My Credit Issues

[chints]

Hey guys,
Wow its so inspirational just to go through so many stories of how people built their credit,it gives me hope that I can do it too. Mine is a sad story, I have been wandering in the mid 500's to upper 500s from the last 3 years 2005 was a very bad year for our family financially and it pretty much screwed our credit big time.

Heres how my credit report reads:

Collection Account(medical) -This was just sooo unfortunate that this got reported after 8 years!!!!(I had to go to emergency room during college days and the collection agency couldnt find me as I moved since) reported on 02/01/2008, paid it off the same week. Now it says "Paid".

These below 3 accounts are for the same creditor:
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 - Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid

Collection Account - reported in 2005 -paid
Collection Account - reported in 2005 -utilities - paid
Collection Account(medical) -reported in 2005 -Paid


AMEX - CLosed in 2001 - says NO DATA
Citibank Creditcard- collection account - paid
Citibank Creditcard2- collection account - paid

Honda Financial - Charge off -reported in 2005 - Paid
Auto Loan1- Closed-Paid on time- No delays
Auto Loan2 - Currently Paying on time - No delays

Capital one credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card2 - Current - 3 30 day delays
New Mill Bank Credit card - Current - No delays





Balances on credit cards more than 50%. Do you guys see any hope for me

[Anonymous]

I would dispute with the cra's that first medical account. Collections are only supposed to show on rpt for  7 yrs. They re-reported after fall of date. Account may have been re-aged which is against the law.

The other collections and the Honda charge off send goodwill letters to the original creditors asking to have info removed.

PAY your cc balances down, preferably to under 10% utilization, both total and individual. You also want no more than 50% of your cc to report a balance. You can use them just pay in full before balance reports.

The collections and charge offs are what is killing your score. Work on getting them off your rpt.

[Anonymous]

chints wrote:
Hey guys,
Wow its so inspirational just to go through so many stories of how people built their credit,it gives me hope that I can do it too. Mine is a sad story, I have been wandering in the mid 500's to upper 500s from the last 3 years 2005 was a very bad year for our family financially and it pretty much screwed our credit big time.

Heres how my credit report reads:

Collection Account(medical) -This was just sooo unfortunate that this got reported after 8 years!!!!(I had to go to emergency room during college days and the collection agency couldnt find me as I moved since) reported on 02/01/2008, paid it off the same week. Now it says "Paid".

These below 3 accounts are for the same creditor:
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 - Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid

Collection Account - reported in 2005 -paid
Collection Account - reported in 2005 -utilities - paid
Collection Account(medical) -reported in 2005 -Paid


AMEX - CLosed in 2001 - says NO DATA

Do you remember if this is a good account or a charged off account?

Citibank Creditcard- collection account - paid
Citibank Creditcard2- collection account - paid

Honda Financial - Charge off -reported in 2005 - Paid
Auto Loan1- Closed-Paid on time- No delays
Auto Loan2 - Currently Paying on time - No delays

Capital one credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card2 - Current - 3 30 day delays
New Mill Bank Credit card - Current - No delays





Balances on credit cards more than 50%. Do you guys see any hope for me

What is DOFD? Accounts will remain 7-7.5 years from that date. If the account that just reported in January is 8 years old, it is past CRTP and you need to dispute it as obsolete.

As the other poster said, send GW letters for paid collections and hope they'll remove.

High balances on CCs do kill your score from what I've read(i have no cc). If you can pay the balances down it might give you a good boost in your score.

What is your average age of accounts and how old is your oldest account? If you oldest account is one of the paid collections, you may not want to do anything with it, as your score will take a hit if you lose account age.

Do you have a lot of inquiries?

Other than continuing to pay on time, GW the paid collections, and paying your balances down, not a lot else you can do since everything else is paid.

[chints]

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@Anonymous wrote:

@chints wrote:
Hey guys,
Wow its so inspirational just to go through so many stories of how people built their credit,it gives me hope that I can do it too. Mine is a sad story, I have been wandering in the mid 500's to upper 500s from the last 3 years 2005 was a very bad year for our family financially and it pretty much screwed our credit big time.

