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Checking in for July.
I eliminated by chequing overdraft by making use of 0% interest rate on one of my cards. That eliminated ~$35 montly interest. Interestingly, that $2500 debt never showed up on my CRs but now that I transferred it to a CC it became trackable. I was never any worse off but my credit score had dropped 5 pts because of that.
I increased my monthly payment by $400/month on my highest balance card. Due to a quirk in my payroll taxes, I have reduced taxes in the second half of the year so I was able to be more agressive in my paying off debt. 5 more payments will erase that card's debt and then I will focus on the second card. The plan is to get down to 1.5% utilization from 6.5% by end of year.
I then early renewed the mortgage with a higher payment and locked in for 5 yrs at 3.42% which is a drop from my current 3.6% I had some extra funds in my property tax holding account so I added that to paying down the principal. All tolled - I dropped 47 months off my amortization schedule with a phone call to the bank! (Original amortization was 25 years, I am down to under 17 years now). I just wished I would have taken advantage of the ultralow rate of 2.99% earlier this year (it was on for only a week!) but since the discount rates were starting to rise, I figured it was better to lock in now rather than wait for the inevitable higher rates on my renewal date.
My score has been creeping upwards from a low of 743 to a current of 756 and by this time next month I am projecting a 760 score (back in the club!) and a 780 by the end of the year as I lower my utilization, the effect of 2 inquiries lessens and my AAoA increases. My next CLI date is October. My next credit event will likely be when I choose to purchase a new vehicle, likely something after Christmas.
Well enough with "tickling the keyboard" - time to go out to the ball game!
So far so good.....
Late July posting...
Never heard back from my mortgage servicer about being able to rent out my condo. However, loan officer said that underwriting couldn't approve my mortgage application because my current job verifies as Temp. Should be going permanent in August, so I will try again in 6-9 months.
New plan is to sell the currently underwater condo. Just started going back and forth with a realtor to do a comparative market analysis so I can get a professional opinion of where we stand. After that, I'll come up with a budget of paying the condo down to market value over the next 6-9 months.
Scores took a 1 point drop due to lender hard pull. Sent goodwill and pay for delete letters to 3 accounts on my wife's credit report, still waiting to hear back there.
Hoping the CMA shows I'm not as far underwater as I think!
What a ride for the past y18 months - all the way up baby! I went from high 600's to high 700's as of today
All I did was pay down my cards, which had very high utilization rates, and take a new car loan out and made the payments on time every month.
I Still Owe about 20k on my car, will I get penalized for paying the whole thing off? How long should I wait to pay this car loan off
As of August 1st 2013 my scores are:
1. Experian = 783
2. Equifax = 772
3. TansUnion = 784