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I'm on my third round of goodwill letters for five baddies; four settled charge-offs and 2 lates on my mortgage
Settled COs:
Commenity/VS (paid in full after CO in 2018) - was told via phone and FB messenger that they won't take off a charge off
Webbank/Fingerhut (settled for less than full in 2018) - received written notice no removal
Santander Consumer car loan (defaulted on year 5 of a 6 year loan, paid 60% of balance at default in 2018) - written notice no removal
Capital One (settled after 2018 charge-off, last payment was in October of 2020) phone call and written response, no removal
Lates:
Ditech Financial, two lates in early 2018 (unfortunately they are going through bankruptcy so they won't speak with me, they keep referring me to my new bank, which refers me back to Ditech)
I have multiple addresses for each, and have just sent out my second round of letters.
My question is; has anyone found success after multiple attempts? I understand it can't hurt to keep trying, but I'm sending out 15-20 letters at a time, so if it's a waste of time, and there really is no proof saturation works, I would prefer to stop putting in the effort. It tends to be more defeating each time I get a denial.
There are a lot of successes with goodwill but there are many who had no luck. It's truly YMMV. I've seen people get it on the first try and I've seen people try for years. It's rare for an OC such as Comenity to remove a chargeoff but it has happened.
I would say that since you have a number of years before they fall off naturally, it's worth continuing. Some of what might be slowing you down is that these derogs are recent, and creditors may not be in a very benevolent mood so soon after taking a loss.
Are you following the process as outlined in the Goodwill Saturation Technique post by @Anonymous ? He lays out how to adjust the letters based on responses, days to mail letters to increase the odds of different people seeing them, etc. The thread is full of subtleties that you can adopt to maximize your chances.
@Anonymous wrote:There are a lot of successes with goodwill but there are many who had no luck. It's truly YMMV. I've seen people get it on the first try and I've seen people try for years. It's rare for an OC such as Comenity to remove a chargeoff but it has happened.
I would say that since you have a number of years before they fall off naturally, it's worth continuing. Some of what might be slowing you down is that these derogs are recent, and creditors may not be in a very benevolent mood so soon after taking a loss.
Are you following the process as outlined in the Goodwill Saturation Technique post by @Anonymous ? He lays out how to adjust the letters based on responses, days to mail letters to increase the odds of different people seeing them, etc. The thread is full of subtleties that you can adopt to maximize your chances.
I have been sending them on different days of the week, and i've been sending them to any address I can find. I also have changed the letter, but not based on their response, I will go re-read the thread to see what that says.
I did have some luck with two baddies with goodwills. They were both on the first shot, and browsing through all of the threads, it seems like this is the most common story of success. I would love to hear from people who had success on the third or fourth round. Just to give me some motivation to keep sending them.
It can be tough, and of course it's not guaranteed, but I *have* seen a few stories around here of people being persistent with GW letters and finally getting results after months, some even after about a year or so.
Yes, keep doing it.
When send out my goodwill, I noted that all of issues were around a certain time, explained why and what I have done to correct. I am also trying to get a home soon, so I noted that in my letter and literally ask for them to support my goal to get my son a home.
I have also sent Thank You cards, too. I just happen to have a stack, so why not.
@CyberChick wrote:Yes, keep doing it.
When send out my goodwill, I noted that all of issues were around a certain time, explained why and what I have done to correct. I am also trying to get a home soon, so I noted that in my letter and literally ask for them to support my goal to get my son a home.
I have also sent Thank You cards, too. I just happen to have a stack, so why not.
Thank you cards is a great idea! Thanks for the motivation ![]()