Heres how my credit report reads:

Collection Account(medical) -This was just sooo unfortunate that this got reported after 8 years!!!!(I had to go to emergency room during college days and the collection agency couldnt find me as I moved since) reported on 02/01/2008, paid it off the same week. Now it says "Paid".

These below 3 accounts are for the same creditor:
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 - Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid
Collection Account(medical) - reported in 2005 -Paid

Collection Account - reported in 2005 -paid
Collection Account - reported in 2005 -utilities - paid
Collection Account(medical) -reported in 2005 -Paid


AMEX - CLosed in 2001 - says NO DATA

Do you remember if this is a good account or a charged off account?

Citibank Creditcard- collection account - paid
Citibank Creditcard2- collection account - paid

Honda Financial - Charge off -reported in 2005 - Paid
Auto Loan1- Closed-Paid on time- No delays
Auto Loan2 - Currently Paying on time - No delays

Capital one credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card - Current - No delays
HSBC Credit card2 - Current - 3 30 day delays
New Mill Bank Credit card - Current - No delays





Balances on credit cards more than 50%. Do you guys see any hope for me

What is DOFD? Accounts will remain 7-7.5 years from that date. If the account that just reported in January is 8 years old, it is past CRTP and you need to dispute it as obsolete.

As the other poster said, send GW letters for paid collections and hope they'll remove.

High balances on CCs do kill your score from what I've read(i have no cc). If you can pay the balances down it might give you a good boost in your score.

What is your average age of accounts and how old is your oldest account? If you oldest account is one of the paid collections, you may not want to do anything with it, as your score will take a hit if you lose account age.

Do you have a lot of inquiries?

Other than continuing to pay on time, GW the paid collections, and paying your balances down, not a lot else you can do since everything else is paid.

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The AMEX was a charged off account(It doesnt say anything like that on the report though). The average age of accounts is 3 years(2005). I also noticed that one account(the citibank credit card account) is shown twice as collection account(not reported to third party collections), can I dispute that?

[Anonymous]

chints wrote:

The AMEX was a charged off account(It doesnt say anything like that on the report though). The average age of accounts is 3 years(2005). I also noticed that one account(the citibank credit card account) is shown twice as collection account(not reported to third party collections), can I dispute that?

I personally don't know if the Amex is helping/hurting because it doesn't say anything or not.

Someone else might be able to advise you on that.

Somewhere it should show the age of your oldest account, not just the average age of accounts.

If your oldest account is deleted, your average age of accounts will decrease.

Make sure that the citibank card showing twice is not being reported by Citibank and Citibank's own collection department.

I think it is ok for them to do that.........not sure.

I do know that my friend has a HSBC card that is listed by HSBC and then by their collection department. And a JCPenney card doing the same.

[chints]

When do the credit card companies report balances? Say on my HSBC I have a balance of $500(my credit limit is $500), my statement date is 2/20/2008 and my due date is 3/16/2008, if I pay the complete balance on 3/3/3008, will it immediately reflect on my next credit report pull(say 3/6/2008) or will it be reported on next statement date which is 3/20/2008? Basically I am trying to find out a way that I can use credit cards at the sametime pay it off so it wont show any high balances on my credit report.

[Anonymous]

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chints wrote:
When do the credit card companies report balances? Say on my HSBC I have a balance of $500(my credit limit is $500), my statement date is 2/20/2008 and my due date is 3/16/2008, if I pay the complete balance on 3/3/3008, will it immediately reflect on my next credit report pull(say 3/6/2008) or will it be reported on next statement date which is 3/20/2008? Basically I am trying to find out a way that I can use credit cards at the sametime pay it off so it wont show any high balances on my credit report.

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It varies with each card issuer. Best way to know is to call the card issuer and ask what day of each month they report to the CRAs.