@Anonymous wrote:
Hey all, a little background info from me; I defaulted on a $4k motorcycle loan when I was younger which was about 10 years ago. Huge regret to this day. I let a $400 Verizon Wireless bill go to collections in 2011 and I have 2 medical bills, one $40 (yeah I know) and the other $900. They were from when I first started my current job and my benefits had not started.
I was miraculously approved for a $17k loan for my dream car through my local CU with a credit score (not sure which bureau was pulled) of around 550 I believe. It was a 8.9% rate with a .5% decrease because I enrolled in auto pay and had $100 direct deposited every week into that account. My payments are $390/mo and I have had the loan since September of last year. I was told I could refinance after 6 mos for a lower rate but have yet to do so. 2 weeks ago I got a CreditKarma alert that my score has changed and when I looked I was at a 628EQ and a 620TU. I was surprised so I looked into a Cap1 card and applied for the Platinum. Was approved for $300 and just got my card yesterday. I didn't want to get card happy but I was also interested in the Quicksilver 1 and thought about applying for that as well.
Does anyone know when Cap1 reports so I have a definitive date to have my balance paid and should I apply for the Quicksilver 1 as well or wait? Thanks for any advice!
Congrats on your progress so far and welcome to the forums.
If you haven't already done so, you need to find out what your true FICO scores are. CK uses Vantage scores, so that is not an accurate reflection of your true scores. You can get a trial membership with CCT for $1 and find out what your scores are. What will assist you long term is taking care of the collections, especially if they are reporting monthly. It is usually recommended for FICO scoring purposes to have 3 tradelines reporting and 1 installment loan. As you have one Cap 1 card, you might consider Discover Card and/or BoA. If not approved, you might be offered the secured card instead and both have the potential to unsecure. NFCU at one time was a viable option, but they have restricted eligibility to those with military affiliation.
