Hello all.
I just heard about this website about a week ago and have found some very useful information and advice in your forums. Well, now it's my turn to ask for some advice...
I'm about to purchase a home and I need to get my credit score to 650 and quickly (as in a few months timeframe. It is currently at 604. BTW, right now this is all dependent on the EQUIFAX score (kinda complicated so I won't waste your time) I made some pretty bad decisions when I was younger and got under on a few credit cards and eventually had to settle them. I am and have been on the right track for a while now and am trying to get over that 650 hump so I can get this house. So what I am asking for is how to go about paying the following credit cards to help my score jump up as high as possible. Here is what Equifax currently shows:
CARD BALANCE CREDIT LIMIT
Cap1 492 0 (Why doesn't it show my 500 max limit?)
HSBC 1491 1500
Dept store card 7094 7100 (normally pay about 200 a month)
Keep in mind that I have about 350 extra to put into these cards on top of my regular payments. Which ones should I knock down first?
Another question. I have a dispute over an old card that was sent to collections. I paid off collections but the card shows a balance of 1800 w/ a credit limit of 1000 yet it also shows up as a charge off. It looks like it will be coming off my credit report soon (that's what a supervisor told me... that they would have it removed because it was sent to collections and paid). I am also working on getting an assumption letter from the collection agency... just in case. Anyways, I had this card since June of '01 and it went sour on Oct '04. They stopped reporting CO in Jul of 06. Is there a possibility of this hurting my score by going away since I did have a good history from '01-'04?
Ok, that's about it. For those that made it this far... thanks for taking the time to read this.
-Mario