Your welcome! Good luck with your GW campaign! Make sure to come back & update us on your progress!
Hello, I am going to the garden after some much needed advice on these forums. I will focus on attempting to remove 2 single 30 day lates on my credit report. I know it will take some elbow grease if i am denied. I will need to Goodwill and Goodwill again. My QUESTION is....THe 30 day late on my BofA closed Secured account is from December of 2017. My credit reports state Paid as Agreed. Is this a 30 day late worth fighting? Or is it aged enough that it is not causing me much harm? I will say also that I have a Discharge BK in 2017 and I am not sure if that post discharge late rings a red flag to creditors.
Thanks,
Starting Score: 614@UpAndComing74 , I am going to let some of the more seasoned myfico'ers weigh in on this. I personally don't see the harm in sending a GW letter to BOA but maybe someone else has knowledge that I don't.
@UpAndComing74 wrote:attempting to remove 2 single 30 day lates on my credit report....THe 30 day late on my BofA closed Secured account is from December of 2017. My credit reports state Paid as Agreed. Is this a 30 day late worth fighting? Or is it aged enough that it is not causing me much harm?
@UpAndComing74 I agree with @Anonymous that the credit score impact lessens quite at bit at 2 years and fades into the background. On the other hand, I will also say that 30-day lates will affect your score to some degee for the full typical 7-year life. (Of course, 60-day and 90-day lates are much worse, especially the 90's.) I have done Goodwill letters and had mixed results, but it never hurts to try. I'd say go for it! At the same time, don't expect positive results and make sure you word your letters carefully. There are some good examples around the web. Politely explain the circumstances, acknowledge your part in the mistake, and explain what actions you've taken to clear up the situation and prevent a recurrence. Overall, polite and humble is the order of business.
Over the years, I've been slightly late (less than 30 days) more times than I care to admit, but that is mostly from 15 years or more ago. In the "old days" of credit management, it was before you could quickly and easily make electronic payments on a website or through a smart phone app. Snail mail and paper checks was the order of the day. Some cards didn't even take phone payments and if they did, they might charge an extra fee! I was much more cash-strapped back then and even though I had fewer cards to manage, I got burned periodically trying to gauge the "postal float" and had payments arrive a day or three behind. Those didn't show up on my credit reports or affect my scores directly (since they didn't get close to 30-days), but I was assessed late fees and interest charges. Thankfully, lenders would sometimes work with me to reimburse the fees if my payment was only slightly late and it hadn't been a pattern. I'm glad that I've become more responsible but also today, it's also much easier to manage payments.
I've only had a few 30 day lates ever over my 30-plus years of credit, none intentional. The last one was an honest mistake due to a brand-new account and the first statement getting mixed up with junk mail (at my secondary mailing address) before I had set up autopay. So annoying, because that lender refused to be kind and understanding even though I called up right away when I became aware and paid-in-full. No reversal of any fees and declined on multiple attempts to remove from reports, even after I set up autopay, continued to use the card, and established a good payment history to try to rebuild the relationship. It was an impulse credit application at a retail store register to save a few dollars and ended up costing me dearly for the full seven years, which is a main reason I still despise retail store cards and solicitation at checkouts to this day. Much too easy to apply without due forethought, use the card, and then forget about it in the craziness of life.
So my odds on Goodwill letter success have been about 50-50. My last late payment has been aged off my reports for a few years now, and my goal is to not ever have to worry about them again by making sure I'm signed up for autopay, paying balances frequently and early, and monitoring most of my accounts about once a week throughout the month.
Call Discover and add to your Discover it Secured card. You can add up to the limit of $2500. Yours is at the minumum of $200 when you opened the account. As long as your card is at least 31 days old.
I've read that many who have added to their Secured Doscover card, get the graduation to an unsecured not to long after that.
Starting Score: 502That is so funny you say that. I added $800 and 3 days later I graduated!
@UpAndComing74 wrote:That is so funny you say that. I added $800 and 3 days later I graduated!
Congratulations on your graduation!
Great to here! Congrats~