This forum has been extremely helpful through my quest to rehabilitate my credit. I thougt this week would be the moment of truth, and I'd be ready to apply for a mortgage. I was soooooo wrong.
I'll outline my situation first to hopefully help put things into perspective. I went through the student loan rehab program. My loans were originally through Sallie Mae, USA Funds is/was the Guarantor, and Pioneer Credit Recovery was the collections agency. When signing up for the rehab, I was told:
- "this will cover ALL of your loans" (FALSE: it only covered Federal Loans, nobody ever made this clear).
- "when completed, you will receive a new loan" (FALSE: it was transferred right back to Sallie Mae)
- "all derogatories will be removed" (FALSE: nothing has been removed)
- "you will need to sign an application for loan consolidation" (FALSE: they weren't consolidated, just transferred back to Salie Mae)
I checked my credit report this week to see how things turned out, and to my shock and dismay, nothing improved. This is leaving a bad taste in my mouth, as the reason the defaults happened in the first place were because Sallie Mae employees (for the most part) are dumber than dirt, and have no clue what they're talking about. When I worked with them a year and a half ago to make sure things were "squared away", the constant 45-minute wait times followed by foreigners who apparently didn't understand a word I was saying, and couldn't convey any information with any level of clarity are the reason my loans went south. Time and time again I was told I was "up to date", "in good shape" and had "nothing to worry about"... a few months (and payments) later, I started receiving default notices. Further communication seemed to do little besides guarantee everything would default.
Despite this horrific almost 2-year long battle, I have completed my student loan rehab. My private loan was not included (I actually had one person tell me "YES, your private loans will be included")... so I just paid a large settlement to "get rid" of the judgement.
My major issue now is that I currently have 3 loans with SM. They are still reporting as derogatory, and the 3 TLs from USA Funds are still showing as derogatory (with a payment being made, despite the payment going to SM). I understand USA Funds is [part] of SM, but those lines were supposed to be removed and the SM TLs showing as "pays as agreed"... instead, I've completed the rehab, started making payments, and I still have 6 derogatories with all 3 CRAs.
There's a good chance I will not have a place to live in 2 months from now, as the house I'm renting is being sold. Rents in my area are about $300-$400/mo higher than a mortgage (plus taxes) would be, and outside of what I can afford. I need to buy a house, but due to these screw ups in reporting, I can't even apply for a mortgage right now (despite having found a perfect, affordable house in a good neighborhood which is right in my price range).
When I spoke to Sallie Mae a few days ago, I got the same old BS "Let's wait a month or so and see if things get reported the right way, if not, we can start to look in to it" (not paraphrsing, that's a verbatim statement).
I don't have a month to wait to see IF they'll be reported properly, followed by waiting who-knows-how-long for a company I have no faith in to "investigate" the issue. So, my question is... considering I'm nearly screwed anyway, would it be worth disputing all 6 TLs and hoping the USA Funds ones get removed as they are supposed to, and the SM ones get updated to "Pays as Agreed"? If so, should I just dispute with one CRA and hope they update all 3, or has anyone tried something similar, and found that I'll have to file 18 disputes to get this resolved in a timely manner?
