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Hi, first time poster here. Long story short, I have three derogatories on my credit report, all of which were paid several years ago. However, all three seem to be showing as active in my current credit report.
1 Chase Bank charge-off where the collection agency was paid. (Never got new card from Chase after they bought WaMu, so I stopped paying after several attempts to get one sent... Not really the smartest move in retrospect.) Report says Status as of Aug 2010: Balance: $0, Status: Charge-off. Date of Last Activity: Dec, 2009.
2 liens - I just got off the phone with the IRS, and both are showing as released in their system. One is state, one is federal. I have release filing numbers for both.
What steps do you recommend taking to get these removed? Or at least flagged as paid? The paperwork should be out there, but the credit agencies didn't get them. My credit would be a whole lot higher without these things - let this be a lesson to check your report more than every few years. You can imagine my surprise when I saw that my middle "FAKO" score was 750, while my actual FICO was only 640. With any luck, getting these removed will give me a boost.
Thanks in advance.
@CrankyDave wrote:Hi, first time poster here. Long story short, I have three derogatories on my credit report, all of which were paid several years ago. However, all three seem to be showing as active in my current credit report.
1 Chase Bank charge-off where the collection agency was paid. (Never got new card from Chase after they bought WaMu, so I stopped paying after several attempts to get one sent... Not really the smartest move in retrospect.) Report says Status as of Aug 2010: Balance: $0, Status: Charge-off. Date of Last Activity: Dec, 2009.
2 liens - I just got off the phone with the IRS, and both are showing as released in their system. One is state, one is federal. I have release filing numbers for both.
What steps do you recommend taking to get these removed? Or at least flagged as paid? The paperwork should be out there, but the credit agencies didn't get them. My credit would be a whole lot higher without these things - let this be a lesson to check your report more than every few years. You can imagine my surprise when I saw that my middle "FAKO" score was 750, while my actual FICO was only 640. With any luck, getting these removed will give me a boost.
Thanks in advance.
For the Chase CO GW letters will be needed in an attempt to get forgiveness from them.
For the federal tax lien file form 12277, you want the lien withdrawn that is what gets it removed from your CRs, you can also dispute with the CRAs directly if they are paid and not showing satisfied.
For the state lien you want it withdrawn as well so you need to contact the state entity that filed the lien.
Welcome to the board
Is there a state equivalent of the federal 12277 form? From perusing this board, dealing with state liens seem to be one big random headache. With the various CA contact numbers, does this qualify for their dispute line?
I have 100% on-time payments for the past 2+ years, zero debt with my car loan paid off, and sub-10% credit utilization, but my FICO is still crap and I have sub-$2000 limits on each of my three credit cards. I reeeeally hope this kicks everything back up there. And when/if I get these removed, how bad a ding would it be to request CLIs for the cards to reflect the new rating? I want to get my maximum available credit up.
Thanks again.
I talked to the collection agency that I paid off years ago, and they emailed me a paid-in-full form, so I faxed that along with the two lien release forms I got from the county recorder's office this morning to the three credit bureaus. Fingers and toes, crossed. Breath, bated. All four cheeks, clenched. The ball, she is a'rollin'.
Okay, TU was the first to update, with two of the three derogatories dropping and my TU score going up to 677. CapitalOne's TU info now correctly shows my On-time Payment rating as A, up from D, so that old CC collection is definitely gone. It doesn't specify which derogatory is still there, but I'm assuming it's the paid state tax lien, since those are apparently more of a crapshoot to get removed. I'll call all three bureaus on Monday for confirmation of the material I faxed in last week. My EquiFax score is the lowest by far, so I want to get that dealt with.
After that, the main negative noted in my reports is the low credit limit of my three cards (only totalling about $5K), but that was directly the result of these items I've had removed, so I think I should request a CLI based on the new information to get that figure up. How much of a ding can I expect from such CLI requests, given that it will be offset by the increase in my borrowing power and lowering my utiliization even further (it's under 5% at the moment)? I know enough *not* to try to do that by applying for new cards. That will be *after* the mortgage.
Things are finally getting underway here, thankfully. Here's hoping that my real FICOs will soon be closer to my FAKOs of a few months ago -- 730, 740, and 775.
@CrankyDave wrote:Okay, TU was the first to update, with two of the three derogatories dropping and my TU score going up to 677. CapitalOne's TU info now correctly shows my On-time Payment rating as A, up from D, so that old CC collection is definitely gone. It doesn't specify which derogatory is still there, but I'm assuming it's the paid state tax lien, since those are apparently more of a crapshoot to get removed. I'll call all three bureaus on Monday for confirmation of the material I faxed in last week. My EquiFax score is the lowest by far, so I want to get that dealt with.
After that, the main negative noted in my reports is the low credit limit of my three cards (only totalling about $5K), but that was directly the result of these items I've had removed, so I think I should request a CLI based on the new information to get that figure up. How much of a ding can I expect from such CLI requests, given that it will be offset by the increase in my borrowing power and lowering my utiliization even further (it's under 5% at the moment)? I know enough *not* to try to do that by applying for new cards. That will be *after* the mortgage.
Things are finally getting underway here, thankfully. Here's hoping that my real FICOs will soon be closer to my FAKOs of a few months ago -- 730, 740, and 775.
Grats to your success
Thanks, here's to even more. The main lesson I came away with is that the hardest step is to stop pretending that those statements and reports don't exist. That knot in your stomach will feel a whole lot better once you open them up, take stock, and get the repair process underway. After that, every little accomplishment will feel awesome.
What state is your tax lien with?
Illinois.
Still no traction on anything but TU, who sent me an investigation report today. Looks like the slight bump I got was due to the liens being marked as paid, but they're still on there. And it turns out that I sent the 12277 federal release form to the wrong office, which will add processing time to the already long 30-45 day figure that their system gives me. I faxed in a new copy to the proper office, but that item is gonna stay put for another month at least. And the person I talked to at the Illinois dept. of revenue says that there's no interaction at all between them and the CRAs, so I don't even know if I can get that one removed. It's such a paltry amount that I honestly don't remember why it wasn't paid, but still...
I haven't managed to talk to anyone at the other two agencies, but those scores (especially Equifax, which is significantly lower than my other scores) haven't budged, so I don't know if they've done anything with the new info.
Man, being in limbo sucks... I don't want to do any CLI requests until those are updated/removed, but I have no idea when that will happen.