Credit Score/Report Advice Please

[Anonymous]

Hello All, I am in my late 20's...while I was in college made alot of poor credit decisions which lead to charged off credit card accounts. After that period ended, I have paid EVERYTHING on time and have no negative credit items come onto my report.

I currently have a credit score in the mid 600's (ouch). I have an auto loan that I have been paying on time since it was started which is a year and a half now. I co-signed for my sisters auto loan and every payment there has always been on time for over 2 years and counting. I have student loans that when I first came out of school had some trouble with(about 6 years ago) but after that I consolidated them and have been paying them every month on time for a good 5 years.

I also have 2 credit cards, one of which I owe about $100 and it has a $200 limit, the other I owe about $700 with a $1500 limit. Both of those have been maintained on time every month since they were opened.

This old debt seems to be haunting me. I recently pulled my free annual credit reports from all 3 agencies. Out of the 11 negative items on my reports, 8(all credit card related) of them are estimated to come off next year. And no I did not have 11 credit cards, more like 3, but I guess each time the debt is sold to another collector it just adds the item to my report. The total amount is around $2,700. I'm not really in the position to pay this off b/c if I do I could risk falling behind with the active accounts that I have been working hard to keep current.

I am not planning on making any home or other major purchases within the next few years or so unless I hit the lotto. I was wondering when the items come off my report how much could that possibly raise my score from the 650's if everything else is good? Also in the future when I plan to purchase a home and these items are not on my report, could they still haunt me in the home buying process? Also I was thinking of re-financing my auto loan, should I wait til next year after these items are removed? I know this is alot of info, please let me know if I posted in the wrong forum. Thanks for reading.

[Anonymous]

If you applied and received credit in NC and then defaulted then they SOL on CCs (open accounts) is 3 years from DOFD. They will remain on your CR until CRTP which is approx 7 years from DOFD.

You can have 1 OC and 1 CA report the same collection BUT you can not have 2 CA report the same collection.

Keep hard copies of all 3 CBs (CRs) forever. If a CA starts reporting a collection past CRTP you can use the old CR to get them deleted.

All baddies age and delete 7 years froom that date.(late payments)

If your collections are past SOL and you want to pay then first send a DV along with the Past SOL letter. If they answer then send a PFD. Never pay withoud a PFD!

All collections must delete at the same time as the OC.

Yor CC  UTIL is way to high. Always keep then below 10% for best scores.

IMO everyone should have at least 3 CCs as they count more toward scores then any installment.

You will see a score increase when the collections delete. How much of an increase has to do with when they last reported and weather the amount is counting into your UTIL.

To keep junk buyers from buying old collections I would go to the CRs and opt-out. This way the CRAs can not farm out this info.

 If these are to drop well before you look for any large purchase I would leave them along and let them drop.

I would not refi the auto loan unless you are pretty sure that you would get a better int rate.If you do refi then you will lose a few points and then gain them back when the new loan starts reporting. All new credit is concsidered new for 1 year.

Late pays drop 7 years from the date that you were late. lates hurt less as they age also.