should I add a statement?

[thankfulheart]

I am joint on a mortgage that is my estranged spouse's responsibility. It is my only major negative account left. Would it help me at all, not scorewise, but maybe for future recons, to add a statement that although it is joint, it is his responsibility in our separation agreement?  Or, should I just suck it up and deal for another 2 years until it all falls off (30-150 day lates)?

[Revelate]

I think a better plan would be just to have the seperation paperwork ready for faxing over to whoever you're reconning with honestly.  Legal document >> personal statement of any sort.  

I don't know if statements on one's credit report affect things at all, let alone positively or negatively, but I'm fairly confident that most people don't use them... as a general rule when it comes to lending insitutions (which are all conservative by their very natures) you would prefer to be the needle-in-a-haystack rather than calling additional attention to yourself.  In a happy, positive, optomistic world, a statement would be viewed as valid and therefore beneficial; however, I would suggest that's not where we live and banks are inherently suspicious animals anyway.

[drkaje]

You should probably get divorced to avoid being sued or whatever down the road. That being said, the seperation agreement doesn't affect the mortgage in any way. Not being harsh, but you wouldn't want any ugly surprises in two years like a second mortgage.

[Anonymous]

And the problem with consumer statements is that they can linger long after the derogatory information is gone. Then you have any manual reviewer saying to themselves "Well, I assume there was prior problems." I agree with the posters advice to simply have the paperwork available to fax if there is a reasonable chance that a creditor will accept it.

You have to remember that separation agreements or divorce decrees may assign responsibility to another but do nothing to modify the terms of the loan agreement with an original creditor. The only way to remove your responsibility as far as credit reporting goes is for the mortgage to be refinanced in your spouses name only. And don't worry about second mortgages or equity loans. Unless you sign the paperwork for a new loan you would not have any responsibility simply because your name is on the first mortgage.