Getting started!

[Anonymous]

Hello. My name is Krystina. I am 26 and I have awful credit history. I owe on an old cell phone bill, an old power bill, an old cable bill, and many medical bills. I have student loans that are currently deferred so I haven't done much with them and they aren't showing negative(I don't think). My credit score is in the high 400s. I would like to purchase a home in the next few years and after seeing how bad my score is, I realize that I need to address this in order to make my dreams of homeownership possible. I am looking to start credit repair(myself; no company) in January and am thinking that PFD is the way to go. I have about 6k in debt and have most of that in savings so I think that would be the route to go. Should I send out any DVs if I know that I owe the debts or should I just go ahead and send out PFDs? I have an unsecured CC from Capital One and also a secured credit card from them that should be arriving anyday but I'm not going to spend more than 5% on it and then I will pay it off the next month. I hope this will help my score. I am almost maxed out on the unsecured and have paid the minimum most months but I know I should really just pay it off and then keep my spending on it way low and pay it in full each month to help boost my score. I also don't see the DOFD on the credit reports but I did see a date opened date on there. I am not applying for anymore cards(mainly because I don't need anymore debt and can't get approved anyways). I have a car loan that I have always paid on time that will be paid in 2013 and am wondering if it will help my score since I don't even see it showing on the report. Some of the medical collections are from the same place and I'm wondering if I will need to send a PFD for each entry even if its going to the same place? Thanks so much for your time and help.

[Anonymous]

You need to list it out, then we'll help you where to start. 

[Shogun]

Hello and welcome to the forums.

First of congrats on the decision to take control of your finances.  Let's start at the beginning.  Where did you get your CRs from?  Did you go to www.annualcreditreport.com and pull them from there?  This is the free federally mandated place to get your CR free once a year, it's not one of those supposed free ones that charge you for services.  Don't pay extra for the scores though, their FAKOS and you don't need them

Now once you have those, EQ will list the DOFD and TU and EX will give you the date that it is expected to be removed from your CR, just backdate 7 years from that for your DOFD.  Now once you have those, they will be more accurate, you will have a better understanding of where to go.

Let us know if we can help with anything, it's kind of what we live for, LOL.  Best of luck to you!

[Anonymous]

Thanks guys. I have my experian report and I pulled them all from annualcreditreport.com but it doesn't show my dofd. For a collection account that I never paid at all, how would I know? When it first went late and unpaid? Here's a snippet from my report. So I am guessing that the dofd would be from september 2011. I'm going to look at my other reports when I get home tonight. I got my equifax earlier this year and doubt I will be able to open it back up again. I guess I could pay for it and check it out again to compare the three. Some accounts don't show on some of my reports.

Status: Collection account. $69  past due as of Nov 2011.
Date Opened: 09/2011 Date of Status: 11/2011 Reported Since: 11/2011 Last Reported Date: 11/2011	Type: Collection Terms: 1 Months Monthly Payment: $0 Responsibility: Individual	Credit Limit: $69 High Balance: N/A Recent Balance: $69 Recent Payment: $0

[Shogun]

Experian and Transunion will not list a DOFD, only Equifax will show that.  TU and EX will list the date this will be excluded from your report.  Not all creditors post to all 3 of the CRAs, plus information gets lost, misreported, etc.  That's why we're here!