i need help getting my score up from mtg lates!

[Anonymous]

pls help!  this is my first post..i need help gettting my scores raised.

 i was at a 770 middle score before 4/07. at that time, i had a 25k equity line on one of my investment properties and i used 5k, but quickly paid off,but unbeknowing to me,left a $5.00 balance when i paid the $5k off before the end of the month. i never recieved anydocumentation from lender, however, 2 mosnth later recived a letter that said the laon was in defautl?, so i quickly contacted and found out that i owed $5.00, and that the lender had reported a 30 and 60 day late on my credit report. after 3 phone calls to lender, they informed me that there was nothign they could do because it wasnt a bank error. anyway, this lowered my score to 620 middle which i currently have...ouch!!

i have only 9 open accounts on my credit reoprt, whcih are all mortgages. i have no revolving accts, and no installment accounts, only mtgs. im a real estate investor and rely heavily on my credit score as i need to apply for mtg loans to buy my homes, therefore this is really killing me right now!

waht can i do to get my credit score up?? any suggestions???

[SmartCookie]

hi and welcome! 

Please start here, even if you think you don't need to, you do.  http://ficoforums.myfico.com/fico/board/message?board.id=ficoscoring&thread.id=2654  

You need to write a GW letter to fix the $5 issue if this was not your fault.  You have since paid, correct?  Take it up the lines at the lender to someone with more ability to fix this. 

You need to get a better mix of credit, starting with a credit card, but with your score where it is, I would try to wait for the GW results first. 

[haulingthescoreup]

Many lenders will tell you that they can't/ it's illegal to remove a notation of a late payment from your credit report. This is not correct. It is illegal to report false information. There is nothing illegal about making a business decision to forgive a customer a late payment, and therefore no longer report it. It's a business decision by a lender not to remove derogatories. It's not the law.

[Anonymous]

im sorry, this might be dumb question , but...what is gw letter?? do you have an example?

basically, this was my fault becasue i left a $5 balance from unpaid interrest that was due on the $5k i originally borrowed and paid off in same month, i jsut didnt realize that i owed, that is waht is the point here. obviously, to this lender and everyone else i would thinnk, that if  i knew i owed $5 , i would have paid, i just thought i had paid the $5k off before end of month and didnt owe any interest. obviously , i was wrong. however, you would think that being that i had perfect credit, never missing a paymetn on any account with them(bank of america) or anyone else EVER on my credit report, with probably over 15 paid as agreed and in full accounts, mostly mtgs., and the fact i have been a bank of america account holder for over 10 yrs, and i keep about $100k in checking/ savings account there, i would get a little better treatment and understanding.who should i tlak to or send letter to at bank of america, the "manager" over the phone denied me any lates  being corrected.

pls help...

[haulingthescoreup]

Abbreviations thread (I'm on Firefox, so you'll have to copy/ paste it into your browser window):

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/fico/board/message?board.id=ficoscoring&thread.id=1325

GW = goodwill letter (or phone call.) It's what you send to a lender, asking them as a gesture of goodwill in a business relationship to remove a derogatory entry such as a late payment from your file.

You can get a lot of help from these forums, but none of it will make any sense if you don't go back and read a lot of the basic stuff here, starting with the link that the previous poster supplied. Since you're a real estate investor, you would really benefit from a thorough understanding of this stuff--it will help you in your financing. GL

[haulingthescoreup]

And yeah, you would think that your great business history with them would count, but welcome to BofA and the new millennium! That's typical, by the way, to have a denial over the phone.

Enter GW or GW letter in the search box at the top left of these pages and brace yourself. Lots of examples--make sure that you look at the ones for lates. When you send yours, include what you said above about your history and all. State that it was your fault, and you should have caught it, and it will never happen again--be reasonably humble, since they've got all the power in this case. If it's denied, keep sending it, tweaking as you go, and hope to just wear them out.

Round 1 was your phone call, which was denied. Now it's round 2! Time to start typing.

[Anonymous]

thanks for the helpful info, i appreciate it....you wouldnt happen to know exactly who i should send letter to at BofA would you? do you have an address for BofA?? sounds as if you have much experiecnce and are very knowledgeable about this stuff and i figured i might try to get an easy answer to this, i wouldnt want to hunt down an address from a statemetn and it be the wrong address to send to, this would defintley get "lost" and be a waste of time....help if you can..

thanks agagin

[haulingthescoreup]

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bbtoy1234 wrote:

thanks for the helpful info, i appreciate it....you wouldnt happen to know exactly who i should send letter to at BofA would you? do you have an address for BofA?? sounds as if you have much experiecnce and are very knowledgeable about this stuff

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No, I just read an awful lot of posts! I've never had to get into it with BofA, thank goodness, but plenty of others have. I don't know if I've seen an address for them--sure don't remember it if I did--but really, I would try typing   BofA address   or some such in the search box.