Amex PRG

Amex BCE $1,000

Amex Delta Skymiles $1,000

Care Credit $8,600

NFCU Cash Rewards $14,000

I will be closing Credit one soon and merging my Cap one Plat with my Quicksilver after September 21 when it becomes a year old. 

Credit one $1350 - $0 balance

NYC CC $2500 -    $0 balance

Macys $7800-  $223 balance

Marathon Gas $2350 -  $0 balance

Victoria's secret $3000 - $267 balance

USF CU $1000 - $40 balance

Cap 1 QS $9250 - $7700 balance

Jewelers Club $5000 - $0 balance

Cap 1 plat $1100 - $0 balance

Merrick $700-    $0 balance

Total CL= $58,650