Pestman you are well ahead of me when I started. I was one of those you thought once you file BK you are sentenced to debtors prison for the next ten years. The most important thing is to maintain agood payment history on your current accounts, now on to your questions:
How do you get tax liens to show "satisfied" or paid on reports? Dispute it with the credit bureau. You should have received some sort of documentation that the lein was paid off or satified. Include it. A friend of mine simply called the IRS and was sent a letter and a copy was sent to the bureaus and it was updated immediately
Other than the credit cards, we are not going to carry any other loans. Good idea?
One thing the Fico system dings you on is having a good 'mix' of credit. Once you get back into 'desirable' range again, try adding some installment bank loans but stay away from finance companies.
Our plan is to buy another house in 18-24 months with 20% down payment.
Wishful thinking, or possible? Very possible. Most lenders required you to be two years out of bankruptcy before they will touch you. You will need to give good cause for the BK as well as a copy of the court papers so that they can see eveything that was included but if you have scores of 620 or above you are still in prime lending territory.
