@KeithW wrote:LS,
I think I agree with you, though I do not know how much trouble it would be to get this fixed, and considering they are paid, how much it would benefit me. It appears that the fact that I still have a seperate legal residence means that the law of nessecisties I mentioned above would NOT apply.
A collection hurts your FICO score the same way paid or unpaid. Id be fighting it tooth and nail if it did not belong to me!!! Dont give up, I would frequent the rebuilding forum on this topic. There are a lot of smart members there that can help you! Good luck!! 
Can you perhaps write a goodwill letter to the collection agency to stop reporting the collection account?
What I'm really confused about is how Chase knows that your wife has a collection without it showing up on your credit report.
@HiLine wrote:Can you perhaps write a goodwill letter to the collection agency to stop reporting the collection account?
What I'm really confused about is how Chase knows that your wife has a collection without it showing up on your credit report.
AFAIK his wife's CA's are showing up on his reports which is totally inaccurate.
Oh I see. The CA did not show up until the OP paid off the bill.
@HiLine wrote:Oh I see. The CA did not show up until the OP paid off the bill.
Which sounds like to me they took advantage of that card info. Not sure if that is illegal but the CA is to put it on his report.
Sorry for the denial. Take LSs advice to work on those baddies. Chase can be picky if you have multiple issues to overlook. In your case, high util + CAs.
Chase are probably one of the most picky creditors IMO. I have been denied three time by them, but I got approved for two amex and discover it with no problem at all.
$5k
$4.5k
$2.8k
$8k
$500
@sperrin wrote:How did you get approved for a Citi card for your Experian just over 600? And what made you think they'd approve you through chase with those scores? Are they loosening their credit score standards? What did they pull?
They likely didn't pull EQ'04 classic which is presumably the OP's EQ score in his signature line.
AFAIK they haven't loosened the underwriting for the card since last June, but I haven't been paying too much attention for the past several months. Chase will approve with paid collections, but 40% util and if they were looking at payments vs. balance, hard to say. LIke has been suggested, I'd call in tomorrow explaining the collections and even the utilization if it came up assuming there's some rationale for it (like paying said collections or whatever the most recent large but reasonable expense was) and a plan to make that prettier.
